Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

“I’ve been having these weird thoughts lately. Like is any of this for real, or not?”

Sora was sinking to the bottom of the ocean. Very slowly, but still sinking nonetheless. Despite being in the ocean though, he wasn’t drowning. In fact, the water never touched his body. It was like he was floating down from the heavens.

Slowly but surely, he began to pick up speed. It eventually got to the point where he felt he was torpedoing to the dark abyss below him. He closed his eyes, dreading the eventual collision with the bottom.

Suddenly, the rushing feeling stopped. Sora slowly opened his eyes, only to find that he was no longer in the ocean, but on an island. Sora recognized this island. This was one of the islands comprising the Destiny Islands, his home. Specifically, this was the island that he and his friends would hang out and play. Speaking of his friends…

Sora could see a figure standing by the shore. It took awhile due to the sun getting into his eyes, but he recognized him. It was Riku, his oldest friend and one of his closest. At this moment, he seemed to be staring out onto the horizon. This made sense to Sora. Riku always did want to leave the islands and see what lied beyond the horizon…

It was at this moment that Sora noticed the water was receding. That wouldn’t be a cause of worry normally, but it had never receded that far before. Something caught Sora’s eye in the distance and he saw that a ginormous wave was being formed.

Realizing what was going to happen, Sora ran to Riku to warn him about the oncoming wave. He seemed to catch his attention as Riku turned around. But he didn’t get out of the way. Instead he stood still and raised his hand toward Sora as a sinister grin formed on his face. Sora ignored the malevolent nature that his friend suddenly gained and reached out his hand as well. The wave hit them before either of their hands could touch.

Sora was being swept away by the current of the wave. He could barely make out the shape of Riku as it unmovingly plummeted towards the briny bottom. He tried to swim towards his friend, but the current was too strong. He was starting to run out of breath. He swam to the surface...

It was morning when the wave consumed him. It was now dusk. Sora didn't notice the sudden change in weather but he did notice another of his friends at the shore. Kairi was waving for him to come over. And he did, his worry for Riku fading away.
But when he got to her, Kairi started to look past him. Sora turned his head and saw...

Himself.

A lot of himself.

Duplicates of Sora were falling down from the sky like a meteor shower. Sora stared at this in disbelief. How the hell was this possible? His head was starting to feel woozy. He fell backwards and now... he was one of the comets. He was too unconscious to question anything at this point.

When he woke up, he found himself in some sort of dark void. He looked down and noticed he was standing on a circular platform with a top of stained glass. A young woman was depicted on the stained glass. She had short black hair and wore a black dress with a red cloak attached. She appeared to be holding some sort of mechanical red scythe. Her eyes were closed as if she was asleep. Towards her head was a circle containing seven smaller circles, but due to how the woman was positioned, only four of them were visible. Each of them detailed another person, three of them were female, one with long black hair and cat ears, one with silver hair in a ponytail and one with long yellow hair, and the fourth one was male with graying hair and some stubble. Behind her was a giant white castle.

“So much to do, and so little time.”

Sora looked around. There was no one else with him so who was speaking to him? It was a male voice with a british accent but there was something off about it. He could hear the voice and how it sounded but he also heard silence at the same time.

“It’s okay, mate. Take your time. Don’t be afraid. The door is still locked.”

The door is still locked? What door? Despite all the questions rattling around in his mind, Sora felt calm. Like he was able to understand all of it.

“Now step forward. Can you do it?”

Sora moved his legs till he reached the middle. For some reason, this felt like a good place to stop for him.

Suddenly, three pedestals appeared around Sora. Each contained a different object. The leftmost pedestal had a sword, the middle had a staff and the rightmost had a shield. Something Sora noticed was each weapon had the same symbol, an angular heart, etched into them.

“Power sleeps within you. If you give it form, it can give you strength. Choose well.”

So it seemed that Sora would have to choose only one of the three items to wield. But which one should he pick? He noticed that there was writing on the pillars. He checked the one under the sword.

“The power of the Warrior. Invincible courage. A sword of terrible destruction.”

He then checked the one under the staff.

“The power of the Mystic. Inner strength. A staff of wonder and ruin.”

And finally he checked the one under the shield.

“The power of the Guardian. Kindness to aid friends. A shield to repel all.”

It seems that each weapon has its detriments as well as benefits. But what would Sora choose?

He decided to pick the sword. Not only does the promise of Invincible Courage sound promising, he trained with a sword before albeit a wooden one. Though as soon as he touched it, it vanished as if it was never there.

“Now, what are you willing to give up in exchange?”

The brunette looked at the two remaining weapons. He wanted to protect his friends so he won’t give up the power of the Guardian. So he went to touch the staff and just like last time, the staff vanished.

“The path is set.”

The pedestals and shield then crumbled away to dust. Unfortunately for Sora, that was not the only thing that was crumbling. The platform itself started to fade away. With nowhere to go, Sora just stood on the platform until he eventually fell into the darkness.

As he was falling, his mind was racing. How deep is this void? Is there even an end to it?

His fears of him falling endlessly in the darkness were alleviated by the sight of another platform entering his field of vision. This platform had a sleeping girl as the main focus, just like with the last one. The girl had short hair as well but unlike the previous girl hers was blue. In fact, all of her clothes were blue from her scarf to her sweatshirt to her leggings. The only thing she wore that wasn’t blue was her pink tinted glasses. She also had circles depicting other people near her head, though she only had three. One was a man with orange hair and some hair on his chin and another was a dog with tiny gold glasses and a collar with a question mark on it. As for the third circle, its original image was barely recognizable as a giant crater covered it up. Surrounding the girl were simplistic looking pink ghosts with yellow hearts at their center. A spooky looking mansion was seen behind her.

Sora’s falling slowed down the closer he got to the platform to the point where he harmlessly floated to its surface. As soon as he touched down, the voice spoke again.

“Now that you’ve chosen your power, use it to protect your friends.”

Protect his friends? From what?

As if to answer his question, black shapes began forming on the surface of the platform. They were small black creatures with crooked antennae on their heads and large soulless yellow eyes. These…Shadows seem to be eyeing Sora as a predator would its prey.

“There will be times where fighting is necessary. Keep your light burning strong.”

It was at this point that one of the Shadows lunged at Sora. Out of instinct, the brunette made a slashing motion even though there was nothing in his hands. Or at least, that was the case, as the sword that he picked earlier materialized in his hand as he slashed the Shadow, causing it to dissolve into harmless black mist. Sora didn’t have the time to gawk at his weapon’s sudden appearance for every second is crucial when fighting for your life.

He continued slashing at the monsters. He was rather good at sword-play, thanks to all the play fights he and Riku had. He had slain most of them when a new swarm rose from the ground. They caught the brunette off guard, quickly surrounding him, blocking his vision…

And suddenly they weren’t. Suddenly he was back on Destiny Islands, this time at the tree house instead of the beach. Soon a familiar voice reached his ears.

“Hold on, mate. The door won’t open just yet. First, tell me more about yourself.”

Normally, when he would hear that voice, no one was there. This time, three people were standing in front of him, though none were the source of the voice. Two of their identities are unknown to Sora. One of them was a girl who looked a few years Sora’s junior. She had brown curly hair with multicolored stars in it, freckles and a bear-themed hoodie. She also appeared to be of African-American descent. The other was a woman in her late-20s. She had long blonde hair where a daisy resided. She wore a green shirt and blue shorts. The third, however, he recognized. It was Kairi. Because he was the most familiar with her, Sora headed to her first.

“What do you want out of life?”

The question startled Sora for numerous reasons. First, who the hell begins a conversation like that? Second, it was how she said it. Her voice no longer had the playful quality that Sora remembered. Instead it sounded emotionless and yet caring at the same time.

As for the question, Sora considered it for a minute. Then he gave his answer. “I want to see rare sights.” It was always a dream of his to see what lay beyond the islands. In fact, it was thanks to Kairi that he had the desire in the first place.

“To see rare sights, huh?”

And then she vanished without a trace. Sora looked around to see if he could spot her, but the only two people in his field of vision were the two other women. He had a gut feeling that he had to talk to them as well. So he walked to the girl in the bear hoodie.

“What are you so afraid of?”

Another personal question, just like Kairi, and in the same monotonous yet caring tone. Unlike with the last question, Sora had to think about his answer for a moment. What did he fear the most? It wasn’t something he thought about. Eventually, he gave the answer of “I’m afraid of getting old.” It was a cliche answer, but one that felt right for him.

“Getting old? Is it really that scary?”

And she vanished as well. This meant that the woman with the flower in her hand was the last person to be talked to. Sora walked up to her.

“What’s most important to you?”

Another question was asked. This time, Sora didn’t have to think for a while, instead having an answer almost immediately. “My friends. They are what’s most important to me.”

“Is friendship really that important?”

And then she, like the rest, vanished with the voice piping up once more.

“As long as the sun keeps shining, your journey should be a pleasant one. But the day you open the door is both far off and very near.”

Suddenly, the islands were enveloped by a blinding light, forcing Sora to close his eyes. When he opened them, he found himself on another platform. It depicted a girl with blonde hair in a Puritan-era maid outfit. She looked mostly human, but there were some distinct features on her that suggested otherwise. She had a mouth too wide for a normal human and her limbs were like those of a crab. She was sleeping like the other girls. Four circles surrounded her. Two of them contained normal humans in cowboy attire, one was a man with a mischievous look on his face, the other was a woman who looked slightly bored or at the very least uninterested. The other two contained monsters in them. One of them was a rotting creature that vaguely resembled a pterodactyl and the other looked like a living cloak with rows of sharp teeth inside. Behind her, a foreboding forest next to some train tracks.

There weren’t any questions to ask or monsters to beat on this platform, instead there was only a stain-glass staircase leading up to another platform and a green light off to the side. Sora felt drawn to the light, like someone would be drawn to a fire after spending hours in the cold. When he stepped in the light, two things happened. One, his exhaustion from his fight with the Shadows quickly faded away. And two, the voice returned.

“In some areas, you won’t need to resort to fighting in order to progress. Use these safe havens to rest up before continuing on your journey.”

With that, the light vanished, leaving Sora’s only option to head up the floating steps.

Halfway up the stairs, he heard a shattering sound. The brunette turned around and saw that the steps were being destroyed one by one. Not fast enough to force him to move faster, but it told him that there was no turning back at this point. By the time he made it to the platform, the stairs were gone.

The platform had yet another sleeping girl depicted on it. She had long black hair with a red streak in it. Like the previous girl, there were some features that indicated her as not quite human like her wolf ears and tail. She wore a black dress with white leggings. She had the least amount of circles surrounding her, having only two. Both contained women with white hair, one with wolf ears and another with a oni mask covering one of her eyes. In the background was a shrine.

“I must warn you, the closer you get to the light, the greater your shadow becomes.”

Sora noticed that the voice’s tone changed, sounding more foreboding and a little panicked. What he didn’t notice was his shadow gained a life of its own.

It rose from the ground just like the Shadows did, but then it changed. It started to grow gargantuan and its features began to distort. Its face began to elongate to the point where it barely had a resemblance to the brunette. Its spiky hair became a tangled mess of tendrils. A heart-shaped hole began to form in its stomach and its feet became pointed and jagged. Wings grew on its back but they were too puny and small to allow the shadow to fly due to its sheer size.

Sora turned around to see the monster his shadow became - a Darkside. The voice spoke to him again, but he was too scared to understand the entirety of what it said. The only words he caught were “But don’t be afraid” and “And don’t forget.”

The Darkside slammed its fist down at Sora, attempting to crush the boy. Sora managed to get out of the way before any damage befell him. He took this chance to strike the monster’s hand before noticing Shadows forming behind him. Unlike last time, he didn’t let them overpower him, destroying them as they attempted to pounce on him.

The monster leaned back as an orb began to form in its chest. Once it got big enough, it shot out of its chest, knocking Sora back and causing his sword to vanish.

Being left without a weapon to defend himself from the Darkside was not the only thing that the brunette had to fear, as a dark mess formed around him, causing him to sink into it. He tried to struggle out of it, but that only caused him to sink quicker.

And the void consumed him, he heard the voice one last time, repeating what it said earlier to him.

“But don’t be afraid because you hold the mightiest weapon of all, and don't forget - you will be the one who will open the door.”

Chapter Text

Sora opened his eyes to see nothing but blue skies. 

He sat up and looked around and saw that he was on the shores of Destiny Islands and not on a stained glass platform. He was confused, what happened? The last thing he remembered was being swallowed by darkness, so shouldn’t he be trapped in a dark void?

Suddenly it dawned on him. What he just experienced was nothing more than a bizarre dream. How else could you explain everything that happened to him? Satisfied with this answer, Sora leaned back so he could continue his nap.

Or he would have, if the sight of Kairi looming over him hadn’t scared the shit out of him.

“Gyah!” he yelled, shooting back up. He turned around to see Kairi giggling at the shock she gave him. “C’mon Kairi, don’t do that! You nearly gave me a heart attack.”

“Sora, I’ve never seen this much on edge before. Could it be I scared you that much, you lazy bum?” the red-haired girl teased.

“No, it wasn’t you - mostly, it was this dream I had! There were these shadowy monsters, and there was this voice and…” As Sora was attempting to explain his dream to Kairi, he felt his memories of it slipping away and was having trouble remembering any details until eventually, the most he could remember were scraps. “I - I can’t remember,” he admitted.

“Are you telling me you went all the way to the shore to nap and couldn’t even get a memorable dream? Man, you’re lazy even in your sleep.” teased Kairi playfully.

Sora smiled and giggled. Though the remarks were aimed at him, Sora knew that Kairi would never be intentionally hurtful with her teasing.

A voice manages to catch both of their attentions. “You didn’t forget about me, did you?” They both turn around and see Riku carrying a log above his shoulder. “I thought I was going to be the only one working on the raft.”

“No, we wouldn’t forget that, right Sora?” asked Kairi, looking towards her spiky-haired friend as she did.

“Not at all.” said Sora. How could he? After all, they spent months planning this. The necessary use of transportation, the materials needed to make it, and the supplies to bring aboard. Pretty soon, they would be able to use the raft to visit worlds.

“See, we haven’t forgotten about it.” reassured Kairi. “In fact, I was just going to get Sora to help look for the materials for the raft.”

“That’s good.” replied the silver haired teen as he sat down on the sandy shore and placed the log down. “Well, I’m finding the logs to make it. That means that you two have to find the cloth for the sail and the rope to tie it all together. Both of those will probably be in the treehouse.” As he said that, Riku turned and pointed at the treehouse.

“On it!” Kairi turned her head to face Sora. “C’mon, I’ll race you!” Sora, Riku and Kairi have always had a competitive nature about them, somehow being able to turn a simple task into a race or a challenge. Not being one to turn down a challenge, Sora raced after her.

Due to his recent rest, Sora was energized enough to make it to the treehouse first, with Kairi following suit shortly afterward. The brunette walked into the treehouse to grab the cloth covering the window while the redhead looked for a rope outside on the deck.

As Sora attempted to pull off the cloth without accidentally tearing it (a sail is no good if there’s a hole in it.), he turned his head to face Kairi. “Hey, Kairi, what was your hometown like?” He figured it was important to ask in case they come across it in their world-traveling. After all, it was Kairi’s arrival in some sort of futuristic pod that got Sora and Riku interested in visiting other worlds in the first place.

This question made her freeze momentarily, as if it took by surprise. After a few seconds, she answered with a wistful “I don’t remember anything besides these islands.”

“Nothing at all.”

“No, nothing.”

At this moment, Sora stopped trying to take the cloth off. His expression became slightly remorseful. “Do you ever want to go back, if you could?”

“Yeah, I would like to visit if I could, but honestly?” She turned to face Sora with a smile on her face. “I’m glad that I ended up on these islands. Otherwise, I wouldn’t have met you and Riku.”

“I would like to see it too, along with all the other worlds out there.” said the brunette. “I wanna see them all!”

“Well, we’ll just have to go see them then,” said Kairi. Suddenly, she saw something out of the corner of her eye. She turned to look at it and when she saw what it was, reached down and picked it up. “I found the rope, Sora! Have you taken down the cloth yet?”

Upon Kairi’s asking, Sora remembers what he came up here for. He finished taking off the cloth. Thankfully, the cloth didn’t get torn when we took it off. “Yep! Cloth’s taken care of!” he shouted.

“Good. We should let Riku know that we’re done.” suggested Kairi. “Of course,” said Sora. “I’ll be with you shortly.”

With that, Kairi made her way down the tree house and to the shore. Sora made sure to roll up the cloth nicely, then hold it under his arms. Before Sora made his way down, he looked at the horizon. There were many worlds out there, and soon he was going to be able to visit them all. To say that Sora was excited to see other worlds would be an understatement.

- - - 

Far away from Destiny Islands, stood a world the size of a medium-sized asteroid. This world was originally uninhabited but then roughly 10 years ago, the world became populated. Its new inhabitants fled to this world because their previous homeworld had been destroyed. The asteroid was originally nameless, but its new occupants gave it the name of New L’manberg.

Most of New L’manberg’s citizens lived within the walls of an obsidian colored fortress. One of them was the president of the world, a man by the name of Tobias Smith. He was a man in his mid-20s sporting a green suit with epaulets on his shoulders. He was also a brunette. Parts of his body have been marked with some scarring, though a decade has passed since they first appeared so they don’t appear as bad as they once did. Currently, Toby was looking through letters and paperwork. Due to this being the most boring part of the job, his body was on auto-drive as it speed-read through it all. But one letter managed to catch his attention. Its appearance was that of a regular envelope, but what caught his attention was the seal. He recognized that angular heart anywhere - it was Phil’s emblem. That instantly made it priority number one. Toby opened the envelope and read its contents.

“Dear Toby -

It has recently come to my attention that some stars are unnaturally blinking out, one by one. Since each star is in fact its own world, the fact that they are vanishing like this means that something is wrong. I’m going to go check it out but there is something you can help with.

There is someone out there with this key. That key will be the key to our survival. You and Tommy need to go find him and stick by him. But first, you’ll need to go to a world called Traverse Town. There, you will go and meet an old friend of mine by the name of Scythe Cyvotix. He’ll help point you to where the Key should be.

- Signed, Philza Watson”

Toby stared at the letter, rereading it again and again. He and Phil didn’t see each other often, in fact, he last saw him when he helped regroup the former L’manbergians to their new home. He knew that Philza wouldn’t write unless it was important, but he never knew it would be about something on as big of a scale as this. The stress of this new information was being to pile onto him.

But he shortly managed to calm himself down. He realized that he didn’t need to worry about all the new information all at once - he just has to take things one step at a time. First things first - the letter mentioned that he and Tommy would need to find this ‘Keybearer’. So logically, the first step should be to find him and tell him about the letter. And with that, Toby left his office to search for his friend. It took a while but once he heard a familiar song, he followed it to its source where Tommy was.

Tommy was in his mid-20s like Toby was and he was blonde. The top half of his clothes were mainly armor with a ivory cuirass and shoulderpads over a red shirt whilst the bottom half is more casual, being a pair of tan jeans and white shoes with the only piece of armor covering them was a pair of scarlet knee guards.

Currently, he was sitting down under the shade of a tree planted in the garden next to a record player listening to his favorite track - a slow melancholy-like waltz filled the garden. To him, the song was calming, separating his focus from the rest of the world whenever he listened to it. He was so enticed by the music that didn’t hear his friend calling his name. In fact, he didn’t notice his presence until…

SLAP!

Toby had to slap his friend in order to get his attention. And any person who has been slapped, Tommy was not happy about it. “Toby, what the fuck was that for?” he yelled.

“Sorry, it was the only way I could get your attention.” his friend apologized.

“You could’ve just turned the music off.” Tommy retorted, gesturing to the record player. 

Toby rubbed his head in embarrassment as he realized that he could’ve turned it off instead of slapping him but with all of what he just learned, that possibility wasn’t on his mind. “Tommy, there’s something important that I want to talk to you about. I haven’t told anyone else about it yet.” he said, quickly changing the subject.

“You haven’t?” Tommy asked, seemingly confused as he turned the music off. “Not even to them?” he said, pointing and looking behind Toby.

This caused the brunette to turn around and ,to his shock, saw three people standing behind him, all friends of him and Tommy. One of them, Ranboo, was a tall humanoid creature with half of his natural body being obsidian black, the other being ivory white. His eyes were different colors as well, the left one being green and the right one being red. He was wearing a black suit with a purple fur coat draped over his shoulders and a thin short gold crown around his head. Another one, Fundy, was an anthropomorphic fox in a black coat and donning a black hat. The third one was a human named Jack Manifold. He wore a blue shirt and gray pants. He also had a shaved head and like Ranboo had different colored eyes, though one was blue and one was red. Ranboo and Fundy were looking confused, whilst Jack had his arms crossed and he looked at them expectantly.

“How did you know I would be here?” asked the president. He thought that nobody would notice this yet, and planned on waiting to tell the citizens of New L’manberg once he figured out a plan.

“You ran out of your office in a hurry.” says Ranboo. “You weren’t exactly discreet about it.”

Being discreet. Just another thing that Toby forgot in his panic.

“C’mon, Toby. Spill the beans. What is this important thing you were going to tell Tom?” asked Jack.

Toby sighed. “I was going to tell you guys about this later. But since you're all here, I might as well tell you now.” And with that, he pulled out the letter Phil gave him and read its contents aloud.

- - - 

By the time that the raft finished being built, the sun was starting to set. Sora, Riku and Kairi had all done their part and now they were relaxing at their usual spot; a tree with yellow, star-shaped fruit that grew sideways instead of straight up. Sora and Kairi were sitting on the tree(well, Kairi was sitting, Sora was laying down) while Riku leaned on it with his arms crossed as all three watched the sunset.

The silence was interrupted by a question that Kairi asked. “Do you think that my home is still out there?”

“It could be.” responded the silver-haired teen. “But we would never know if we stay here.”

Like his friends, Sora was excited for their upcoming adventure. But like what happens before most trips into unknown territory, twinges of doubt began to form in his mind. “Could the raft really take us to other worlds?” he asked, worried that all their plans could end up being for naught.

“I’m not sure,” said Riku. His voice was one of confidence instead of worry. “If not, we’ll probably figure out some other way. If the urban legend with that kid leaving was true, then there is definitely a way out.”

“Suppose we do get to another world. What would we do there?” asked Kairi. The question was not out of worry, but of curiosity instead.

“I haven’t really thought about that.” admitted Riku. “It’s just…I’ve always wondered why we’re here on this island.” As Riku was talking, Sora moved his hands to be behind his head. If there are any other worlds besides this one, then why did we end up on this one? And if there are other worlds, then ours must be a little piece of something much greater. So we could have just easily ended up somewhere else, right?”

Sora responded with a simple “I don’t know.” He wasn’t really the one for philosophy.

“Exactly.” declared Riku, pushing himself off the tree. “So, we should go out there and find out. Sitting here won’t change a thing. It would just be the same routine over and over again…so that’s why we should go.”

“You’ve been thinking about this a lot haven’t you?” asked Kairi, impressed.

Riku smiled, as he turned his head toward Kairi. “I wouldn’t have even thought about it if you hadn’t come here. So, thank you.”

The redhead smiled back and said “You’re welcome.” before turning and looking back at the sunset. “I think it’s about time we start heading home.”

Her two friends agreed, and they all began to walk towards the boats that took them to this island so they could head back to their families. As Sora was making his way back, he heard Riku’s voice call out to him. “Hey, Sora!”

Sora turned around to see a small object get thrown towards him and was barely able to catch it. He looked down to see it was one of the star-shaped fruits from the tree. “A Paopu Fruit?” questioned the brunette. “But w-why…?”

“You wanted one didn’t you?” replied Riku. “You know that they say if two people share one, their destinies become intertwined.” he recounted as he walked past Sora.

Sora knew of the legends of the Paopu Fruit, just like everyone else on the islands. In fact, some people would share Paopu Fruits as part of their wedding vows including Sora’s own parents. But why would Riku give Sora one, and why is he reminding him of the legend?

Suddenly, the gears in Sora’s head begin to turn as he begins to realize what Riku was doing. What Riku said next pretty much confirmed the brunette’s suspicions. “I know that you want to share one with Kairi.” the silver-haired boy teased.

So that was his angle, Sora realized. Riku was trying to play matchmaker with him and Kairi! Sora tossed the fruit away in annoyance, as Riku raced down to the docks with a smirk on his face with Sora following behind him.

Chapter Text

Sora woke up today like he would have on any other day, with the rays of the sun beaming down on his eyes causing them to open. He wasn’t sure that he was going to get any sleep at all with how excited he was. One more day, and then they’ll be able to set sail for other worlds! The only thing left that they needed to do was find provisions for the trip, and that is what they’ll spend today doing.

He walked out of his room and down the stairs. Before he could head on to his boat, he had to have breakfast and help his mom with a few chores first. After that, he let her know that he was off to, as his mom embarrassingly calls it, the “Playground Island.”

When the brunette got there, he saw two other boats already docked, meaning that Riku and Kairi must have gotten there first. But at first, there didn’t seem to be any sign of them on the islands with the boats being the only evidence to the contrary. Then Sora realized that they must’ve been at the other side of the island. On the other side there were no places to properly dock, which was why they had to put the boats on this side. In fact, the only way to get to the other side is through a wooden shack. Now knowing where his friends could be, Sora made sure to tie up his boat before heading into the shack.

As he exited the shack from the other side, he saw Riku off to the side, looking towards the horizon. It didn’t take long for the silver-haired youth to realize Sora’s presence behind him. “Hey, Sora!” he called out, waving his hand in greeting. “You excited for tomorrow?”

“Of course I am.” the brunette responded. “All we have to do is get our provisions and then we’ll be sailing the seas.” At this point, there was a grin on Sora’s face that managed to reach both his ears.

“Well, not yet,” said Riku. Sora’s visage turned from one of pure joy to confusion and he tilted his head. “We still need a name for the raft.” He continued. “I think we should call it…Highwind.”

“Really?” asked Sora. “I think I prefer the name Excalibur.”

“Guess we’re split on what to call it.” said Riku. Suddenly, an idea came to his head. “You want to settle this the usual way?”

“Of course!” said Sora. He and Riku had the same idea. They were going to decide the name of the raft via a race. It was also around time when Kairi emerged from the shack. “Hey, you’re just in time! Me and Sora were about to race to decide the race of the raft.”

Kairi sighed. Usually, the competitions that they had were between two people with the third person becoming the judge of it. Since she arrived late, she was the one to be the judge this time around.

The rules of this race were simple. You would have to race across the wooden platforms, then across the treetops to reach the star-maker. Once someone touches the star, that person will then head back to the starting line. Whoever makes it back to the start will win the race.

“How about we add something else to spice things up?” Riku turned and suggested to his brunette friend.

“I know!” said Sora. “If I win, I’ll be the captain. And if you win, y-”

“Whoever wins gets to share a Paopu with Kairi.” interrupted Riku. The teen spoke quietly enough that only he and Sora could hear what he was saying.

This ended up shocking Sora. This was about the name of the raft, wasn’t it? When did it turn to sharing a Paopu with Kairi? “W-wait a minute…” Sora attempted to intervene. But at that point, Kairi began to count down for the race. This was something to confront Riku about later, he thought.

Both boys ran forward onto the platforms as soon as Kairi said the word “Go!” Riku was in the lead with Sora following suit closely behind. It seemed that the additional incentive of sharing a Paopu made Sora more determined to win the race. But questions were swimming around in his mind. Why add the fact that the winner would share a Paopu with Kairi? Did Riku do this to push Sora to be more focused on the race? Was he putting himself as a rival for Kairi’s affections? And why did he jump over part of the platform?

The brunette got the answer to his last question when he stepped on the platform that Riku avoided and fell alongside it when it collapsed. Turns out that one of the platforms was so rickety that any weight would cause it to crumble. Thankfully, it wasn’t that far of a drop to the seaside as the only detriment to that was the fact that Sora was now further behind.

Nearby to where Sora landed was a wooden tower, with a ladder that reached its top. If Sora could climb the ladder fast enough, then he would still have a chance at winning. Frantically, the boy began to climb it to its peak, where he regained some of the position that he lost.

At the top of the tower was a zipline. Sora saw that it led to the trees close to where the star-marker was. If he took that, there was a chance where he could get a lead ahead of Riku! With that knowledge in mind, Sora jumped and grabbed the handles, letting gravity push him to the other side. He even passed Riku along the way.

As soon as he got to the end, Sora dropped from the ziplines. Due to ziplines being one-way, he won’t be using it on his way back. Sora raced for the marker and touched it, with Riku following suit shortly after.

The brunette made sure to not accidentally fall through the leaves as he stepped atop the trees. Thankfully, all of the trees were able to handle the boys running on them. But besides what happened earlier, nothing eventful happened that affected the boys positions in the race, though there was a chance for Riku to squeeze in a victory.

It was turning out to be a close race as both boys gotten to the platforms, both making sure to jump over the fallen platform and eventually-

“The winner is Riku!” called out Kairi

Riku and Sora both stood at the finish line, exhausted. Sora showed his exhaustion more than his friend, on account of what he had to do to try to win the race, but it seems that his efforts were in vain. Still, at least he managed to challenge Riku in that race. Riku had won most of the challenges that the three of them proposed, whenever he participated. Seeing how he nearly won gave Sora some confidence. But still, there was what he said right before it began…

Kairi seemed to notice the concerned expression on Sora’s face. “Hey, Sora…Is everything okay?”

Sora felt…uncomfortable. He couldn’t tell Kairi the truth, that would be completely embarrassing! But he didn’t want to lie to her, she doesn’t deserve that. “Well…” he began.

“I guess it’s my fault.” interrupted the silver-haired teen. “Just before the race, I told him something to motivate him to push himself farther, but I guess I went too far this time. Sorry. Didn’t mean what I said.” he says, turning his head to face Sora.

“Apology accepted.” Sora said. He meant what he said, mostly. There were small amounts of doubt in his mind that Riku’s apology was genuine. He noticed that Riku kept bringing up Sora’s crush for Kairi as a method of teasing him. Was Riku jealous of Sora’s love for Kairi?

Wanting to rid the uncomfortable air hanging around them, Sora noticed something that Kairi was holding. “Hey, what’s that?” he said, pointing to whatever it was that was in her grasp.

“Oh, this? I’m making a necklace out of thalasse seashells.” she held up a star shaped necklace in her hand, each point of the star being made out of a seashell. Kairi seemed to have drawn a face similar to her own on one of them. “Sailors would make and wear them for good luck. I figured this will help us in case we ever get separated.”

“Good thinking, Kairi.” said Riku. “But luck is not all we need. We still need to get the provisions for the trip.” He pulled out a list he made of the three decided to be necessary provisions and read its contents aloud. “We need some mushrooms, coconuts, fish, clean water and some seagull eggs. Sora, you go get the mushrooms. Kairi, you’ll get the clean water and fish. I’ll get the coconuts and seagull eggs. Let’s meet back up here when we’ve finished.”

They agreed and went their separate ways. The first place that Sora checked for the mushrooms was back at the obstacle course. He found two near the zipline tower, one hidden in a bush and another behind a small boulder. After that, Sora couldn’t find any more in the cove. There must be more on the other side of the island, thought Sora. And so he entered the shack yet again.

Mushrooms on Destiny Islands usually grow under places covered in shade. The only place on the other side that fits the bill would be the Secret Place, a small cave-like area next to the waterfall that, coincidentally, Kairi was using to get some clean water. Sora and Kairi both noticed each other, paused and waved before going back to their business.

When Sora stepped into the end of the Secret Place, his heart was filled with nostalgia. Across the walls were drawings that he, Riku and Kairi had made on the walls. They were mostly self-portraits, the adventures they either had or wanted to have, and mythical creatures that they were fascinated in. Besides the drawings and the cracks of sunlight shining through, the only thing on the cave walls was a mysterious door with no handle or lock or any possible way of getting in. Sora would know, as he and Riku tried multiple ways when they first saw it, all of them ended in failure.

Sora grabbed the mushroom he spotted on the side of the wall when he spotted something else. It was a picture of a younger Sora and Kairi’s faces looking at each other. The brunette remembered it as something he and Kairi sketched years ago, possibly a year or two after they met. Happiness flowed through his brain when that image reached his eyes. Then came an idea. Sora grabbed one of the small rocks that were off to the side and began to crudely etch an arm passing a Paopu from Sora to Kairi. When he was finished, he looked at his handiwork longingly. He wanted to tell Kairi what Riku said and why it flustered him so, but he was too embarrassed at the moment to say. This way, he would be able to express it without all the - 

“This world has been connected.”

The voice caused chills to travel across Sora's spine as if it were a busy interstate. He turned around to see the source of the deep voice. He saw...someone in a lumpy brown coat standing in the shadows. The coat obscured the figure's face so much that Sora wasn't sure if he exactly had one. Another thing of note? Sora had no idea who this guy is. The islands were small and connected, meaning that everyone knew who everyone else was. By that logic, Sora should have know who this man was, but he didn't. "W-Who are you?" Sora questioned.

"I have come to see the door to this world." the man said simply. "It's tied to the darkness, soon to be completely eclipsed."

Was this man from another world? If so, what did he use to get here? Why does this talk about doors sound familiar to him? None of these questions were what Sora was expecting to ask himself today. He didn't want this man speaking vaguely to him, he just wanted to get some mushrooms and -

Wait.

"Have you been eating the mushrooms?" asked the brunette cautiously. He knew that they should be cooked properly before eating, as if it isn't, it would temporarily warp the perception of reality that the eater had, but he had heard that some people would forgo cooking it in order to experience these effects. Maybe this man ate one and was unaware of the side effects. Or maybe he did know.

"You know not what lies behind the door. You have yet to know so much, for you know so little." The man kept talking, as if ignoring Sora's question.

At this point, Sora was starting to get annoyed by the nonsense the man in the coat was saying. "I don't know what you're talking about!" he yelled.

"One who knows nothing can understand nothing." the man retorted.

And then, he simply vanished.

This was the biggest surprise for Sora. There was nowhere else to hide and no secret exits to his knowledge, so where did he go? He was expecting him to appear behind him, but after waiting a few seconds, it seemed as though that wouldn't happen.

Feeling shaken by what happened, Sora exited the cave, mushrooms in hand.

- - -

Though a day had passed on Destiny Islands, at New L’manberg, only a few hours had passed. During that time, Toby addressed the contents of the letter he got from Phil to Tommy, Ranboo, Jack and Fundy. Though most things were explained, there were still questions amongst the quintet.

“I thought that Phil told us once that a world dying was some sort of common occurrence. The hell changed to make him want to check it out?” questioned Jack. The rest of them admitted that he had a point. With the countless worlds out there, there had to be a good number of planet-destroying monsters out there in the cosmos.

“He told us that stars dull down when they get destroyed.” Toby corrected. He had seen evidence like that before. Some nights, he would look out at the stars he could see and try to find his old world amidst the countless others. Every time he did, he noticed that the star formerly named as L’manberg had gotten dimmer than the last time he gazed upon it. “That act usually takes decades to complete. The way Phil described, the world was there one sec and gone the next.”

It was this moment when dread started settling in. If stars usually take so long to dull down, then what was happening to them that made them vanish so fast? It was also now when Fundy noticed something. "Wait, there's more writing on the back!"

Guess it turns out that Toby hadn't read through the entire thing before leaving to find Tommy. He flipped the paper around and read the writing aloud.

"P.S. - 

Nearly forgot to mention, but I've parked the ship you'll need for your transport underneath the Elton John house. There also should be someone outside the house waiting for you. She will join you on your quest to document your adventures."

"The Elton John House?" queried Tommy. "What's that?"

"I think I remember what it is. That was one of the places that Sch...uh, the last guy wanted gone when he became president." said Ranboo. He knew how the name of the previous president was not really welcome anymore. After all, he was the guy that caused the destruction of their previous home. "It was rebuilt outside of the fortress, if I remember."

"Guess we should head out there now." said Toby. Before he and Tommy left, he turned to face Ranboo. "Ranboo, you're in charge while I'm gone. Let me know if there's any trouble, got it?"

"I will" assured Ranboo. "Make sure you're safe out there."

"Don't worry, we will." said Tommy. "C'mon, Toby. Let's go." And with that, both Toby and Tommy exited the room.

They walked the halls of the fortress until they reached the area Phil had mentioned. It was a short walk from the entrance to the fortress that nearly covered the planet. At first glance, it appears to be a house colored with black and yellow vertical stripes. A woman was waiting nearby. She had glasses and short black hair. She wore a tan buttoned-up shirt with black collars. Given how there was no one else there, the two figured that she was the woman that Phil was talking about.

The woman perked up like a dog when she noticed Toby and Tommy coming over and greeted them. "Hi! You must be the people told me about. Nice to meet you. My name's Dr. Molly Collingwood, but you can just call me Molly."

"I'm Toby and this is Tommy." said Toby. "So, uh, you're going to document our journey, huh?"

"Yep!" replied Molly. "I've done stuff like this before, when I was in my old world." As soon as she mentioned her old world, that happy inflection is her voice was replaced with a more wistful and forlorn one. Toby and Tommy understood why that was, as people who lost their worlds as well.

"Anyways," said Molly, slipping back into her more bubbly persona. "Let's head for the ship."

Going into the Elton John House, it didn't look very special at first. It looked like a typical small house. Molly went over to the oven, and pushed some of the numbers on it. Apparently, she put in a passcode with a sound indicating she entered the correct one and the oven sliding away to reveal an elevator happening shortly afterwards.

The ride down to what was presumably a garage for the ship was silent, probably due to the brief dourness the doctor had when her old world was brought up.

The silence was broken when the three of them awed at their spaceship. It was almost as large as the house it was hidden under. It was comprised of a material that looked like a mixture of gummy snacks and Mega-Blox, which gave the vehicle a bit of a chunky appearance. It was made up of bright reds, oranges and yellows.

"Mr. President, we're ready for take-off whenever you're ready." announced a voice from the speakers. The three turned to see a booth containing another friend of Toby and Tommy, one who was a tall grass-like humanoid in golden armor.

"Understood, Sam." replied Toby as the three of them crawled into the cockpit. As soon as all three of them crawled in, the cockpit closed and the hanger doors began to slowly open. All of three of them found a seat to sit in and meanwhile, Tommy started to fiddle with the control panel.

"Uh, Tommy? I think you should let me control the ship. I don't even think you have a license for this." warned Sam.

"I've driven plenty in games, Sam. I think I have a clue on how to control a ship." retorted the blonde. At this moment, the hangar doors were fully open. Tommy pressed a button he believed would get the ship to launch.

...And then the ship plummeted like a stone with the cockpit turning full from the screams of the three.

Eventually, it managed to stop falling and turn itself upright when it exited the world, but by then, the three occupants of the brightly colored ship was frazzled.

A speaker from within the ship turned on and out came Sam's voice. "Tommy?"

"Yeah?" responded Tommy, who sounded vocally shaken.

"Now can I fly the ship?"

"...Sure."

- - -

Sunset once again bathed the islands. Kairi and Sora were watching it again, this time they were on the dock and Riku wasn't around. It was kind of nice for Sora, as he and Kairi didn't always have time for just the two of them. However, the nice moment of silence that he and Kairi were having was interrupted when Kairi spoke up. "Riku's really changed, hasn't he?"

Sora looked at Kairi in confusion. "What do you mean?" Did she know about the last-minute addition to the race?

She didn't answer the question Sora posed to her, just continuing on instead. "I think we should just take the raft and go now." she suggested. "What do you say, huh? Just you and me?"

That surprised Sora. Kairi was always too nice to just leave someone behind, especially someone that she has known for a long time like Riku. "Kairi, what are you-?"

"I'm just kidding, Sora." interrupted Kairi as she giggled at the fact that Sora fell for her ruse.

Sora exhaled from the mouth from hearing that. It was a good thing they weren't going to leave anyone behind, especially the guy who planned it out. But still, that felt like going too far in his book. He was generally worried! "What the hell's gotten into you?" he asked.

Kairi's demeanor changed from goofy, to serious. "I- I think I was afraid of leaving this place. But now, I feel more confident. No matter how far we go and what we see, I'll know that we'll always find a way back. I'm sure of it."

"I'm sure as well." replied the brunette.

"That's good." she said, smiling and turning back to face the setting sun. "Sora, don't ever change."

"Huh? Oh, uh, okay?" It was a bit out of pocket and quite ominous, but Sora still accepted.

The two sat watching the sunset for a few more minutes before heading back to their boats. Both of them were excited to set sail tomorrow, it was going to be great! But none of them knew that the real adventure would begin later that night.

Chapter Text

“So, Sora, how was your day?”

Sora snapped out of his current haze. Currently, he was eating dinner - specifically a grilled fish meal called Katsu Fish, with his mother. Currently, he was thinking about how tomorrow, he, Riku and Kairi would set sail to see other worlds. He was excited about their future venture, but he was also nervous about it. He hadn’t told his mom about it. In fact, none of the trio’s parents knew about it. If they did, they probably would’ve said that it was too dangerous and shut the idea down, at least till they were older. That made sense to Sora. According to urban legends, there was this kid who left to see other worlds and, for one reason or another, ended up never coming back. This clouded his mind until his mom talking to him snapped him back into reality. “Oh, i-it was good.”

A soft smile began to break out on his mother’s face. There are some aspects that both her and her son both have, one was that they have the same smile, another was the hair color. The eyes and spiky hair were taken from his dad, a subject which was touchy to both the boy and his mother. “That’s nice to hear.”

After that, the rest of the night was uneventful.

At least, that is how it should’ve gone.

But something had caught Sora’s eye, and suddenly, an uneventful rest of the night felt like a pipe dream.

An unexpected storm had begun to roll in. This storm felt different from the other storms, though. The grumbling of thunder was louder and the clouds that bolted the night sky were thicker. It was too fierce to be a normal storm, but not intense enough to be a hurricane. Normally, this wouldn’t cause Sora’s heart to plummet to his stomach in fear. But one thing changed that fact.

These storm clouds were encircling one island in particular. The island where his friends sent their time playing. The one where the raft was kept.

Sora practically shot out of his chair when he put the pieces together and began to run towards the door. Obviously, this caused Sora’s mom to feel concerned. “Sora, what’re you…”

“Sorry, Mom. I have to go, I feel like Riku and Kairi are in trouble. I got to help them!” said Sora quickly, as he departed for his boat. He wasn’t lying when he said he felt like his friends were in trouble. The only thing that should’ve been on the island for him to worry about was the raft, as if the storm would damage it, all their hard work would be for naught. But for some reason, he knew in his heart that both of his friends were on that island and that they both were in massive trouble.

Despite the storm that was brewing, the boat ride to the island was just like any other. When he reached the dock, he saw two other boats there. So Sora was right, Riku and Kairi were on this island! Another thing he noticed was a ginormous orb that was a mixture of blacks and purples floating above the island. Lightning was emanating from it, but none of the bolts escaped the grasp of the orb and struck the island.

As soon as he stepped foot on the dock, a batch of creatures made themselves known to him, rising out of the ground and turning into small, bug-eyed creatures that the brunette somehow found disturbingly familiar. He couldn’t remember it to save his life, but they are the same Shadows that plagued Sora during the dream he had while he was relaxing on the beach yesterday.

Given how Sora had a gut feeling that his friends were in trouble, he had grabbed the wooden sword that he and Riku would use for sparring before he left. He swung at one of the Shadows and…to say that he missed would technically be false. A more correct observation would be that the attack went through it as if nothing was in its way. It was becoming very clear that, hopefully at the moment, he couldn’t harm them, and he wasn’t going to stand around to see if they could harm him.

It was then when he noticed Riku’s current location. He was on the island on the sideways-leaning tree just standing there and staring into the horizon. Weirdest part of it all was the fact that he wasn’t reacting to any of the chaos around him. But due to the insanity happening in the moment, Sora didn’t pay it much thought.

As soon as he was close enough, Sora called out to his friend. “Riku! Are you okay! Where’s Kairi?” The brunette wasn’t sure if Riku knew of her whereabouts but he at least had to check.

He wasn’t expecting Riku to laugh. It wasn’t a “what a funny joke” laugh or a laugh of insanity. It was a laugh of satisfaction. When he turned to face Sora, an eager grin had formed on his face. “The door has opened, Sora. Can’t you see what this means? We’re finally going to be able to leave and see the outside world!” he exclaimed. “As for Kairi, she’ll be joining us shortly.”

Sora nearly leapt back in shock when he heard talk about this door. He was sounding like the guy in the brown cloak! Did he speak to Riku too? And what did he mean by Kairi will be joining them shortly? But also… “What does the storm have to do with us leaving?” Sora asked.

Riku scoffed, as if Sora missed something obvious with what he said then pointed to the giant orb above him. “That has given us our ticket to leave. Sure, this might be a one-way trip, but this is our only chance.” he said, briefly sounding wistful, before sounding more confident. “I’m not afraid of the darkness, Sora, and neither should you!”

As if on some type of twisted cue, a torrent of darkness began to rise from the ground and engulf Riku. Despite his current situation, Riku remained calm and simply stretched his hand out for his friend to reach.

Sora attempted to reach out to his friend, but the force of the darkness were pushing him back so much that even taking one step forward was a difficult task. Eventually, despite intense pushback, he was within distance to hold his friend, but at that point, the torrent had obscured Riku from the brunette’s vision. That did not stop him from reaching within, however. He ended up touching something solid, jumped it and yanked it out.

As he pulled it out, the torrent of darkness vanished, leaving Sora to realize that Riku was gone, meaning whatever he pulled out was not his friend. He looked down to see what he was holding.

It was a weapon of some kind, strangely it looked like a key! Its teeth and blade are silver, with the empty space in the teeth giving the appearance of a crown. The guard of the blade was yellow and its rain guard was blue. A keychain was connected to the end of it, with the symbol on it being an angular heart.

He stared at it in confusion. Why would someone turn a key into a sword? Suddenly, an echo began to swarm Sora’s inner thoughts.

“Keyblade. Keyblade. Keyblade.”

A Keyblade. So that’s what it was called, thought the brunette. Suddenly, the boy sensed danger behind him. He quickly turned around to see that some Shadows had snuck up behind him while he wasn’t paying attention and one was currently leaping towards him to attack.

He swiped the Keyblade at his attacker, and this time it actually killed the Shadow, turning into harmless black mist as it died. Relief began to cover Sora like a blanket as he realized now he can actually fight back. And so, the boy began to push back against the oncoming shadows, slashing at every one that dared come closer.

It took a few seconds to realize that staying there and fighting them off wouldn’t work as there seemed to be an infinite amount of them, with more spawning after Sora finishes a group of them off. Running from them seemed to be the only option, but to where?

Sora looked around until he noticed something odd. The entrance to the secret place. Where once stood an opening in the rocks to a cave, a long silver door took its place. Sora guessed that the door appeared when everything else weird happened, and took off towards it. If you were to glance at these doors, you would think that you would have trouble getting it ajar, but, as Sora found out personally when he opened them, they were as easy to open as any other doors.

Though the entrance had changed, the inside stayed the same as normal. When Sora got to the area where all the cave paintings were, he saw that someone else had already beaten him there. That person was none other than Kairi, who was currently just standing there staring blankly at the door. Upon hearing his footsteps coming closer, she turned around, an emotionless look on her face. “Sora…” she called out his name with the same amount of emotion that was currently on her face.

Suddenly, the wooden door flung open, as if a gust of wind forced it open. Sora briefly got to look what laid beyond the door, a question he wondered ever since he discovered it. The only thing he managed to see there was complete darkness. The reason why the look he got was brief is because that gust of wind also blew Kairi flying towards him. In shock, he dropped the keyblade and reached his arms out to catch her, but those attempts proved futile as she…simply went through him and vanished as she came out the other side.

The brunette barely had time to process what the hell just happened when the wind got more intense, causing him to fly out of the cave.

He didn’t know how long he was out for, but when he awoke, there was barely any of Destiny Islands left. There was only a small patch of island floating in a purplish void, with debris floating around like a pseudo ring. The sphere still loomed above, though it got much bigger. Quickly, Sora got the feeling that the sphere wasn’t the only thing that was looming and turned to look behind him to see another figure from the forgotten daydream, the Darkside. The boy gripped the keyblade tightly for the fight before him.

The Darkside began the battle by kneeling down and growing an orb of energy from within him, the same move that caused Sora to lose the battle last time. However, it seemed that, perhaps, some memory of their previous encounter was still at the back of Sora’s depths, as he didn’t go down so easily this time. He instead sliced through the oncoming orbs of energy, causing them to evaporate upon contact with his weapon.

After standing back up, the monster reared his hand back then slammed it down, creating a shockwave that Sora barely managed to dodge as well as a puddle of darkness. Out of that darkness, more shadows emerged, clambering towards the wielder of the key as soon as they popped out of the ground. 

He managed to slice through some of the Shadows, but then an idea struck him. Before the Darkside managed to move his hand back, Sora jumped on and began to climb up the obsidian arm. The monster’s head turned to look towards the boy climbing up him and moved to swat him off. Before contact between its hand and Sora could be met, Sora reached its shoulder and plunged the Keyblade straight into its forehead.

A pained roar escaped from the mouth of the creature, as the hand that was going to flick Sora off changed trajectory and went to cover its new wound. The writhing in pain the Darkside experienced was what ended up knocking Sora and the Keyblade off it and onto the ground. 

As it roared in pain, a massive tearing gust of wind blew through, sending the Darkside and Sora flying into the orb as well as tearing apart the last remaining part of the islands.

A few seconds later, the wind slowed down. There was nothing for it to react to when it did, though. No trees, no water, no people, nothing.

Simply put, there were no more Destiny Islands anymore.

- - -

The night sky hung over a large town, as it always did, every day of the week and every second of the day. At times, this gave off a serene atmosphere. Other times, it served as a grim reminder of what happened to most of its inhabitants previously. Right now, the latter holds true. One of the many stars that littered the sky shone brighter than it ever had, and then vanished as if it was never there. That is why many choose not to stargaze despite the constant night sky, they feel like they would be overcome by sadness and homesickness if they did. Though for some of the residents, this was not the case.

One of them was an unclothed humanoid with orange fur and curled ears. She had a large hair curl as well as a brown muzzle area with yellow cheek marks. She was within what appeared to be a green hotel room when she noticed the star committing its vanishing act. “Look!” she yelled and pointed to attract her friends' attention.

Sure enough, they both stopped what they were doing to come over and look. Both of them had robotic appearances, though one was more humanoid with yellow coverings and blue eyes and the other resembled a suit of armor with blue glowing lines running across it.

The yellow one sighed, despite having no visible mouth. “There goes another one.” he said to himself forlornly before talking to his two other companions. “All right, let's split up and explore the town. It seems that we have a new arrival on our hands. Let’s make sure they get properly accustomed to this place. Not like they have anywhere else to go.”

Chapter Text

Despite the slight hiccup at the beginning, the trip to Traverse Town was uneventful. Tommy, Toby and Molly had spent the majority of the trip just sitting in their chairs, while occasionally either ogling at the majesty of a nearby world or getting up to get some food.

The three of them talked to each other at different points, but all their chat was only surface level. They all had their own secrets, but they kept them for different reasons. Tommy and Toby didn’t want to talk about their previous home of L’manberg because they didn’t want to discuss that topic with someone they barely knew. Molly, on the other hand, wanted to discuss the things she encountered at work, but because it was kept a secret on her world, she wasn’t sure how much to spill.

Eventually, they got to Traverse Town. Visually, it didn’t seem that impressive. The world looked like it had different pieces of its cobblestone street and village-like buildings hastily stitched together. Though most people who arrive in Traverse Town lack any way to leave, there was still a docking area for passing ships to land.

The three began to get ready as soon as the ship successfully landed. Before Tommy and Toby could take a step out of their vessel, Molly called out for them to stop. When she caught up to them, she held a syringe of blackish-brown liquid in her hand. “Before you guys leave, I want to give you this.”

As soon as they saw what she held, the two men held a look of disgust on their face, which Molly took notice of. “It’s not what it looks like, thankfully. It’s nanocameras.” the doctor said.

Their two expressions changed from disgust to relief. “Nanocameras, huh? Why would we need this?” questioned Toby.

“It’s more for me than for you.” admitted Molly. “I know that the journey ahead will be dangerous, and since I don’t really have any combat prowess, I’d be a liability if I went out there with you. I’ve connected these to the camera system, so when I inject these into you two, I’ll be able to see what you see and hear what you hear on these monitors.”

“And you had this for this type of situation?” asked Toby skeptically.

“There were situations like this back at my world, yeah.” she responded vaguely.

After taking their shot of nanocameras, Tommy and Toby exited the ship and headed out of the hangar. Before they got to enter the town’s First District, Toby stopped in front of an entrance to an alleyway and stared at it. He wasn’t sure why, but he was certain someone important was down there. 

Tommy noticed that Toby shortly after and turns toward his friend. “Hey, are you coming or what?”

The brunette decided to ignore this gut feeling he had and focus on his mission. With such a heavy task on his shoulders, he couldn’t be distracted - that could only lead to disaster. “Coming” he said as he tried to catch up with his friend.

If the two New L’manbergians bothered to check the alley, they would have found two figures.

One of these figures was Sora, who was lying against the wall knocked out after flying through the orb. The other was a sheep with unnaturally bright blue wool. Currently, the sheep was licking Sora’s face. Eventually, the excessive licking caused Sora to regain consciousness.

“W-Wah?” said the brunette groggily. He slowly opened his eyes to see the weirdly-colored sheep looking down at him. Due to his current status, he did not find the sight he is currently beholding to be strange in any way. “I must be having another dream.” he rationalized to himself, as his eyes began to close again.

The sheep baaing in his ear is what ended up causing Sora to fully wake up. “Oh crap, this isn’t a dream!” he realized. He turned to look at the source of the noise and began to process a couple of things. One, there is a bright blue sheep next to him and two, he’s not in Destiny Islands anymore. All the surroundings around him felt completely new. He decided to focus on the sheep for now, as that was the weirdest part so far.

“Hey there little guy, what’s your name?” he asked the sheep, despite knowing that it couldn’t talk back. He took a look at the nametag around its neck for his answer. Thankfully, the sheep didn’t attempt to bite him during this. As he looked at the tag, he saw the name “Friend” written across it. He did a double take upon seeing the name. After all, who the hell would name their sheep that?

Without warning, the sheep began to bound out of the alley. Sora managed to follow Friend out of the alley, but lost him as soon as he exited the alley. Though he wasn’t far behind the sheep, he didn’t see where it went after turning the corner. If he had been more close behind, he would’ve seen that Friend simply vanished.

Though he didn’t see the sheep upon exiting, what he did see astonished him.

He saw an assortment of characters hanging out in the marketplace-like area that was the First District. There were people from all walks of life here. Some were human and some were animalistic. Some were simply hanging out while others were traversing in and out of the many stores within the area.

It was very overstimulating for Sora. He felt like he needed to head somewhere else in order to get his bearings. So he went to the nearest place he could find; a store with a sign labelled “Accessories”.

The interior of the shop wasn’t much to write home about, but it was welcoming. There was a brick fireplace directly across from the counter. There was a couch for people to rest on as well as a glass container that stored some differently colored rings in them. 

There were two other individuals in the store. One was a plain-looking woman who was working behind the counter. She had long thick brown hair with a blue ribbon tied to the end of it. She wore a yellow blouse with a bee icon on it. The other was resting on the counter. It seemed that this was the woman’s pet, with the pink collar with a bell attached seemingly confirming it. It had white fur with beige parts at the end of its ears, paws and tail. It looked like a cat but it had the tail of a dog. It also had beige markings resembling eyebrows, making it seem like it had a constantly angry expression.

The woman seemed to have noticed Sora as soon as the boy entered. “Hello, how can I…” though she seems to have felt Sora’s presence, she didn’t see that she didn’t recognize his appearance. “Oh, it seems we got a new arrival.”

“A new arrival?” Sora questioned. It seems that new people arriving out of the blue was a common occurrence here. Speaking of here, he remembered that he had no idea where he was. “Um, could you tell me where I am?”

“Yeah, you probably wouldn’t know where this is, you probably haven’t been here that long.” she admitted. “Name’s Bee. Welcome to Traverse Town.”

“Traverse Town.” Sora repeated to himself, before an epiphany struck him. “Is this another world?” he asked excitedly.

“So I guess you’re one of the few people who had knowledge of other worlds beforehand?” Bee asked.

“Not really, but…me and my friends wanted to go out and explore beyond the islands. But that was before…” Suddenly, it all came back to him. The mysterious stranger he met, those monsters attacking, the storm, as well as a ghastly realization he felt like he should have come to earlier. “My islands! What happened to them?!”

As Sora began to freak out about the whereabouts of his islands, Bee’s face gained a more dour appearance. “Sorry to tell you, but your home’s probably gone. That happened to a lot of people here. Nearly all of them actually.”

Sora ceased his freak out as he noticed her expression. “Did you lose your world as well?”

“Yeah.” she said. “Good thing that Puppycat was able to get the two of us out of there before it got destroyed.” As she said this, she gestured to the pet relaxing on the counter.

Sora turned to look at the creature, slightly confused. He wasn’t exactly sure how Puppycat would’ve been able to get itself and the woman off their world pre-destruction. Maybe it was able to use magic? “So, Puppycat helped you get to Traverse Town?”

“Not quite.” said Bee. She stopped herself as if mentally figuring out how to explain something to Sora, then she continued. “I usually help with odd jobs in other worlds for cash. And to accept a job, we have to go to where this giant Temp-agent computer thing lives. So he sent us there and we were stuck…wherever Temp-Bot lived until the job listing for this shop came up.”

There were many things to unpack with what she said. There were so many questions that he wanted to ask, but he decided to keep his mouth shut on those for now, for risk of getting an answer with even more layers to unpack. Due to everything that happened to him, he wanted only to focus on simple things for now. “This shop isn’t yours then?”

“Nope, I’m just a trusty employee here.” said Bee, who returned to a more happy appearance. “Though, just as a head’s up, the guy who owns this place can be a little…odd.”

Sora was about to continue his string of questions with how was the owner odd, but was interrupted by the creaking of the door behind him. He turned to the noise, fully expecting to see the owner walk in, but there was no one there. In fact, it looked like the door hadn’t moved at all. After staring at the door for a few seconds, he turned back to face Bee where…

“HELLO, I’M SPONS!”

Sora was so taken aback by the sudden jumpscare that he nearly fell over. The thing that startled him seemed to look like a floating orange kite, except it had the face of a man with a black beard and a manic smile, hands with wiggling fingers, and blue baby shoes that are just sort of dangling there, as there were no feet for them to be attached to. Sora wasn’t the only one surprised by the kite man’s appearance. Puppycat had gone from resting to awake and aware, standing on the counter on his hind legs. It was difficult to tell due to the beige marks above his eyes resembling angry brows, but it seemed as though he was upset at the sudden interruption of his nap.

At least he now knew what Bee meant by her boss being “odd.”

Maybe it was because of constant exposure to Spons, but Bee didn’t so much as raise an eyebrow to her boss’ sudden appearance. “Hey boss, perfect timing. We were just talking about you!”

“I know.” replied Spons. 

After an uncomfortable amount of silence, his attention shifted back to Sora. “So, boy , you arrive at Traverse Town and the first place you go to is my store. Congrats on not having shit taste. Anything we can help you find?” the kite-man asked.

Sora was about to say that he didn’t come in here to buy anything as he didn’t have any money on him and he just came in here for shelter. But then, something crossed his mind. If this is where people would go when their world was destroyed, then perhaps Riku and Kairi were here as well! He decided to ask them about the whereabouts of his friends. “Actually. I’m looking for some people.”

“Well in that case, we’ll be happy to sell some to you!” replied Spons. Suddenly, his smile sagged to a frown as his tone of voice got more serious. “Unless you’re a cop.” 

“Uh, not what I meant” backtracked Sora. Bee and Puppycat didn’t have any major reactions to any of Spons’ actions so he couldn’t tell from them if he really did sell people or if this was some kind of surreal joke. He hoped the latter was true. “I mean that I feel like there’s a good chance that my friends have gotten to Traverse Town. Have they been in here yet?”

“Sorry but you’re the newest person we’ve seen so far.” Bee regretfully informed the boy. “But they may be in one of the other districts. Maybe you could let us know what they look like? That way we can let you know if any of them come through here.”

“Yeah, I guess I could.” Sora said, slightly bummed. The hope of his friends and family being in Traverse Town were starting to falter. What if no one else from the islands made it here? What if he was the only one left? Those questions spun around in his mind as he explained the appearances of his friends and mom to Bee, who was writing it down on a sticky note as he was talking.

After that, he said goodbye to Bee, Puppycat and Spons as he left the shop. He walked around for a little bit before stopping and realizing he wasn’t sure where to go next. Then he remembered that Bee suggested that they could have been in one of the districts, perhaps that’s where he should go. Currently there was a door that led to the town’s Second District so he went through there to begin his search.

As Sora entered the Second District, one thing became very apparent to him. In contrast to the somewhat crowned streets of the First District, the Second District was almost completely silent. Most of the structures there were houses, shops and hotels. There weren’t really any big signs anywhere indicating what was what, unlike in the First District, except for one. It had the words “MUSIC” in big letters, and showed a group of seven people each in a different color uniform. Sora reasoned that it was near-silent here because the people who are here would be inside the homes and shops within it.

The silence was broken by a scream of terror. Sora turned to see a man in a white suit, blue vest and brown baggy pants running away from something, terrified at the thing that was chasing him. His pleas only got worse when he tripped and stumbled causing to lose precious time in this life or death race.

His cries were silenced as a clawed hand burst through his body. Strangely, there was no wound or impact left by the hand. As the hand retracted, the man’s eyes began to roll into his head whilst his body started to fade into darkness.

As the man’s body faded away, Sora saw the source of the clawed hand. It wore a silver helmet atop its head and brown shoes with crooked tips. On its chest was a heart symbol colored black, outlined in red and with an X in the center. It also had the same yellow beady eyes as the creatures who attacked the islands! But Sora noticed something else about the creature, specifically what it held in its hand. It was a pink glowing gem that was shaped like a heart. Sora didn’t have time to look at the heart gem for long as the monster, also known as a Soldier, crushed it in his hands before vanishing into darkness.

Sora was left in disbelief at what he just saw. Suppose that the creature he just saw was related to the Shadows that had attacked the islands. It was scary enough that they would show up to a world as it was dying as if they were harbingers of doom, but that’s how they kill people? It was the fact that it was so clean that distorted him the most. There was none of the usual blood splatter, or at least a body left behind, they just take… something from you then your body vanishes.

He didn’t have time to think about it as a group of Shadows formed around him and the Keyblade reformed in his hand. This time, the brunette felt more determined to win this battle than his previous encounters with them, because now he saw what they were able to do.

He was able to swat away the Shadows one by one until they were done. He got a few scratches from the battle, but nothing as drastic as what happened to that man from earlier.

Once the battle was over, he bailed and ran back towards the First District. He didn’t know exactly what the Shadows were able to do to people, but he knew that if he messed up once, he would be done for. And he didn’t feel ready to risk his life at the moment.

As soon as he got back to the First District, he felt that something was wrong. Because his mind was still racing from what he saw, he couldn’t put a finger on why. After a few seconds, it snapped into place for him.

When he first got here, the streets were bustling with people from all different worlds. Now, it’s barren. Granted, some people would’ve left already, but surely not all of them would be gone naturally by now. It became just like the Second District.

The silence was broken by a new voice from behind Sora. “You know, we’ve been looking for a guy like you for a while.”

He turned around to see two people. One of them appeared to be in either his late-teen or early-adult years. He had blonde hair that was flat in the middle and spiked at the ends, wore purple overalls over a beige-green shirt and was carrying a camera in his hands. The other appeared to be the age of a child. Her hair, which she wore in pigtails, was also blonde. She wore a similar shirt and overall combo that the other person (maybe her brother?) had, except her shirt was pink and her overalls were blue.

Sora felt it strange that these two were the only people besides him in the First District. “Who are you guys?” he asked cautiously.

“I’m Ben and this here is Kate.” the man said as he gestured to himself then to the little girl. She waved at Sora, who awkwardly waved back.

“Name’s Sora.” replied the brunette. If they were to give them their names, he might as well give his. “So what’s this about looking for me?” he then asked. He had only been in Traverse Town for an hour at the most. Surely, he couldn’t have gotten that popular in that short period, right?

“Well, I’m a filmmaker.” responded Ben. “Currently, I’m making a film about the lives of the people of Traverse Town.”

“I’m not sure what this has to do with me.” responded Sora. Did they want him to star as an actor in their film? Maybe he should let them know that he was not a good actor, though he could be a good stuntman.

“It’s just that this film is missing something…and that’s action !” replied the young filmmaker, emphasizing the word “action” as if it was his favorite word. “And a good source of action would be to have those shadow monsters that pop up every once in a while show up and cause havoc, but we just couldn’t seem to get them to appear when we want them. Then you came along, and not only did you see them take a life, a whole group of them showed up and ambushed you shortly thereafter. That’s why we need you, you’re basically a magnet for them!” 

Sora was shocked at what the man said. “You’re willing to endanger the lives of potentially innocent people, just so you’d have a good action scene in your movie?!”

“Of course.” said Ben, who somehow didn’t register how pissed Sora was at him. “Now, what do you say? You want to join us?”

“Forget it! There’s no way I’m helping you get people hurt!” Sora shouted as he brandished his weapon.

Kate turned her head to face her brother. “Can I punish him now?”

“Make sure you don’t kill him. Just roughen him up, alright? Wouldn’t want to waste good talent.” Ben said nonchalantly as he turned the camera on to record the oncoming fight.

Kate turned her head back to face Sora. Then something supernatural began to happen. Her eyes began to glow a blood-like crimson and she now sported a toothy grin. She began to levitate off the ground as a blue aura surrounded her hands.

Sora felt uneasy about this battle. Fighting shadow monsters from hell was one thing, but fighting a child was another. He felt uncomfortable about beating up a kid, no matter how sinister the kid was.

This act of nonaction was disappointing for Ben. “C’mon, just put up a fight already!” he yelled exasperatedly.

“Well I’m sorry that I have morals, unlike you!” retaliated Sora.

“Don’t worry, I can’t feel pain!” claimed Kate, giggling as she began throwing blue orbs at the Keyblade wielder.

Thankfully, Sora has a history with dealing with orbs being thrown at him attacking the orbs as soon as they were close enough. Unlike with the Darkside’s orbs however, the orbs that he hit flung themselves back at Kate. As they hit her, she barely flinched and no signs of damage were visible.

It seemed that what she said turned out to be true, she couldn’t feel any damage at all! As Sora was thinking about this, a new aura surrounded her hand, one of red color instead of blue.

As the new aura formed, red circular symbols formed onto the ground of the first district. One by one, they began to glow. Sora took this as a sign to get out of the way, and thankfully he did, as the glowing symbols erupted into a brief geyser of energy before dissipating.

Finally, he decided that he was going to get nowhere with just dodging and blocking Kate’s attacks. Despite how much he hated having to do it, he would have to land a few hits on her.

And so, he jumped up towards the levitating girl and tried his best not to swing too harshly towards her.

His attack on her seemed to do more than the orbs did, as she flinched upon the cold metal of the Keyblade connecting with her. Her smile dropped for a few seconds as she just floated there in shock, before turning back up.

“Congrats, you hit me!” she said, seemingly not fazed with being attacked. “Now it’s my turn!” And with that, another red symbol formed on the wall

Sora wasn’t able to block her attack or get out of the way this time. This attack ended up having Sora knocked out on the floor of Traverse Town for the second time today.

Ben and Kate stood over their knocked-out foe. “Something tells me he’s against this.” said Ben, who stopped recording on his camera.

“I could hypnotize him.” suggested Kate, still levitating though her eyes no longer glowed. “That way, he’ll always do what we say.”

“Great idea! You go ahead and do that.” Ben smiled to himself as Kate began her brainwashing spell.

They stopped when they heard someone familiar to them clear their voice from behind them. Both turned to see a robotic figure that resembled a suit of armor with red colored lines running across it. His arms were currently crossed.

“Y’know, when I heard that there was trouble in the First District, I was certain it was you two causing it.” The metasynth said. His voice had an echo to it, giving it a hollow feel. “So, why are you picking a fight with the new guy?”

“Well, we were trying to get him as part of our movie…” began Ben.

“Then let me guess, he refused and said you had no morals?” interrupted the robotic figure.

“Exactly!”

The robot covered his head with one of his hands and sighed. Nearly every time he met the two, it was always in the aftermath or middle of a battle and it always started with a disagreement of ideals between the two sides. At least the damage this time was minimal. “So what was the ‘no morals’ thing about this time?”

This time, Kate was the one who spoke up. “We were going to use him as bait so we could film a Heartless attack!”

The robot sighed once more. “Were you using him as bait because he’s the new guy?”

“Of course not.” replied the young filmmaker. “We planned on using him because the Heartless seem to be drawn to him like a magnet. Maybe it’s because of that giant key he has?”

“...A giant key, you say?” The metasynth turned his head to face the knocked out Sora. Was this who the Keyblade has chosen? Doesn’t seem like he could put up much of a fight.

Without another word, he picked up the boy and put across his shoulders, fireman style.

“Hey! We were going to be using him.” Ben said.

“After all he’s been through, the last thing I would do is to cause him more problems by leaving him in your care.” the robot replied.

“He wouldn’t be upset! He’d be too hypnotized to care!” retaliated Kate.

“Not helping your case, kiddo.” replied the robot, as he began walking away.

As he was taking Sora away, the lights on him changed from red to blue. That wasn’t the only thing that changed though. His personality also changed, from being gruff and snarky, to more peaceful and calm. “You must be so confused, kid.” the metasynth said to the unconscious boy. “Don’t worry, once we get to Scythe, hopefully everything will be cleared up.”

- - - 

Riku had no idea where he woke up. Wherever it was, it refused to obey the laws of physics. There were multiple floating platforms dotting the area as well as the fact that there seemed to be waterfalls running up instead of down.

Suddenly, he realized something. He was completely alone! Sora and Kairi weren’t there besides him. He wasn’t sure if they were here or not, he had to call out for them. “Sora, Kairi, where are you?”

As Riku called out to his friends, a woman with sickly-pale skin in a long black dress was observing him on a nearby platform out of his sight. Though her face was void of emotion, her red reptilian pupils stared at the boy with intrigue. Perhaps she could find some use out of him.

Chapter Text

It seems like asking people about Scythe worked out for Tommy and Toby. As it turns out, he was really popular with the denizens as he helped them with being relocated after losing their world. They were even able to find where he lived. Well, more like the general vicinity, they didn’t know the exact location.

As they were walking through the alleyway attempting to find the room Scythe was in, Toby noticed that his friend was feeling anxious. “What’s wrong? You scared?”

Tommy scoffed. “Of course not. I just feel like we forgot something, that's all.” 

Toby wasn’t sure if he was being honest right now. He knew that Tom usually acted brave, even when he wasn’t. This could just be a way to deflect his fears.

“But what is it?” the blonde continued. “We got the food, the clothes, our weapons, our personal devices…fuck, what are we missing?”

As Tommy was (possibly) deep in thought, someone came up from behind him and tapped his shoulder to get his attention. He stopped whatever he was doing and turned around to see the figure behind him, letting out a startled yell when he saw him. This in turn caused Toby to also turn, see the figure and yelp.

The figure they saw was a living skeleton, the only thing it wore was a headband with a red plus on it, wristbands, boots, a belt and a quiver holder, all of which were brown. “Woah, calm down. I’m not here to scare you.” he reassured to the people he accidentally frightened.

As the skeleton showed that it wasn’t as hostile as they thought, they calmed down. “Sorry about that.” apologized Toby.

“It’s okay.” the skeleton said. “A lot of people have that reaction to me the first time they see me.” After he said this, he tilted his head as if having some faint recognition of the two. “Wait a minute…Are you the guys that Phil sent?”

This ended up perking the two up. “Wait, he was here?!” they both said, nearly in unison.

“Yeah, he came by to talk to us a few weeks ago.” replied the skeleton.

A few weeks?! They figured that Phil would have talked to Scythe before going on his quest, but given the urgency of that letter they received, they thought that Phil learning about something happening to the worlds and writing and sending the letter happened yesterday, or a few days ago at most. They never expected that there was a few week gap in between. Did Phil take his sweet time with notifying them?

No, there had to have been a more rational explanation for the gap. Maybe it was due to the time difference between worlds, and what would’ve happened a few weeks ago in Traverse Town would’ve happened yesterday in New L’manberg. Or perhaps there were more preparations that he had to do before he wrote the letter.

“So you’re probably wondering about what’s happening to the worlds, right?” the skeleton answered. “Don’t worry, We’ll explain inside.” As he says this, he points to a nearby hotel room, motions for the boys to follow, and walks inside. Tommy and Toby followed him in.

- - -

“Come on, lazy bum. Wake up.”

Kairi’s words were the first thing he heard when he woke up.

Sora’s first action after regaining consciousness is holding a hand to his aching head. His second was beginning to open his eyes. As he opened him, he realized that he wasn’t where he was when they closed. He wasn’t on the streets of the First District, but instead resting on a bed in a green room. By the looks of the room, it was probably a hotel room.

“Hey, are you okay?” he heard a voice ask.

He sat up and turned his head to see - of all people - Kairi standing by the bed. He should’ve felt excited, one of the people who he cared about and thought was during the destruction of his home was right there safe and sound. But he didn’t have that reaction, probably due to the pain in his head. “I guess so,” he mumbled.

“It was lucky that Rush was able to get to you when he could.” the girl says. “I guess being the Keyblade’s chosen one is a dangerous job, huh?”

“I’m just glad that you’re alright, Kairi.” the brunette says, not questioning how Kairi knew of the Keyblade.

Kairi looked at him confused. “Kairi? Who’s that? My name’s Pow-Pow.” As she says this, Kairi’s voice became someone else’s, one that Sora never heard before.

That threw Sora for a loop. He began blinking as his headache began clearing up. As he did, the shape of Kairi began to change. The 14-year old with red hair, a white tank top, purple skirt and white shoes was replaced by a slightly older girl with orange furred humanoid with a brown muzzle with yellow cheek marks, curled ears and a large hair curl.

“Wha?” he said. In his delirium, he must have mistook this girl for Kairi. That disappointed him a bit. Seems like he still has to find her after all.

Pow-Pow sighed. “Guess the Dexter siblings got you harder than we thought.” she said.

“We?” thought Sora. Up until now he believed only Pow-Pow was in the room with him. He turned his head to look past her when he saw two other figures. One was a humanoid robot with yellow coverings, blue eyes and no mouth, the other a robot that resembled a suit of armor with glowing blue lines running across it. Something else that Sora noticed was his Keyblade lying against a drawer in the room.

“My name is Scythe Cyvotix but you can call me Scythe.” The yellow one greeted before motioning towards the metasynth. “That there is Rush and I see you somewhat acquainted yourself with Pow-Pow.”

As Scythe is greeting Sora, the brunette began to sit up and reach for the Keyblade.

“I would just leave it be,” said Rush. “Getting it out of your hands was the best way to keep you safe while you were healing.”

This caused Sora to stop and look at him. “Why’s that?”

“You know those shadowy creatures with yellow eyes?” Pow-Pow asked. “They’re trying to find you through that. Since it’s not in your possession, you’re safe…for the moment.”

“I know being a Keyblade Wielder can be difficult and all but…” Scythe stopped what he was going to say as he noticed a confused expression on the boy’s face. He supposed that him not knowing what he had been thrust into made sense. There were barely any other Keyblade wielder in existence, plus there was a strong likelihood that if there were more out there besides him and Phil, they wouldn’t be where he grew up. “I’m sorry, this must be super confusing for you. Would you like it if we explained a little?”

“Preferably, yeah.” said Sora, sounding slightly annoyed, though grateful. Yesterday began a chain of strange events for him, beginning with his encounter with the man in the Secret Place. It would be good to at least have some clarity as to what was going on.

Coincidently, the room next door was the one where Tommy and Toby went into. While Scythe, Pow-Pow and Rush were introducing themselves to Sora, the two of them were also introduced to new people. There was Bonez, the skeleton that led them to the room, Core Harris, a regular human with black hair, a green shirt, blue pants and a green visor that covered his right eye, and Jay, who was wearing a gray and red spacesuit with an opaque glass visor.

Another coincidence between the two rooms was that both were having similar conversations.

“Let’s start off with something simple,” said Core. “Before this, were you aware of the existence of other worlds?”

“Yeah we were,” said Tommy. “Not originally, but…some things happened that forced us to become aware of them. From what we heard, not many other people do, like it’s a secret or something.”

“The reason that they don’t know is because they were not connected. Each world tends to have a barrier that separates them from the rest of the universe.” The black haired man explained. “But now that the Heartless have shown up, things have begun to change and not for the better.”

“So they’re called the Heartless…” said Sora in the other room.

“Yep.” responded Rush. “They’re creatures without hearts, that much should be obvious.” 

“They are made of the same thing that can attract them - darkness.” Scythe said. “They try to hunt and steal the hearts that have darkness in them. Even a little is enough to make you their prey.”

So when he encountered that man in the Second District, that gem that was taken from him that caused him to vanish - that was his heart! That moment was pretty horrifying to him already but that fact makes it somehow worse!

Scythe saw how uncomfortable the boy was and decided to change the subject. “Hey, does the name Ansem sound familiar to you?” He asked.

“Ansem?” asked Toby, cocking his head slightly.

“Guess that’s a no…” said Bonez dejectedly.

“Is he important?” Tommy questioned, slightly rudely.

Core ignored his rudeness when answering his question. “Well, yeah. He somehow was able to study the Heartless in our homeworld. He put what he found inside a detailed report.”

The two New L’manbergians perked up slightly at this piece of information. A report like that could end up being useful with what they’re dealing with. “Would you guys mind if we took a look at that report you mentioned?” asked Toby.

This time, Jay was the one who spoke up. “If you want to take a look, too fucking bad. When our world was lost, so were those pages. Who the hell knows where they are now?”

Ah, so that was why they didn’t lead with that.

It was a few seconds before the silence was broken as Toby had an epiphany. “Maybe Phil is looking for them as well!” he exclaimed.

His blonde friend thought about this for a bit before nodding. If the Heartless were involved with the worlds blinking out of existence, then searching for a report that goes more into detail on what they are would make a lot of sense.

“Could be.” said Bonez. “Talking to Scythe about the Reports was one of the last things he did before leaving.” He stopped for a bit before continuing. “Has Phil told you two anything about what’s happening or…?”

“Honestly, you’ve told us more than he did.” Tommy admitted. “The only new pieces of information he gave were that we need to find and stay with someone with ‘the key to our survival’ as he vaguely put it.”

“‘The key to our survival’? Do you think he meant the Keyblade?” asked Core.

“So what is this Keyblade? Why did it choose me?” questioned Sora.

Scythe sighed. “We’re not completely sure, to be honest. But we do know the Heartless are absolutely terrified of that and that’s why they’re after you.”

Despite all the explanations they attempted to give, Sora still felt like he understood nothing. He began to hang his head down in despair. “I just wanted to go explore with my friends. I didn’t ask for any of this.” By the sound of his voice, he was near the verge of tears.

Scythe put his hand on Sora and tried to cheer him up once more. “Together, we’ll help you find this Kairi and anyone else from your home that you want to find, okay?”

“...Sure.” the brunette eventually said as he got off the bed. The teen still felt upset despite the attempted comfortings of Scythe and his friends and that he didn’t know what was happening and to top it all off, all that he had ever new was gone, lost to the Heartless. Yet, Sora didn’t feel completely miserable. Hopefully, what Scythe said was true and his friends will be able to help find Riku and Kairi. Maybe even his mother as well.

As the four of them were ready to head out the door, they heard the sounds of clanking metal coming from behind. When they turned around, they found that Soldiers had managed to enter the room!

“Looks like they finally found us!” yelled Scythe.

As he says this, the blue lines on Rush change their color to red. As the colors changed, the metasynth also began to act more aggressive. “Take this, you freaks!” he yelled as a pulse of energy began to form and was fired from one of his hands. The blast ended up hitting one of the creatures, turning it to dark mist as a heart-like gem rises out of it before vanishing. As he kept blasting at the invading creatures, he turned his head to the other three. “Go! I’ll hold them off!”

The three followed his instructions and left the hotel room. Once they were out, the yellow robot turned to face Sora. “Kid, listen to what I have to say. Go now. As you do, don’t try to fight off any lesser Heartless you see. There should be someone rallying them up, either a bigger Heartless or someone else. Take them out, and all the small fry will be less likely to show up. You got that?”

“Yeah.” Sora said. “But what’re you two gonna do?”

“We’re going to warn the townspeople about the attack and make sure they’re safe. Not everyone is as efficient in combat as Rush is.” Scythe says and he holds on to the Choreii’s hand.

In a blink of an eye, both of them were gone. The only clue that they didn’t just vanish into thin air was a long streak of lightning, leading away from where they were. Sora guessed that at least one of the two had super-speed and if he was fast enough, he would see the two of them running with the streak dragging behind them.

But he couldn’t worry about them for now. Scythe gave him a mission; find the person commanded these legions of darkness and defeat them. And with that, he ran the opposite direction that the two took.

As he left, commotion broke out in the other hotel room as well. It ended with one of the Soldiers getting thrown out the window and disintegrating as it hit the ground.

“That takes care of them.” said the voice of Core from a much more bulkier creature with walrus like tusks looking out the broken window. The creature tapped something on his visor and his form turned back to the one that the voice belonged to.

The five of them had a suspicion that they weren’t the only room that got attacked, so they exited the room to check if that was the case. If it were, hopefully no one got hurt or in a worse case scenario, died. When they checked, only Rush was there, panting in exhaustion and lines back to their cerulean color with the only traces of the Heartless intruders being the few scratches on the metasynth and the stains where his lasers struck them down.

“Rush, are you okay?” Core asked him, before looking around both inside and outside the room. “Where’s everyone else?”

“Yeah… I’m fine.” Rush said between pants. He stopped to catch his breath before continuing. “As for the others, I didn’t see where they went but I heard that Scythe and Pow-Pow went to warn the townspeople about the Heartless being out and about while the kid with the key went to go and take down whoever’s been summoning them here.”

This caused Toby and Tommy to sigh. They were so close to meeting both of the people they were searching for but they just ended up missing them both.

“All right. Here’s the plan guys.” Core told the group. “We’re gonna head to the First District. Once we got there, we’ll separate. Rush, Jay, Bonez and I will try to find Scythe and Pow-Pow. Tommy and Toby, you guys will try to find and help the Keyblade wielder.”

“You sure you don’t need us to help?” the president of New L’manberg asked.

“If you count us, Scythe would have five other people helping him out. I’m pretty sure he doesn’t need seven.” Bonez responded.

“Guess that makes sense.” the blonde says before turning to face the exit of the Alleyway. “C’mon, let’s go!”

And with that, the sextet left the alleyway.

- - -

Meanwhile, Riku was climbing the floating platforms around him. It was easy for him, as it was like the parkour he did back home. As he reached the top of a platform, he called out for his friends once more. If all he heard was the rushing of the reverse waterfalls, then he would begin to ascend the next platform where he would rinse and repeat.

Once he got to a bigger platform with a stone archway, he heard something else, though it wasn’t one of his friends calling back to him. It was the sound of growling. The source of this noise seems to have emerged from the shadows. They were a couple of black wolf-like figures that stood on their hind legs and were covered in pieces of bone-like armor.

If Riku had a weapon on him, he felt like he would be able to take them out. As he didn’t however, there wasn’t really much that he could do to them right now. Thankfully, the wolf-like creatures weren’t trying to attack him, rather they were just growling and surrounding him.

“You must forgive my pets. They can be quite…harsh to who they believe to be intruders.” The teen heard a voice say.

The source of the voice then walked out as if she came from the shadows themselves. She had pale skin that was covered in dark purple veins and wore a long flowing black dress. She had white hair, with half of it long and straight while the other half was in a large bun with six offshoots. Her eyes had black sclera and red reptilian pupils.

Riku felt uneasy about this woman, but he tried his best to not let it show. “And you don’t think of me as an intruder?” he asked.

“Why, of course not.” she said. “I know what losses you’ve suffered, how you’ve lost your world in order to get here. I’d be more than happy to give you sanctuary.”

Though the woman’s offers seemed kind, the silver-haired teen didn’t fully trust her. “Who are you?” he asked as he tried to keep his steely resolve.

A smile appeared on the woman’s face. “My name, young one, is Salem.”

Chapter Text

While there were a good amount of Heartless that Sora encountered and subsequently avoided, there weren’t as many as the near infinite army that had invaded Destiny Islands. That gave Sora a hint of relief as it means that this world was nowhere near close to being destroyed.

He reached the exit of the alleyway, only to find that the entrance to it was underneath the entrance to the Second District. At this point, he stopped as he didn’t know which way to go. He knew that he had to find whoever or whatever was controlling the Heartless, but lacked any knowledge of where to look.

However, he had this… urge, gut feeling, something inside of him whispering into his mind directions. The brunette decided to follow this urge, due to not having any other clue, with hesitation. He followed its directions, which led him down an alleyway to a door with a sign above it reading “Third District.”

The Third District was small compared to the First and Second Districts, though not by much. A golden fountain in the corner of one of the corners, one that depicted two anthropomorphic cats dressed in Great Depression-Era outfits in the middle of a dance. Aside from Sora himself, No one else was there.

At least, that was true at first. But Sora wasn’t aware of that just yet.

From atop of a balcony above the entrance, Tommy and Toby ran out, chased by a small group of Soldiers. They stopped running when they realized that they were at a dead end.

“These are the Heartless, right?” Toby asked. “They don’t seem that scary.”

“Yeah, we can handle them!” added Tommy. After their old world had been destroyed, both of them trained in different forms of combat to try to make sure it doesn’t happen again with their new home. After learning about magic from Phil, Toby tried to master it himself. However he only managed to learn the four most common spells to know. Tommy, on the other hand, took a more physical approach and learned to fight using a sword and a shield.

The two of them began to brandish their weapons. Toby had a staff that seemed normal at the bottom half and the top half resembled a bee. Meanwhile, Tommy wielded a circular shield with the angular heart symbol of Phil’s on it and his sword was -

“Toby…”

“Yeah?” Though Toby responded to his friend, he didn’t look back at his friend just yet.

“...I just realized what I forgot.”

Toby blew out a sigh of relief. From the tone of Tommy’s voice, it sounded like he was about to say something serious. Turns out it was just something miniscule. “What is it?”

“I forgot my sword.”

The brunette paused and turned to look at his friend with a look of concern. Surely this had to be some sort of joke, right?

Tommy then opened his scabbard and motioned to it, as if to say " No, I’m being dead serious right now ."

Upon seeing the evidence that the sword was, in fact, not there, the president began to freak out. “How the hell did that happen?!” he yelled.

“Look man, I thought that the sword was already in the scabbard when we left, it was an honest mistake!” countered the blonde.

The argument probably would’ve gone further if one of the Soldiers hadn’t decided to interrupt it. It began to run towards the two, before lunging at them and slashing at them. Thankfully, Tommy noticed their attacker just in time to get in front of his friend and protect them both from the attack.

The good news? The attack ended up not doing that much damage to them due to the shield. It merely pushed them back.

The bad news? It pushed them so far back they fell off the balcony they were on.

From Sora’s point of view, he was still the only one in the District. He felt like he was still being watched however. As this feeling of dread was surrounding him, one of his hands felt heavier. He looked down and was surprised to see that the Keyblade was back in his hand. Wasn’t it still in the hotel room?

It took him a bit to realize what this meant. So it can be summoned to his hand, no matter where it was last. That seems like he should commit to memory, it could prove to be useful later on.

The sounds of people yelling above him caught his attention. He looked up to see two people falling from the balcony above. It took him a few seconds to realise that they might end up falling on him. He tried to get out of the two’s trajectory, but at that point it was too late.

Normally, the force of two people landing on you would have knocked you out, but Sora, though slightly bruised, was still conscious. Perhaps he was beginning to build up a tolerance.

It took a few seconds for Tommy and Toby to come and get their bearings back. As they began to get off the boy, something on his person caught their intention. Though this is their first glance at it, they recognized what it was.

“The Key!” both of them exclaimed, their eyes widening.

Their celebrating was interrupted by Sora beneath them. “Please get off.” he said, with a hint of exhaustion in his tone.

Sora picked himself up shortly after the two New L’manbergians did. As he did, he stared at the two with suspicion. Who were these people and why were they looking for the key? Their intentions could be good like with Scythe and his friends, but they could also be trying to use it for nefarious purposes like what the Dexter siblings attempted.

He was about to ask, but a rumbling noise stopped him. The three looked around to see large stone pillars rising from the ground and blocking any way out. To make matters worse, about a half a dozen Soldiers came in from the balconies, as if to attempt to ambush them.

“Kid, I sure hope you know how to fight.” the blonde man said as he and his friend got into a battle stance. “Otherwise, leave this to us and head to safety.”

“Don’t worry… I can hold my own.” the Keyblade Wielder said as he got into a battle stance of his own. It seems that he was going to trust these strangers…for now at least.

Three of the Soldiers were the first to attack, each one swiping at a different one of their three opponents with their crimson claws. Out of the three, only Sora and Tommy blocked the attacks with their weapons. Toby, on the other hand, shot out a blast of fire from his staff to eliminate the Soldier before it could hit him. Under other circumstances, Sora would’ve gawked at the stranger’s ability to cast magic. However, considering the fact that he was under attack at that moment, it didn’t seem like something he should focus on.

Having their attacks blocked caused the Heartless to pause for a few seconds. Those few seconds were enough for Sora and Tommy to counter-attack, with the brunette getting a few hits in and the blonde throwing his shield towards one of them. Both attacks took out their opponent.

Sora noticed that the blonde teen was only using a shield in this fight and not even pulling out a sword to assist him. “If you don’t mind me asking, don’t you knights usually have a sword with your shield?” he asked him.

“I don’t wanna talk about it.” was all that he responded, seeming embarrassed for some reason.

Sora decided not to ask further. Instead, he attempted to get the first strike on one of the remaining Soldiers. He was only able to get in one before it struck back, causing a medium-sized cut to form on his chest. Yes, it was beginning to bleed and sure it hurts, but from what the brunette had seen before, it could’ve been way worse.

As he got cut, the other two were still focused on getting rid of the remaining Heartless. After Tommy defeated one by slamming it into the wall, he turned to see the wound on Sora. Without hesitation, he grabbed something from his pocket and threw it to him. “Here, take this!” he cried out, making sure to get his attention.

Sora did take notice and caught it in time. He looked down and saw that it was a small blue jug-shaped object with a green liquid inside. He paused for a little bit before drinking it.

Despite the fact that it didn’t taste good, he felt a feeling of warmth wash over him. As it did, he noticed something on him changed. That being the blood stopped flowing out and the wound began healing back up. He put his hand on the cut that wasn’t there anymore, being amazed by the healing properties of the Potion he drank.

The Soldier he was fighting took this chance to strike Sora yet again, but this time it was the boy who struck first, blocking the attack and then finishing it off.

By the time Sora healed up and defeated the Soldier, Toby and Tommy had taken out the last remaining Soldier. Meaning that all of the six soldiers that had attempted to ambush them had all been vanquished. They had celebrated their victory not with any fanfare, but with a pause as they caught their breath.

That pause ended up being pretty short as numerous objects began careening down from the sky and landing in front of them. They looked very different, with the only things they had in common was that they were large, purple in color and had a mechanical appearance. Two of them looked like hands with sharp claws. Two of them had long black slabs at the end that made it look like feet. The last one was a hollow bell-shaped object with a lilac diamond project around the middle where the symbol of the Heartless stood.

A few seconds later, the five objects rose off of the floor with tremendous speed. As they did, the five objects began to connect together to form a body that despite being massive was only a few heads shorter than the Darkside. Once it did, it stood still for a few seconds before a sixth object rocketed down towards the body. The object in question was a spherical purple helmet with a faceplate riddled with holes and a spike on its sides and top.

Once the helmet slammed down on the body, it connected to complete the set, leaving the three to lay their eyes upon the face behind the invasion of the Heartless in Traverse Town - Guard Armor!

Now that all of the pieces of Guard Armor have been put into place, the massive set of armor began to move toward its foes. As it did, its arms began to spin slowly before picking up speed. Sora and Toby were able to dodge out of the way, but Tommy was not so fortunate. Despite trying to use his shield to attempt to lessen the impact, the attack not only sent him flying towards one of the walls, but also knocked him out, for the time being.

Eventually, the hands began to stop spinning. As it did, both the brunettes both took their chance to attack with Sora whacking the gauntlets with his Keyblade and Toby using a spell to summon Thunder from above to attack the head and arms.

The suit of armor then retaliated with a different part of its body. Its legs began to walk with a small shockwave emerging with each step though the rest of its body did not move. The feet were heading towards Sora, who was able to sidestep the legs in time. Then, Sora took a risk - he struck one of the legs just as it was about to step down. This seems to have worked in the boy’s favor as it caused the legs to stumble back and stop for a little bit allowing for him to get a few more hits in. The reason Sora was the only one attacking at the moment was because Toby was tending to the knocked-out Tommy, using another spell in order to restore his consciousness.

Pretty shortly, the legs began moving again, this time moving back and attaching itself back to its body. After that, the body as a whole began moving towards the heroes. It leaped up into the air towards them in order to squash them beneath his body. 

Thankfully, they managed to have gotten out of the way when it finally slammed down on the way. But something else happened to the body of the Guard Armor when it hit the ground. All of its parts detached and went limp.

All three of them took this moment to attack the Guard Armor while it was still down. Sora attacked the body while Tommy and Toby fought the hands. As they were hitting the gauntlets, however, something happened to them. The gauntlets blew up in a small harmless explosion of dark mist.

This took the trio slightly by surprise. They were not expecting part of it to be done with as quickly as it did. It took them a moment before realizing what this had meant. The Guard Armor’s different segments weren’t the same entity as it, with the reason that the hands vanished first was because they took the majority of the damage being dealt. “We have to take out the rest of the body before we can finish this thing off!” Toby said to his friends.

“Got it!” Tommy and Sora both replied. As they did, the suit of armor began to stand back up and put itself back together with what hadn’t been destroyed yet. It began to walk towards them yet again with the miniature shock waves emanating from its feet, though this time the body decided to move with it.

The group decided not to use melee attacks, due to not wanting to risk getting flattened by its heavy feet. Instead the two New L’manbergians used ranged attacks to damage them, the blonde throwing his shield and the brunette casting another fire spell.

“I’m surprised you’re making it this far with you forgetting your sword and all.” The president admitted to his friend as they attacked.

A small smirk graced Tommy’s face. Though he was much more experienced fighting with a sword to compliment his shield, he was doing pretty fine without it. “C’mon, Toby, did I ever give you a reason to doubt me?” he said, catching the shield as it boomeranged back after hitting its target.

Unfortunately for Tommy, Sora overheard their conversation. “Wait, you forgot your sword! How the hell did that happen?”

“Look, that’s not what you should be focusing on!” he yelled in embarrassment and slight anger.

After getting a few more attacks in, the legs had been felled as well, ridding the Guard Armor of all of its appendages. It seemed to be stuttering in rage over the fact that the three heroes were able to destroy its hands and legs, but then it did something unprecedented.

It slammed itself back down onto the ground - and not going limp from it this time. It stayed silent and rigid for a moment before it began to move again. The torso began to spin at ridiculous speeds, threatening to eliminate those that were foolish enough to get close to it.

Unfortunately for Sora, he was the first target that the spinning torso had its sights on. This time, the boy took another risk and attempted to strike the body in an attempt to stun it just like what they did with the legs. When he struck, while he was able to deal damage to it, it was not able to stop its rampage. Instead he just changed the direction of where it was spinning, heading towards the blonde now.

Thankfully, he was also able to block the attack by holding his shield up to protect his body, causing its direction to change yet again.

With how the armor kept ricocheting around the district with the speed to rival a bullet, the trio weren’t sure if they would be able to stop it from its rampage.

Then, an idea began to construct itself from within Sora’s mind. All this time, they’ve been striking the body to stun it, but to no avail. Perhaps a good strike to the head would be enough to finally stop it in its tracks. However, it would be too risky for Sora to jump for a hit, as the Guard Armor’s spinning could easily bulldoze him. To get the air and safety necessary to accomplish what he has in mind, he was going to have to ask one of the strangers for help.

“Hey!” he yelled to get the attention of one of his allies as he ran over to them. Thankfully, both of them turned to look but he only needed the help of one to achieve his objective - the blonde one with the shield but no sword.

“I have an idea on how to beat this thing” he said to both before turning his head to talk to Tommy. “As soon as it moves close to us, I want to use your shield to help me reach its head. Think you can help me do it?”

The blonde took a few seconds before he responded. “Yeah, I think that I could,” he said hesitantly. It was risky, but if executed properly it could work. He was unsure if he wanted the kid to do it. He was able to handle himself against the Heartless so far however, so maybe he could survive this.

It was at this moment that the suit of armor began to head towards their direction, as if it was following some kind of cue. As it was barreling towards their direction, Tommy squatted down and held his shield above his head. “If you're going to use your plan, you better use it now!” he yelled at Sora.

And use it now he did. He made sure to get a running start in order to achieve more height before jumping on the shield and launching himself towards the Guard Armor, making sure to try to stay the right amount of distance to not miss and to not get hit by it. Before the teen landed safely on the ground, he managed to land one strike of his Keyblade onto the helmet.

After that hit, the Guard Armor finally gave up its assault and froze for a few seconds. Everyone had their hackles up when it began to sputter and float but the caution at the moment was unnecessary as the suit of armor began to slowly disappear in a purple mist. Its last action before vanishing completely was a giant version of the heart gem floated upwards from its body.

After it bit the dust, the only noises in the Third District were from the water rushing from the fountain, which somehow avoided getting damaged in the fight. A sense of relief flashed over him due to the fact that now, hopefully everyone in Traverse Town was safe, thanks to him and the strangers. Speaking of the strangers…

Once Sora caught his breath yet again, he broke the silence. “So, why have you guys been looking for me?” he asked.

“A friend of theirs and ours told them that you could help with what’s happening with the worlds.” a voice said from behind Sora. He turned around to see Scythe, Pow-Pow and Rush and three other people that were unfamiliar to him (but not to Tommy and Toby, they recognized Core, Jay and Bonez but not the other three) walk in from one of the no longer blocked off entrances.

“Scythe! Pow-Pow! Rush!” the spiky-haired teen said, happy that they weren’t killed by the Heartless. “So is everyone else in Traverse Town okay then?”

“Yep!” the girl of the group said. “We were able to help everyone get to safety in time. Congrats on defeating whatever was controlling them.”

“Thanks! Oh, by the way, were you able to find anyone who was looking for me?” Sora asked, the hope from his voice was practically oozing out at the moment.

“Sorry, we checked, but it seems as though you were the only one from your world to make it here.” Scythe said glumly.

And with that, all the joy from knowing everyone in Traverse Town was safe and that the Heartless were driven back deflated out of him. "Oh." he sighed as his head began to look down.

The robot tried to cheer the boy up once more, though this time he couldn't come up with an immediate response. "Just because they are not in Traverse Town doesn't mean that they're not elsewhere." he eventually said.

Sora lifted his head back up to face them. He was still in somewhat of a funk, but it wasn't as bad as before. "Is that possible?"

Core's hand was over his mouth as he thought about it. "It's rare, but them being on another world is something to consider." he said.

"We can go to other worlds in our vessel." The blonde with the shield said. "If you come with us, we can help find your friends."

This caught Sora's attention as well. "You could?" he said as he turned to face the strangers he fought with.

"Excuse me." Toby said to the spiky haired kid, before forming a huddle with Tommy. "What're you doing?" he whispered. "We can't just ignore the mission to help him with his friends."

"I'm not ignoring the mission!" Tommy whisper-retorted. "Besides, we needed him to come along with us anyway. You know, 'key to our survival' and all that?"

"Yeah, I guess you're right." Toby gave in before he and Tommy turned back to face Sora. "Looks like you're coming with us - that is, if you want to."

This caused Sora to stop for a bit. For as long as he can remember, he always wanted to leave his home to explore other worlds but now all he wants to do is stay. The weirdest part was he could not explain to himself why that was the case. Was it because he thought there was still a slim chance that someone from Destiny Islands would be here looking for anyone familiar as well? Or was he worried that the Heartless could come back and end Traverse Town in his absence?

After some silence, Sora finally responded. "Sure, I'll come with you." Yes, there might've been a slim chance that someone from home was still here, but it seemed extremely more likely that they ended up in another world. Besides, despite the feeling of not wanting to leave, he still wanted to explore what wonders the other worlds have.

Scythe smiled (at least as much as he could for someone without a mouth) , glad that the kid was happy again. Just then, he remembered something. "Oh, I almost forgot. Before you guys leave, we have some farewell gifts for you. So just wait by the hangar's entrance while we get them, OK?"

"Guess we can do that." responded Tommy. He and his friend then began to walk towards the door to the Second District, only stopping for a short bit to get Sora's attention. "C'mon, kid!"

Sora dashed up to them just so the distance between them wasn't too far. As soon as he got close to them, something occurred to him, a question that he never had the time to ask the strangers. "Now that I have the chance, what're your guys' names?" he asked.

"Toby." said the brunette with the staff.

"Name's Tommy." replied the blonde with the shield.

"I'm Sora!" the boy with the key said with a grin on his face.

- - -

Though the Heartless in Traverse Town have been dealt with for now, dark forces still lurked.

From the shadows of the Third District, hidden out of sight stood a black jellyfish-like creature covered in bone-like armor. From its hiding place, it was observing the actions of Sora and his friends. It wasn’t planning on an ambush, no, that wasn’t what it was here to do. It was simply here to watch and to transmit what he watched to another world.

In that other world, standing in a dark room were five recipients to what was being broadcasted. The images of Sora and friends were being shown from a crystal ball that bore a resemblance to the jellyfish creature. For a while, the five figures were silent as they watched.

Eventually, one broke the silence. He was a man with purple skin, long flowing black hair and horns that curled. He wore a black vest and a purple undershirt that exposed a good deal of his chest. “So the boy managed to fell a Heartless of that magnitude? How impressive.”

A second figure didn’t share the same sentiment. She was a rather beautiful woman in a blue and black dress with dark auburn hair tied neatly in a bun. Out of the five figures, she was the only one who was undeniably human. “He only survived because he wields the key. Without it, he would’ve been nothing but food for the shadows.”

A third figure chuckled. She had purple skin like the first except hers was of a lighter color. She had red hair and wore a red dress. She also had sharp fangs and claws, giving her a vampiristic appearance. “If he’s as weak as you say, then why don’t we just turn him into a Heartless?” she suggested smugly. “That should solve our problems.”

“His foolish friends shouldn’t fare much better.” added a fourth voice. It belonged to a man with pale skin wearing black robes. His face was his most defining feature as it not only held his fiery red eyes but also a gigantic distorted maw that covered where his nose should’ve been. “Honestly, they’re so weak that I’m surprised that their King saw them fit for this job.”

The fifth and last figure let out a laugh, taking the attention of the pale-faced man. The fifth figure was by far the strangest looking of the group. If you were to look at the source of the voice, you would be forgiven for mistaking the source to be a huge blue-skinned muscular creature wearing a black apron and a fez. However, the laugh belonged to the figure broadcast on the T.V. attached to its stomach. The figure in question had the appearance of an egg, also in a fez with facial features that looked like they were hastily drawn on. “I wouldn’t knock ‘em. After all, we said the same thing about you!” he said before launching into a fit of uproarious laughter.

An anger was brewing inside of the pale-faced man, but all he could do was growl at his insulter. After all, he wasn’t actually in the room like the rest of his allies, instead that cowardly egg would rather use that T.V. to broadcast himself then appear in person. That way, he could mock his fellow members without being punished by them. If only he could lay a hand on him...

“That’s enough.” said a sixth voice that silenced the laughter that was echoing in the rooms. The voice belonged to none other than Salem, the same woman who encountered Riku on the floating platforms. A chill could be felt in the air as she walked towards the table. “No matter how you try to argue, the boy was chosen by the Keyblade for a reason. But a question still stands; will he succeed in fighting against the darkness or will he eventually end up allying himself with that same darkness?” She finally reached the table, where her eyes narrowed at the sight of the Keyblade wielder and his friends. “Either way, he might prove himself to be of some use to us…”

Chapter Text

STORY:

Sora’s Story Part I:

Sora, a boy who was born and raised on a small cluster of islands known as Destiny Islands, wanted to see the outside world. With his friends Riku and Kairi, he began to build a raft so he could visit them. 

One day, when he was exploring one of the island’s caves, he encountered a stranger in a lumpy brown coat who claimed to want to see “the door to this world.” 

That night, disaster struck when his islands were attacked by monsters that suddenly appeared. Riku and Kairi had vanished, the islands were swallowed by darkness and all Sora was left with a mysterious weapon. 

Meanwhile, Toby, the president of New L’manberg, got a letter from his friend Phil containing disturbing news. Toby and his friend Tommy used the content of the note to help him out.

Somehow, Sora found himself in another world, a place called Traverse Town. There, he met Scythe, Pow-Pow, Rush, Core, Jay and Bonez. He also learned about the Heartless and his Keyblade, a weapon that could unlock some greater power. Before long, he encountered Tommy and Toby and joined forces with them.

CHARACTER ENTRIES:

Sora

First KHY Appearance: Y-1 Chapter 1: Dive to the Heart (Chapter 1 Overall)

A young boy who is always ready for adventure. He was cast into unknown territory when a swarm of Heartless invaded his island. He battles the Heartless with a mysterious weapon known as the Keyblade as he searches for his two best friends Riku and Kairi.

He helped unlock new journeys in “Kingdom Hearts”(Disney - 2002)

Riku

First KHY Appearance: Y-1 Chapter 1: Dive To The Heart (Chapter 1 Overall)

A self confident youth that was always competing with Sora. He hated the monotony that came with living on Destiny Islands, so he built a raft with the help of Sora and Kairi to explore the outside world. He seems to have vanished alongside his homeworld.

His wish to explore was first expressed in “Kingdom Hearts”(Disney - 2002)

Kairi

First KHY Appearance: Y-1 Chapter 1: Dive To The Heart (Chapter 1 Overall)

Sora, Riku and Kairi were best friends. Her mysterious arrival on the islands about a decade ago was what inspired the boys desire to visit worlds beyond their own. The three of them ended up separated when Destiny Islands was destroyed.

She first appeared in “Kingdom Hearts” (Disney - 2002)

Philza Watson

An old friend of Toby and Tommy. He set off to find out why the stars were vanishing and left instructions for Tommy and Toby to find and follow the Keybearer. Currently, his whereabouts are unknown, but his friends are still determined to look for him.

He showed up last-minute in “Dream SMP: Festival Aftermath Era” (2020)

Tom Simons

First KHY Appearance: Y-1 Chapter 2: It Began With A Letter(Chapter 2 Overall)

Knight. He often acts brash and stubborn but still has a good heart. He usually fights with a sword and shield, though for this adventure he forgot his sword at home. Following Phil’s orders, he has joined forces with Sora.

Tommy’s arrival changed the course of events in “Dream SMP: Growth Era”(2020)

Toby Smith

First KHY Appearance: Y-1 Chapter 2: It Began With A Letter (Chapter 2 Overall)

President of New L’manberg. Uses his limited knowledge of magic to his advantage in combat. Though he seems innocent and cheery, he usually follows logic and reason rather than belief. He and his friend Tommy set off to find Phil and, along the way, joined forces with Sora.

Tommy invited him on in “Dream SMP: Growth Era” (2020)

Ranboo

First KHY Appearance: Y-1 Chapter 2: It Began With A Letter (Chapter 2 Overall)

One of Tommy and Toby’s friends from New L’manberg. He is taking over as president while Toby is away. He seems to be a hybrid of two different kinds of creatures, but what those creatures are is unknown.

He showed up late to the party in "Dream SMP: Reconstruction Era" (2020)

Fundy

First KHY Appearance: Y-1 Chapter 2: It Began With A Letter (Chapter 2 Overall)

One of Tommy and Toby’s friends from New L’manberg. If someone on New L’manberg had trouble with anything technological-related, chances are that Fundy could help you fix it.

He began his life of building in "Dream SMP: Growth Era" (2020)

Jack Manifold

First KHY Appearance: Y-1 Chapter 2: It Began With A Letter (Chapter 2 Overall)

One of Tommy and Toby’s friends from New L’manberg. His attitude can come off as pompous and strict causing people to second-guess wanting to be near him.

He appeared shortly after L'manberg formed in "Dream SMP: After L'manberg War Era" (2020)

Sam

First KHY Appearance: Y-1 Chapter 3: Strange Whispers (Chapter 3 Overall)

A plant-like man who helps maneuver the Gummi Ship, which can travel to any world, all from the comfort of his home on New L’manberg. Despite having good intentions at heart, he has a bit of an ego, placing the fault of his own actions on others.

He built his way onto the scene in “Dream SMP: Unity Era” (2020)

Friend the Sheep

First KHY Appearance: Y-1 Chapter 5: The Town of Lost Souls (Chapter 5 Overall)

A mysterious sheep with blue wool that was the first thing Sora encountered in Traverse Town. It led him to the First District, but its whereabouts afterward are unknown.

It was first discovered in “Dream SMP: Post-Banishment Era” (2020)

Dr. Molly Collingwood

First KHY Appearance: Y-1 Chapter 3: Strange Whispers

Greetings. As you may or may not know, I am the author of this journal. I was tasked by a man named Phil to chronicle the adventures of Sora and his friends after my world was destroyed.

I made my first appearance in “Origin of the Tickle Monster” (NewscapePro - 2020)

Scythe Cyvotix

First KHY Appearance: Y-1 Chapter 4: Night of Fate (Chapter 4 Overall)

A bio-metallic being who is essentially the mayor of Traverse Town. He helps people get used to being in Traverse Town after their worlds got destroyed. Now he is also helping Sora and his friends on their adventures.

He established himself as the leader in "Avisterra: Fleeing The Shadow" (Mattercell Entertainment - 2020)

Pow-Pow

First KHY Appearance: Y-1 Chapter 4: Night of Fate (Chapter 4 Overall)

An energetic young Choreii gifted with lightning fast super speed. Her world was lost to the Heartless. Luckily, she was able to escape to Traverse Town and become one of the people helping the refugees there. 

She first sped her way on-screen in "Avisterra: Fleeing The Shadow" (Mattercell Entertainment - 2020)

Rush

First KHY Appearance: Y-1 Chapter 4: Night of Fate (Chapter 4 Overall)

A Metasynth that was accidentally programmed with two personalities. The blue one is more calmer and an architect whilst the red one is aggressive and a fighter. He lost his homeworld to the Heartless and is one of the people helping the refugees of Traverse Town.

Both his personalities originated from "Avisterra: Fleeing The Shadow" (Mattercell Entertainment - 2020)

Core Harris

First KHY Appearance: Y-1 Chapter 6: Introductions (Chapter 6 Overall)

A technological specialist who lost his world to the Heartless. Core is most known for the device he uses - the Assimilation Transformation Life-Form Altering System, otherwise known as A.T.L.A.S. This device can change the appearance of its wearer down to their DNA.

Despite being a shape-shifter, he didn't exhibit this quality in "Avisterra: Fleeing The Shadow" (Mattercell Entertainment - 2020)

Bonez

First KHY Appearance: Y-1 Chapter 6: Introductions (Chapter 6 Overall)

A living skeleton that found its way to Traverse Town. He’s a skilled medic as well as a weapons expert. No one is sure why Bonez is a living skeleton…not even Bonez himself!

This mysterious medic first appeared in "Avisterra: Fleeing The Shadow" (Mattercell Entertainment - 2020)

Jay

First KHY Appearance: Y-1 Chapter 6: Introductions (Chapter 6 Overall)

An inventor who escaped to Traverse Town once his world was destroyed. He is a vulgar, yet brilliant inventor who has helped Core build some incredibly advanced works of machinery.

This architect built himself up in "Avisterra: Fleeing The Shadow" (Mattercell Entertainment - 2020)

Bee

First KHY Appearance: Y-1 Chapter 5: The Town of Lost Souls (Chapter 5 Overall)

Bee used to have trouble getting and then keeping a job. That all changed when Puppycat made her his “plus one”. Afterwards she travelled the universe to help people in need. Perhaps it’s because of her adventures with Puppycat, but she has no reaction to some of the stranger inhabitants in Traverse Town, including her boss.

She signed up for work in “Bee and Puppycat Part 1” (Cartoon Hangover - 2013)

Puppycat

First KHY Appearance: Y-1 Chapter 5: The Town of Lost Souls (Chapter 5 Overall)

Bee’s co-worker at the Accessory Shop. He took Bee in when she was down on her luck. When the Heartless invaded their world, he was the one to take the two of them to safety. Despite looking like a pet, he is about as capable and smart as a normal human. 

He began work in “Bee and Puppycat Part 1”(Cartoon Hangover - 2013)

Spons

First KHY Appearance: Y-1 Chapter 5: The Town of Lost Souls (Chapter 5 Overall)

Several unanswered questions surround Spons. Why does he act the way he does? Is he some kind of god? Was he in Traverse Town because his world was destroyed or is he here on his own violation? Why is he a kite? All we can truly say about Spons is that he really enjoys selling merchandise.

Spons first barged in with a sponsor in “The Horrible World of Kinect Games” (Caddicarus - 2021)

Ben Dexter

First KHY Appearance: Y-1 Chapter 5: The Town of Lost Souls (Chapter 5 Overall)

No matter where he is, Ben usually can be found trying to work on his latest film. His films usually have tense action scenes that are not only made without CG, but are usually filmed in one take. The only problem with that is these action scenes usually end up with innocent bystanders being killed whilst filming. Not that that deters him from his passion.

Ben put himself in the director’s seat in “Crash Zoom: Movie Massacre” (TomSka - 2015)

Kate Dexter

First KHY Appearance: Y-1 Chapter 5: The Town of Lost Souls (Chapter 5 Overall)

Though she may look pure and innocent, her true intentions couldn’t be any further than that. Somehow, she got ahold of demon powers and uses them to cause chaos and bloodshed wherever she goes. Though she’s the more powerful of the two, she seems ok with working for Ben.

Kate added her own personal special effects in “Crash Zoom: Movie Massacre” (TomSka - 2015)

Sora’s Mother

First KHY Appearance: Y-1 Chapter 4: Night of Fate (Chapter 4 Overall)

Sora’s mother. Her love for Sora is massive even if it can be embarrassing at times for him. Hopefully she managed to survive her islands falling to darkness like her son.

She made a very brief appearance in “Kingdom Hearts” (Disney - 2002)

THE HEARTLESS:

Shadow

First KHY Appearance: Y-1 Chapter 1: Dive To The Heart (Chapter 1 Overall)

The most common type of Heartless. They sneak up on their opponents from the shadows and strike them with their claws. They are extremely tenacious, with some of them ending up chasing their prey till the end.

They emerged from the shadows in  “Kingdom Hearts”(Disney - 2002)

Soldier

First KHY Appearance: Y-1 Chapter 5: The Town of Lost Souls (Chapter 5 Overall)

Common foot soldiers for the Heartless alongside the Shadows. Their movements are brisk and they tend to attack opponents with a rush move. Thankfully, they aren’t that aggressive towards their opponents. They are usually found in groups, but they lack the use of teamwork.

They swiftly attacked in “Kingdom Hearts” (Disney - 2002)

Darkside

First KHY Appearance: Y-1 Chapter 1: Dive To The Heart (Chapter 1 Overall)

An enormous Heartless that appeared on Destiny Islands. It led the shadows against Sora when he first gained the Keyblade. Despite its defeat, the islands fell to darkness.

It commanded the Heartless in “Kingdom Hearts”(Disney - 2002)

Guard Armor

First KHY Appearance: Y-1 Chapter 7: All For One, One For All (Chapter 7 Overall)

The leader behind the Heartless attacks in Traverse Town. It is made up of multiple pieces that can attack together or individually. Sora met Tommy and Toby right before fighting this Heartless.

It attempted to tag-team Sora in “Kingdom Hearts” (Disney - 2002)

Chapter Text

Sora, Tommy and Toby weren’t sure how long they were waiting for Scythe and his friends to return with parting gifts, but it was longer than they thought it was going to be. What was patiently waiting around for a few minutes turned into the trio just standing by the hangar door in absolute boredom. ‘What’s happening to Scythe and the others that is taking them so long?’ all three of them thought.

Eventually, Toby had an epiphany that could help pass the time. “Y’know, if Scythe and the others are giving you gifts,” he said to Sora. “Me and Tommy might as well give you some as well.”

This caused Sora to perk up and turn to the direction of the speaker. “What kind of gifts?” he asked curiously.

“Well…” the older brunette said. “I have an idea on what to give you, but there’s a small chance that it might end up not working.”

This word of caution only piqued Sora’s interest further. “What is it?” he asked.

“Would you like to learn magic?”

“Learn…magic?” Sora repeated, being some-parts in awe and some-parts confused.

“Just a single basic spell for now.” replied Toby, before briefly pausing. “How about we do a Fire spell, to start off with, huh? To begin, hold your Keyblade out in front of you and point it straight. Try to aim for a wall, as to not accidentally hurt anyone.”

Sora was feeling uncertain. On one hand, before the islands fell to darkness and him summoning his Keyblade for the first time, nothing in his life suggested that he was, in fact, capable of casting magic. On the other, nothing suggested that he would be using a giant key to fight shadow demons and save multiple worlds, and yet here he was.

He ultimately decided to follow Toby’s instructions, if only to see if he was adept at magic. He pointed his Keyblade at a spot on the walls near the Hanger entrance with no people or objects that could get caught in the crossfire. “Now what?” he asked.

“Imagine a flame bursting out from the tip. At least, that was how I figured it out.” the president said.

‘If that was how he learned to do magic, I might as well learn it like that’, thought Sora. He focused on the tip of the Keyblade and imagined flame roaring out of it like a flamethrower. He also closed his eyes as he did it, as if that would increase the chances of it working.

The silence filled with a lack of the noises of a roaring fire were what caused his eyes to open. It didn’t work! A sigh escaped his lips as he was filled with disappointment.

“Don’t worry.” Toby assured him. “I didn’t get it on my first attempt either. Let's try it again. Oh, and don’t close your eyes this time, just in case it works.”

Before continuing, Sora closed his eyes and took a deep breath. He then pointed his Keyblade at the wall and imagined fire coming out of it once again.

This time, flame erupted from the keyblade. It wasn’t like a flamethrower like Sora imagined, but rather a small, yet fast moving fireball. Sora was amazed at what he was able to produce. He had seen magic before, granted, but during those times, he was being attacked so he lacked the time needed to appreciate it. He watched as it hit the wall and dissipated.

It seems like Toby was impressed as well. “I knew that you had the capacity for magic!” he said. “And what do you know? It took you less attempts than I did.”

“Really? How many attempts did it take you?”

“About…” Toby paused, apparently counting the number in his head. “...five days worth, I guess?”

This surprised Sora slightly. The number of attempts was a lot longer than what Sora did. If it took him days to learn one spell, why did it take Sora only two attempts? Did it have something to do with being the Keyblade master?

He tried not to think about it for now, instead turning his head to face Tommy. “Do you have any-?” he began to ask, but stopped once he saw him. He was currently leaning against the wall, but he had fallen asleep from the boredom of waiting.

“Uh, Tommy?” Toby asked, walking towards his friend. As soon as he got up to him, he tapped him on the shoulder to attempt to wake him up.

His attempt was successful and the blonde jerked up moments after. “Huh,what?” he quickly said.

“Sora was wondering if you have anything to teach him.” Toby recapped to his friend.

Come up with something to teach him? Tommy chuckled to himself. That should be easy, right? 

Key-word: Should. 

It turned out to be a lot more difficult than Tommy thought. Sure, he could’ve taught Sora some techniques with his sword, after all, he was talented with it. Unfortunately he had his shield with him at the moment, so that was out of the question. So what did he know that he could pass on to Sora?

After about a minute of thought, he spoke up. “Sora… are you the athletic type?”

“Yeah - I did parkour races a lot back at the islands. Why’d you ask?” Sora questioned.

“Just wanted confirmation for something.” Tommy said, smiling. “Want to know how to Dodge Roll?”

“Uh…what’s a Dodge Roll?” Sora asked, seeming less excited to learn this than to learn magic, but still curious.

“I feel like it’ll be best if I show you.” Tommy then began to crouch down before stopping. “You should copy me, that’ll make learning it easier.” he suggested.

Sora nodded and began to copy the pose Tommy was in. After that, he made sure to look intently at him, to make sure he gets everything correct.

He observed Tommy’s movements. After crouching, he rolled a short distance forwards before immediately standing back up once it ended. Shortly after Tommy finished his demonstration, Sora copied his movements. Crouch, roll, and stand up, though his wasn’t as quick as Tommy’s was. That made sense though, given that this was his first attempt at this.

“That was good!” praised Tommy. “Make sure to use that to avoid getting hit by opponents, it could be a lifesaver later on.”

It seemed like teaching Sora these new tricks was a great way to occupy time as a few minutes later, Scythe and his friends finally showed up, each carrying an object with them.

“Sorry that we took so long.” Scythe apologized. “We just had to get everything we needed ready.”

Most of the gifts weren’t much to talk about. Bonez, Jay and Rush gave them a few Potions, a few cubes made of a blue jelly-like substance called Ethers, and one small golden globe with star and moon markings and a spiky top called an Elixir respectively. Both Scythe and Pow-Pow got them accessories, one of them was known as Brave Warrior, a thin silver ring with a blue orb attached and the other was a Thunder Ring, a black ring with a silver ornament with a thunder symbol etched in. According to Scythe, both of them could make Sora stronger but Brave Warrior would increase the user’s strength while the Thunder Ring would nullify certain types of damage.

The most interesting gift was the ones that Core held. He opened up a dark-green rectangular box, within it were 6 metal gauntlets with a green, glowing screen of them. They were lined up to form 3 horizontal lines and 2 vertical.

“These are A.T.L.A.S. Gauntlets.” Core explained. “For most worlds, humans are a common sight to see. But there will be some worlds where that is not the case. That is where these will come in. These will be able to turn you into something that fits the world you’re in more closely, right down to the DNA.”

As he’s explaining this, he takes three of them out of the box to give one each to the trio. Instead of admiring them like Sora and Tommy were, Toby made a mental connection. “Wait. Was this how you were able to transform back there?” he asked.

“Yep!” Core responded. “As I am currently, I’m not really combat-proficient. Things change when I become a Walrinian like you saw back there.” 

“A few more things of note before we continue,” he continued. “First, while there are three of you, I’ll give you six just so you could have extras. Secondly, whilst mine I can manipulate, yours will be more automatic. That way, you won’t accidentally mess up the technology and will always be in the necessary form.”

The final gift that they gave was from the whole group. It was a bag containing small and medium sized yellow gems. According to Scythe, they were called “munny" and they too can change from world to world, camouflaging itself to fit the currency of that world. “Make sure that you don’t spend it all, because those will be the only ones we’re giving you,” he added.

After putting the bag of munny in his pocket, Toby turned towards Sora. “Do you want to head out now or do you want to wait to prepare some more beforehand?” he asked.

It took Sora only a second to think. The doubt from earlier was still lingering in his mind. Despite that, he still wanted to go see the other worlds. “I think I’m ready to go,” he responded. He then turned to face Scythe and his friends. “I guess this is goodbye, then.” he said with a hint of melancholy.

“Yeah, for now at least.” Scythe said. “You’re always welcome to come back here to visit whenever you want.”

“Thanks.” the spiky brunette said, a soft smile on his face. “I’ll make sure to keep that in mind.”

The three of them waved goodbye as they turned to enter the Hangar door, with Scythe and his friends waving back.

As soon as Sora went through the door, he stopped again, only to marvel at the Gummi Ship. It was certainly different from what he thought a spaceship looked like. He thought that they would be sleek and monochromatic, whilst this one was more bulky and colorful.

Tommy noticed that Sora had stopped to gawk. “Hey!” he called out, getting Sora’s attention. “If you’re going to be amazed by this, at least keep walking while you do it.”

Sora began moving to catch up with Tommy and Toby, but he still kept on marveling towards the Gummi Ship. After all, he never was this close to a spaceship, nor had he seen one in real life ever before this. It felt unreal how massive it was compared to him.

“Your ship…looks amazing.” The spiky-haired boy admitted. “What’s it called?”

“Oh, we haven’t really come up with a proper name for the Gummi Ship,” said Toby. “We just got it recently and we didn’t really have the time to think about it. You can name it if you want.”

This got the boy excited. He always wanted to name the vessel that was responsible for taking him and his friends to other worlds, he lost that chance when he was beaten by Riku, but now he has it again. Finally, Sora will be captain of the Excalibur!

But…it didn’t feel right. 

That lingering doubt that he wouldn’t find his friends was still eating away at him. He didn’t want that to be true, but what if it was? He decided to let Riku have this one. That way, if he didn’t end up finding his friends, the memories of them will still live on in the name. “OK, then. How about Highwind?”

“Highwind…” Tommy repeated. “That’s good. You came up with that yourself?”

“No.” Sora answered, a small forlorn smile across his face. “A friend gave me that idea.”

When they finally reached the cockpit, Sora noticed that someone was sitting in one of the chairs taking notes. She was watching something on two different screens. He couldn’t exactly figure out what she was watching, though it seemed to be through someone’s eyes.

“Molly, we’re back.” said Toby, as he and Tommy went to sit in their chairs.

The woman stopped writing notes as she turned to face the trio, to which she extended a hand towards Sora. “Nice to meet you, Sora.” she said.

“Nice to…” Sora began as he headed over to shake her hand, before stopping as he realized something. “Wait, how did you know my name?”

“Right, they didn’t tell you.” she muttered under her breath. “Before the two of them headed out into Traverse Town, I injected some nano-cameras into them that I’ve connected onto these screens. Basically whatever they see and hear, I can too even though I’m on the ship.” Molly explained as she motioned towards the screens.

It was then that Sora realized what was being broadcasted onto the screens she was watching. It was from the perspectives of someone, they were from Tommy and Toby’s! He whipped his head around numerous times, going from looking at the screens to his friends as he was mentally processing this new piece of information. “Really? That’s cool!” he exclaimed after a few seconds.

“Molly’s going to give some to you as well, but only after we’ve taken off. Speaking of which…” Toby said, before turning to face the console. “Sam, we’re just about ready to go.”

“Roger that, Mr. President.” Sam’s voice said from a speaker in the cockpit.

“President?!” Sora repeated in shock, more interested in the title that Toby had rather than who Sam was. He didn’t know that he would be travelling the universe with a world leader!

“Yep! I’m kind of a big deal back home.” Toby answered. “Anyways, buckle your seatbelt and keep it like that until we have finished with takeoff.”

Sora shook off his shock and buckled himself in, being the last of the four to do so. Shortly afterwards, the massive ship began to levitate off of the floor and it began to fly out of the hangar with tremendous speed. Thankfully, all the passengers were buckled up, so the only thing they felt was the rush when the ship began takeoff.

A few short minutes later, The Highwind got into a pace that allowed its four inhabitants to freely walk around. It was now that Molly was able to inject the nanocameras into him. As she did, he asked her a question that had been on his mind for a short while. “So why exactly do you need to do this? Why not just leave the ship and travel with them?”

“Phil put me onto this mission so I could document your adventures. As for why I’m not travelling on the ground with you, I know how dangerous it is out there with the Heartless roaming around and I’m terrible when it comes to combat.” As she says this, she takes the needle out of Sora. “So, instead I put these in you and then I connect them to these screens, where I can see what’s happening and write them down.” Molly continued as she gestured towards the screens.

She then sat at a seat near Sora, pulling out her notebook and pen yet again. “I was wondering - I only managed to catch Tommy and Toby’s side of the story. Could I by any chance hear what your side was?”

“I guess so…” was Sora's response. Guess it couldn’t hurt to tell them, he thought. He began telling her about what it was like on his homeworld before the Heartless had ravaged it then continued on to discuss what happened and the friends that he met once he got to Traverse Town. Tommy and Toby listened in to the conversation as well, mainly because since Sam was piloting the ship, they had nothing else to do except look out of the cockpit to see the stars.

Something that stood out to the three was how much Sora was revealing to them. When they talked before getting to Traverse Town, they didn’t reveal much, each for their own reasons for doing so. So the fact that Sora was very open about what he went through was disarming to them.

After Sora finished his story, nothing much really happened for the next few hours. During that time, Sora occupied himself by marveling at what he saw outside of the cockpit. He was excited, and why wouldn’t he be? After all these years of wanting to leave home to see what happened beyond his islands, he finally got the chance. Albeit, it hadn’t happened exactly as he or his friends had wanted it, leaving his completed dream covered in a bittersweet filter. Perhaps if I can find my friends, they could join me on this adventure as well, Sora thought to himself.

Soon, the Highwind began to slow down until it eventually stopped, staying in place. The reason for this was in front of the ship, for a new world laid in front of them. It was dotted in buildings, giving the feel of it being a metropolis. Despite there being skyscrapers depicted across the surface, one building was standing out to the group. It was a rather wide building with orange roofing. The middle of it held an upwards extension that didn’t appear to be a second floor or an attic, but rather a raised ceiling.

Once again, Sora was staring with intrigue. It was the first time that he had ever seen another world from the outside before. Though its appearance was confusing to him. He had globes back at Destiny Islands which depicted his home as a ball of water dotted with green, white and tan masses of land. He thought that all worlds were similar to that in appearance, though that was proven false at this moment. He wondered what appearance other worlds had, like Traverse Town or Destiny Islands.

“So this is where we’re stopping first, huh?” Toby asked. “Well, it’s about as good a place to begin as any.”

“Before you guys head off though…” Molly said, attempting to get the trio’s attention. “There’s a very important thing that you must know. You can’t let anyone know that you’re from another world.”

“Really?” asked Sora. “Why’s that?”

“Each world has its own separate system of beliefs.” She began to explain. “What may be common knowledge in one world can be regarded as pure fiction in the next. If the inhabitants of one world are introduced to the beliefs another has, no matter how long it takes, the only thing it can lead to would be chaos and conflict. That means that it’ll be best to not interact with anyone unless the Heartless are involved.”

“You seem to know a lot about world-travelling.” Tommy said. “Was world-travelling a common occurrence where you came from?”

“N-Not really.” Molly responded, looking away and yet again keeping things vague as a wistfulness was added to her voice. The others decided not to push further as it seemed to be a sensitive topic to her.

“There’s something else you guys should know about.” the voice of Sam came out from the speakers yet again. “Before you took off from New L’manberg, I took the liberty of checking the ship from top to bottom to see if it had any useful in its arsenal. As it turns out, this thing can scan a world and get back some information on that world. That could help you guys with blending in.”

“Well then, what are we waiting for?” exclaimed Tommy. “Activate the scanner and let’s see what it pulls up!”

“I already have.” answered Sam, sounding annoyed at the exclamation. “Unfortunately, the information it was able to get was limited, meaning you’ll have to work with the bare minimum that it pulled up.”

“That’s alright, Sam.” Toby said. “Tell us what you were able to find.”

“Well, the name for this world you’re about to land in? It’s called Sweet Jazz City.” Sam informed them. “Some of its inhabitants called Inscribed possess a special power, known as their Epithet.”

“Wait.” Sora interrupted. “Are you telling me that this world is full of superheroes?” The excitement in his voice was becoming more apparent as he went on.

“Not really.” Sam replied, slightly deflating Sora’s bubble. “Think of them more as people who happen to have super-powers, rather than people with superpowers.”

So Sam was saying that the inhabitants are more like ordinary people that happen to have gotten powers. Sora could relate to that, that’s how he got the Keyblade after all. Sora’s current train of thought was cut off however, as another one quickly replaced it. “Wait…if no one’s supposed to know about other worlds, how do we even get down there in the first place?” he asked.

Sam scoffed. “That’s easy, just press the big blue button on the top right of the control panel, that should take you easily.”

All of them turned their heads to see the button Sam had mentioned. “That’s… that’s all we have to do?” questioned Tommy, who thought that it would be more complex than that.

“Somewhat.” The plant man replied. “Once the button is pressed, it’ll teleport anyone within a close radius of it down to the world to a location that the ship has predetermined.”

Sam’s explanation satisfied Tommy’s curiosity. But his curiosity was quickly replaced by dread when he began thinking about the implications of what ‘predetermined’ entailed. “Wait. You mean we won’t know where we are going to touch down?!”

“Don’t worry.” Sam began to reassure him. “The ship will make sure that you’ll touch down somewhere both safe and discreet.”

Tommy sighed. “Alright, guess I’ll trust you on this.” he said.

Before the three of them could leave, Molly made sure she was outside of the button’s teleportation range. Afterwards, Sam spoke up once more. “One last thing, whenever you want to head back, look for a small glowing spot on the floor nearby, step on that and it will take you back to the ship.” 

“Thanks for that, Sam.” replied Toby.

And with that, the blue button was pressed. They were ready to head down and to explore their first new world on their journey.

However, they were not ready for the blinding white flash that appeared afterwards.

It ended up blinding the trio, if only briefly. They ended up blinking rapidly trying to regain their vision afterward.

“From now on, when teleporting to and from the ship, can we all agree to close our eyes beforehand so this shit doesn’t happen again?” said Tommy.

“Yep.” Both Toby and Sora said.

Once they fully regained their vision, they looked around to determine where they were. They seem to have landed in a lobby of some sort of building. There was a receptionist’s desk nearby as well as some different colored chairs across the room from it. Opposite of the doors was a fountain that was topped with a stone angel playing the harp. Currently, they were the only ones in that room.

“So Sam wasn’t lying about the place being safe to land after all.” Tommy said as he was looking around. “But where did the ship put us?”

“Given those advertisements over there and how fancy this place is, it must be some kind of museum.” Sora said, pointing to the walls near the angel fountain which held advertisements for Animal, Desert, Dinosaur and History exhibits. As he did, a new thought entered his brain. Could this have been the building that he saw when they first saw the world?

“There’s no one here…” Toby stated, pointing out the lack of people where they have landed. “Is this place closed?”

“Well, that just makes no sense.” Tommy said. “Why on earth would the Highwind send us to a closed museum?”

Their pondering was interrupted when Sora shushed the two. He did for good reason, as when they quieted down, she heard the faint sounds of voices, presumably coming from another room of the museum. Given where they were compared to them, they couldn’t quite make out what they were saying.

“Maybe it has something to do with whoever’s over there?” Sora suggested.

“Perhaps that is the case.” Toby said. After that, Sora began to head towards the voices but Toby stopped him before he went far. “Wait, that doesn’t mean that you can rush in like that. You remember what Molly told us.”

Right. They weren’t allowed to meddle in other people’s affairs, at least until the Heartless were involved. But curiosity was getting the better of him, so Sora attempted to bargain. “Can we at least check to see what they’re talking about? Maybe it's about the Heartless.”

Toby sighed. He was already deviating from his mission by helping Sora look for his friends. Listening to a conversation couldn’t hurt that much, right? “Alright. We’ll go and check. But it has to be from a distance, all right?”

“Got that.” said Sora, a small grin on his face.

And with that, they begin to head towards the voices.

The museum wasn’t very massive, so it was easy to follow the source of the voices. By following it, they eventually found their way towards the Dinosaur exhibit. Making sure that they stayed hidden, they looked in by peeking their head through the entrance.

When they did, they could make out the shapes of a few figures, a majority of them behind an orange wall, seemingly made of glass. The only one that wasn’t behind the wall was an incredibly well-built man with caramel-colored skin covered in tattoos and white hair being formed in a rather unique style of mohawk. The only clothes he wore were pants and shoes, both were black with orange highlights.

A bunch of figures behind the glass were knocked out with the only exception being two people. One was a tall and lanky man with pink hair. His clothes were yellow with white boots and a cape, giving him the appearance of a Hero or Villain who just stepped out of a Silver Age Era comic book. Upon further notice, the knocked-out figures were also wearing similar attire, suggesting some kind of affiliation. The second figure was a girl with dark skin, who appeared to be a few years Sora’s junior. She wore a brown bear hoodie with the hood being down to show an afro decorated with differently-colored stars as well as a backpack that was probably bear-themed as well. Sora had a strange feeling that the girl was familiar to him, which couldn’t be correct as he never saw anyone from another world before what he could presume was a few days ago.

It seemed that the voices they heard were the three of them having some conversation, one that so far hadn’t been interrupted by their presence being noticed. Given how close they were, they could now clearly hear the conversation at hand.

“Listen, you wanna protect your boss right?” The man behind the glass (it was at least glass-like) asked.

“More than anything!” The buff man said, who seemed to be interested in what he had to say.

“Well…” the pink-haired man said as he got closer to the glass. “You’d better go back there right now before the REALLY dangerous thing gets her!”

This caught the three’s attention! “Does that mean that the Heartless are here?” Sora asked, whispering so only he, Tommy and Toby could hear.

“Could be.” responded Toby. “Let’s wait and find out though, just to make sure. We wouldn’t want to end up meddling.” And with that, they continued to listen in.

The muscular man seemed worried about this information as well, which made sense given how devoted he is to his boss. “What is this really dangerous thing?!” he asked.

“Uh…uh…” the man behind the glass flustered. It seemed strange to the trio why he didn’t have the name of them off the top of his head, given how deadly he was making it seem. After a few seconds, he answered with a “Q-Quicksand?”

It was then that Sora, Tommy and Toby realized that he was just making the tales of something dangerous up, presumably as a way to escape whatever his current predicament was. The man on the other side hasn’t seemed to figure this out yet.

“Guess the Heartless aren’t here then.” Toby whispered, before beginning to walk away. “Come on, let’s head back to the ship, there doesn’t seem to be anything in this world for us.” Tommy and Sora shortly followed.

While both the New L’manbergians were fine with just leaving the world now, Sora was a bit more hesitant. He wanted to know more about how the situation they saw came to be, why the figures were behind the glass and if they deserved it or not. But he wouldn’t be able to do so without interfering. The only way he could know more would be whatever pieces of the conversation he’ll catch on the way back to the ship.

While he was listening, he was able to hear two things. The first was another voice speaking up, presumably the girl’s. “No! It’s…it’s those!” she said, seemingly covering up for the man contained behind the glass with her, with the last part of the sentence indicating that she was pointing at something that was in the room.

The second were noises that sent chills down his spine. He had heard those sounds before. That was the sound of the Heartless teleporting into a room!

Without a second thought, Sora bounded back towards the exhibit, Keyblade now in hand. This didn’t go unnoticed by his friends. “Wait, Sora! Hold on!” exclaimed Tommy, but Sora didn’t stop, forcing them to chase after him.

When they entered the room, they saw that the three from earlier weren’t the only ones there anymore. A group of Heartless had now appeared consisting of multiple Shadows and Soldiers as well as a singular member of another Heartless species, the Large Body. It was about as tall as the muscular man, was very rotund and the only pieces of armor it wore were the manacles on each hand and a tiny helmet atop its head.

Though the people behind the glass-like object appeared shaken by the sudden appearance of the monsters, the muscular man didn’t show such fear towards them, instead showcasing more of a seriousness that he didn’t have before. “So you’re the dangerous things that threaten Lady Mera. By the will of My Lady, I’ll make sure you’ll never lay a finger on her.”

Sora then rushed onto the scene, with Tommy and Toby following suit. “Hey, you need help dealing with these?”  

The white-haired man turned to face the newcomers. “Hm? Ah, greetings newcomers. I would very much appreciate the assistance in this battle.”

And with that, the four of them began to fight the Heartless. Tommy made the first attack by slicing a Shadow in two with his shield before it could even move to attack him. Sora was fighting various Shadows and Soldiers one-on-one while Toby used a spell to summon lightning bolts from nowhere to get rid of a lot of them at once, instantly downing the Shadows and merely stunning the Soldiers.

The muscular man also made an attempt to fight though his method of fighting was a lot less effective. With a cry of “BARRIER!”, he formed a circular orange shield that looked like it was made of similar material as the glass wall that contained the two other figures. While it was great for blocking the attacks the Heartless attempted to make on him, there was really not that much else he could do.

This didn’t go unnoticed as Tommy briefly stopped fighting and looked over at him. “You aren’t really useful in combat situations, are you?” he asked. So he has the ability to make shields? Tommy’s currently using a shield to fight, and he can still dish out damage!

“I am more of a guardian type.” the man admitted. “Which makes sense for someone with the Epithet of Barrier like me.”

Tommy just sighed and went back to fighting. By the time he did, only a couple of Soldiers and the Large Body remained. No one had attempted to hit it as they wanted to get rid of the smaller, more weaker ones first. Due to the lack of inactivity towards it, it had silently fallen asleep standing upright.

That was all about to change as Sora attempted to land a hit on it while it was sleeping. To his surprise however, his attacks only bounced off its gigantic rotund body. The only thing the attack managed to do was wake it up.

“It - It just bounced off!” Sora said, shocked. Why did it not take any damage? It couldn’t be because of what it was made of, they had just fought the Guard Armor, a giant Heartless made of metal and they were able to damage it then.

He didn’t have time to think about it further at the moment, as the Large Body began to attack him, swiping one of its manacled hands towards him. Sora managed to use the Dodge Roll Tommy taught him earlier to move out of its attack path.

Maybe magic was the only thing able to take it out? As an attempt to test that hypothesis, Sora aimed and launched a Fire spell towards the Large Body. But to his dismay, it was about as effective as his Keyblade strikes.

“Seriously, is this thing invincible?!” Sora yelled, exasperated that none of his attempts at dealing damages were working out.

At this time, the Large Body began to charge towards Sora. He dodge-rolled out of the way once more, still feeling frustrated. Was there really no way to damage this thing?

Whilst Sora was having difficulties defeating the Large Body, the rest were taking out the remaining Heartless. After Toby finished out the last Soldier, the three turned to face Sora, who was still dodging its attacks while trying to uncover some way to damage it.

“Need any help?” said Toby, as he and the others began to get closer to him.

“Lots of it.” Sora admitted. “Every time I land an attack on it, it never seems to affect it.”

The muscular man had his hand on his chin as if he was deep in thought. Suddenly an idea struck him. “What if its protection was like a barrier?” he said.

The others looked at him in confusion. “What?” said Tommy, dumbfounded at what he just heard.

“A barrier can protect someone from one side, but leave them defenseless on the other.” the man explained.

Was he saying that he should attack it from behind? At this point, Sora was ready to take whatever ideas he could to beat the large Heartless so he gave it a chance. He made sure to quickly circle the Large Body, and before it could turn around and attack, Sora slashed its back.

This time, there was an actual reaction as a roar of pain escaped its lips. The pained roar changed into a roar of fury as it turned to face the boy who attacked it, stomping its feet and literally turned red with rage!

Before it could attack however, Toby managed to cast a Fire spell that would end up finishing off the Large Body. It didn’t seem so powerful now that its weakness had been exposed.

“You think after the first time that it would’ve learned not to turn its back on its enemies.” remarked Tommy.

Now the room had been cleared of Heartless, the four fighting began to regain themselves. As they did, Sora turned to face the muscular man. “Thanks, uh…” he began to realise before remembering something. “We never got your name, sir.”

The man grinned. “My name is Indus Tarbella and my epithet is BARRIER!” he shouted whilst he flexed. “Besides, I should owe you thanks. By vanquishing those monsters, you helped me save my lady from harm.”

Indus then turned to face the man and girl behind the Barrier wall. “I appreciate your warning about these creatures, but they aren’t a problem anymore now that they’ve been dealt with.” he said, now speaking in his usual more gentler tone.

“So are you going to let us go then?” the salmon haired man asked. “After all, we did give you that free tip about those…uh.” He leaned over to look at Sora and his friends, as if he was asking for them to tell them the name of those monsters. Indus hadn’t picked it up. Seems as though the idea he had to combat the Large Body was just a fluke.

They hesitated a while before speaking. Did they really want to tell him what those creatures were called? At the end, they figured that they should. If the Heartless were going to be attacking multiple worlds, it would only be fair if they at least knew what they were fighting against. “Heartless.” Toby said.

“Ah, yes! The Heartless.” The man said, acting as this was information that he already knew of. “Glad that these strangers came to help otherwise you would’ve…” He stopped and leaned over again.

“Had your heart stolen.” This time, it was Tommy who said it.

“Had your heart stolen!” he continued. The grin on his face briefly went away as he realized what he just said, before carrying on like normal. “P-point is, we warned you about and she saved your lady from harm. That gives you two favors you owe us, which is clearly more than your one order, right?”

“Yeah, that’s the rules!” the girl chimed in.

“I…I guess that makes sense.” Indus said. He then began to walk towards his barrier and slightly lowered its height, before picking the man and the girl up by their necks like kittens and putting them down on the other side. “I’ll be keeping a watch over you though, just to make sure you don’t plan on hurting Lady Mera.”

“You really just going to stay here?” the man asked. “Even with those creatures running around?”

“There’s MORE?!” Indus cried in shock.

“Possibly.” the salmon-haired man said, shrugging as he did. “But you wouldn’t want to risk that chance, right?”

Indus then began to turn his head back and forth, from looking at the two to the exit of the room, clearly unsure about where he should go. “Stay here and don’t cause any trouble.” he finally said, as he pointed at them before running out of the room shouting “I’M COMING, LADY MERA!”

The man chuckled and the girl next to him looked less proud about what happened. “Now that that is out of the way…” he says, before turning to face the trio. “Who are you three and why are you in the museum?”

“Funny, we could ask the same for you.” Tommy said, arms crossed. Despite the little bit of help they gave explaining the Heartless, they still didn’t trust the two due to the lack of knowledge they had about why they were imprisoned behind that barrier.

The man scoffed. “You tell me that you haven’t heard of GIOVANNI POTAGE, CAPTAIN OF THE BANZAI BLASTERS?!” He attempted to dramatically pose while exclaiming this, but failed when he nearly tripped over his own cape.

“Captain of the Banzai Blasters?” Sora repeated as he and the two New L’manbergians tilted their heads in confusion. “Is that some kind of football team?”

“Some kind of - we’re not a football team, WE’RE A CRIMINAL ORGANIZATION!” Giovanni corrected him. “We don’t make field goals, we make crime.”

“Criminals, huh?” Sora said, before drawing his weapon. “Then you must be up to no good.” Tommy and Toby also drew out their weapons and so did Giovanni, pulling out what seemed to be a makeshift weapon consisting of a baseball bat with a knife taped to the end.

This time, the young girl spoke up. “Wait!” she said. “He’s not the real threat here!”

If what she was saying was meant to stop Sora, Tommy and Toby from attacking Giovanni, then it worked. It caused them to hesitate as they went to look at her. “What do you mean?” Toby asked.

“We’re not the only people here.” she said. “Indus is working under someone, someone who’s trying to steal my Epithet!”

“Steal your Epithet?” Sora repeated, shocked. He knew that people in this world had super-powers, but stealing super-powers wasn’t anything that crossed his mind. “How’re they going to do that?”

“They’re trying to find this thing called the Arsene Amulet to steal Epithets.” she explained. “It’s somewhere in the museum and they really seem invested in taking mine. That’s why we were put behind the barrier, they didn’t want us to interfere.”

They weren’t sure whether the girl was lying or not, but what she said made sense to them. It seemed obvious as to why Giovanni was trapped behind there, with him being a criminal and all, but they never really stopped to think why the girl was behind there. Maybe Indus’s master was why the Heartless came here, being attracted to their darkness?

“Yeah, but why does that mean that we can’t also stop him?” Tommy asked as he pointed to Giovanni. “He could also try to steal the amulet for himself.”

“Of course I could.” Giovanni said. “But if I were to get my hands on it, I’m not going to use it to steal epithets, if that’s what you’re worried about.”

That soothed the three, but only slightly. “So, what’re we supposed to do with him?” asked Tommy. “Are we just supposed to leave him be?”

“Well…” Giovanni said, turning to face the unconscious bodies still behind the barrier. “I am in need of some new minions, and it seems like you guys would fit in quite nicely.”

“And why would you think we’d ever be henchmen to a criminal?” asked Toby.

This caused Giovanni to chuckle. “You guys really think you’re so noble? Well news flash, you are currently within a museum after closing, meaning you’re breaking and entering! You’re no more of a criminal then I am!”

That…didn’t really line up logically for Sora, Tommy and Toby. Sure, he was right in that they were breaking and entering - something that didn’t even cross their minds before now - but that doesn’t make them as much of a criminal as Giovanni.

“Could you give us a moment to think about it?” Sora asked. Surprisingly, Giovanni let them, and with that the three made sure that they were slightly further away from the two and huddled.

“So what should we do now?” Sora asked in a whisper to his friends.

“Do we really have to humor this guy and be his minions?” Tommy questioned. “We can probably stop Indus and his master from stealing the amulet on our own.”

“I think so too but…” Sora said. “But I think that we should still go with them. The Heartless could still be roaming around the museum and I’m not sure how long they can handle them on their own.”

Toby sighed. “Sora’s right.” he whispered. “We might as well stick with them.”

And with that, the huddle was broken. “We’ve decided that we’ll accept your offer.” Toby said.

Giovanni chuckled. “I knew you’d accept it.” he said(he actually didn’t know, he was just saying it to sound cool). “Now, what are your names?”

The three introduced themselves to him, and were a little confused when Giovanni scoffed at that information. “First, Bear Trap had “Molly”, and now you guys. It’s like people don’t even try to name their kids evilly nowadays.” he complained. “Looks like I have to come up with names for you guys too.”

He then began to look at the three all over, as if looking for clues to help him come up with names. Eventually he came up with “Spike-Key” for Sora, “Sting” for Toby and “Guardian” for Tommy.

Giovanni grinned. “Now that that is out of the way…” he says. “We need to establish a secret base, and once we do, we can come up with a plan to swoop in and GRAB THAT AMULET!”

“Wait, why do we need to make a base here?” Sora asked. “Surely, your organization has their own headquarters.”

Giovanni scoffed once again. “Of course they do!” he said. “What kind of organization doesn’t? It’s just that I’m not leaving unless I take something valuable like that amulet. Otherwise, I’ll just get branded as a failure.”

That did make sense for Sora and the others.

Before the five of them left the room, Giovanni turned and placed his hand on the barrier, looking longingly towards his unconscious minions. “Wait for me, my boys.” he said, his words now a hushed whisper, a contrast to his normal voice. “I shall return to you.” This did not go unnoticed to the others, but they chose not to speak up about it.

As they left with Giovanni and Molly (that seemed to be the girl’s real name), Sora, Tommy and Toby were feeling conflicted on what they stumbled into. On one hand, they’re teaming up with someone who’s openly admitting to being a criminal. However, on the other hand, they’re teaming up to prevent someone from taking it with possibly worse intentions than Giovanni had. Besides, that brief moment of caring towards his minions hinted that he wasn’t all that bad. It seemed like for now only time would tell if their decision was a good one or not.

- - -

Meanwhile, in another part of the museum, in a storage room covered in opened boxes, two people were talking. One of them was Indus Tarbella and the other was his master. She was on the shorter side and had long blue hair. She wore a sand-colored vest and ripped purple jeans. Her skin was an unnatural pale-blue color and she looked rather frail.

“Let me get this straight, Indus…” the woman said, sounding cross. “You left the prisoners that I specifically told you to guard because you wanted to protect me from… creatures that could steal my heart?” She was in complete disbelief. Sure, Indus could be daft at times, but she never expected him to disobey orders as badly as this.

Indus didn’t seem to notice he was in trouble, despite the fact his master’s tone was making it obvious. “Of course, Lady Mera! Thankfully, the prisoners were kind enough to warn me about them.”

A smile then crawled up on Mera’s face, though it didn’t seem genuine. “Oh, I get it. The little girl must’ve used her “Dumb” epithet to make you STUPID enough for you to believe these campfire tales!” she said, her anger becoming more and more apparent as her sentence continued.

“But, Lady Mera!” Indus exclaimed. “They weren’t fake. I saw them with my own eyes! Three more people even came in and got rid of them.”

“Three more people?” the woman repeated. “There’s more thieves to deal with?! WHY DIDN’T YOU TELL ME THAT, INDUS?!”

“Honestly, I thought the heart-stealing shadow monsters were the more important issue.” the man admitted.

Mera growled. “That’s just great! Now we got even more thieves searching for the amulet. We don’t even know if it’s even in the collection yet!” She would kick one of the nearby boxes over in rage, but decided against it. She didn’t want to end up breaking another toe after all.

It was at this moment when a third voice, a more snooty one, inserted itself into the conversation. “Not here either, huh? This is starting to feel like a waste of my time.”

“Tell me about it…” Mera groaned under her breath. It took her a few seconds to realize the fact that the voice was unfamiliar to her. “Wait. Who said that?” she said as she turned to face the source of the new voice. At this point, Indus had already turned around to face the stranger as well, hackles in the air.

The stranger was standing in the shadows of the room. He didn’t step out yet, so it was hard to discern any physical details about him. The only thing they were able to figure out is that he had large round glasses, and that was only due to a glint of light briefly flashing on them.

“Step aside, Lady Mera.” Indus said, showcasing another rare moment of seriousness. “I’ll take care of this thief for you.” He then pointed his finger towards the stranger rather dramatically. “In the name of my Lady, you shall face my FIST!”

After his declaration, he ran towards the stranger, as if in an attempt to bowl him over. However, he missed, the only contact he made of him was him rubbing across his shoulder. As they briefly connected, a golden powder came off of the stranger and landed on Indus.

He stopped running shortly after the dust got on him. Before he could attack again, he began to feel woozy. The last thing he said before losing consciousness was “Did…did I get him?” and the last thing he heard was the stranger’s smug answer of “Nope.” Shortly afterward, he fell down onto the floor of the storage room, a stream of drool pouring from his mouth.

Mera sighed. It was a sigh of both exasperation and relief. If the stranger hadn’t interrupted them, she might’ve been strangling Indus for his stupidity. “And just who are you supposed to be? Another thief?” she asked

The snooty voice spoke up again. “I take it you’re referring to those Banzai Blasters that I saw knocked out near the entrance? No…I have nothing to do with them. I’m simply…an interested party.”

With that, he finally stepped out of the shadows, revealing his appearance. Besides his large glasses, he had fluffy salmon-colored hair and wore a white jacket above his yellow hoodie. He also appeared to be rather young.

Despite the stranger’s young appearance, Mera didn’t let her guard down. His epithet could take her down if she’s not careful. “And what exactly are you “interested” in, kid?” she asked.

That question seemed to have set the stranger off, his normally smug attitude briefly wavering. “I’M NOT A KID! MY NAME…” he stopped and composed himself before continuing on as if nothing had happened. “...is Dr. Sylvester Ashling. I’m a psychologist investigating how epithets interact with a person’s psyche.” he said, as he began to walk closer to Mera. “I heard your lackey talk about the amulet during your tour earlier, and I was hoping to get a look at it myself.”

The blue-haired woman wasn’t sure if the doctor knew anything about their true intentions or why they were here, so she decided to keep the facade up, just in case he didn’t. “Well…” she said, clasping her hands together. “The exhibit’s not open yet so how about you go home and wait a few weeks like everyone else?”

Sylvester hmph’d at that. “Waiting behind red tape is for the general public. I figure there’s no harm in trying to get an academic preview! That’s what you’re doing, after all. Isn’t it?”

“Uh…R-Right!” she said. Relief flooded her body. So he didn’t know anything after all. He thinks that her and Indus are looking for the amulet because they are fellow scholars. It was then when a plan had begun forming in her hand. Sure it involves having to deal with this little shit for a little while longer, but it’ll be worth it.

“But as you can see, my assistant’s abilities are currently a little lacking.” Mera says, acting innocent as she motions towards the sleeping Indus. “With all these Banzai Blasters running around, I don’t know if I’ll be able to keep the amulet safe! Of course…If I had someone more competent willing to take care of them, I might just let them take a look at the amulet once I’ve found it.” She turned her back on him, if only to grin as her bait had been set.

And it seems that Slyvester was taking it. “So…if I apprehend these thieves, you’ll give me time to study the amulet?” he muttered to himself as he began pacing.

He wasn’t muttering quietly enough, as Mera heard him just fine. “Yeah, that’s right. But they’re pretty strong, you might not be able to handle them, kid!” she said, pretending to try and sway him away.

“I-I told you before, I’m not a kid!” the salmon-haired boy retorted before reverting back to his snarky personality, placing his fingers on the bridge of his glasses. “And trust me, if I’m the one dealing with those thieves? They’ll be out cold before they have a chance to make the same mistake!” He then began to laugh. It might’ve been an attempt to appear threatening on his part, but it ended up coming across as annoying more than anything.

Mera rolled her eyes at this. Despite his snarky personality waning on her however, she smiled as he began to exit. Sure there might be a chance at him failing, but that didn’t matter. Either way, he might just buy her enough time to locate the Amulet, and then, it’ll all be over.

Chapter Text

“Alright!” Giovanni announced. “Fort Cool Guy is now complete!”

The others stared at his handiwork, not being sure what to say. They knew that Giovanni wanted to have a base in the museum but they never thought that he was going to be making it. The base itself isn’t really one to talk about, being made out of only two large ribbons that he tied onto two bear statues that he moved from the animal exhibit.

Tommy was the first to speak up. “Were the bears really necessary?” he asked. Sure, Giovanni was making due with the objects that were around the museum but there were definitely some other stuff that he could’ve used to wrap the ribbons around.

“Of course the bears were necessary.” retorted Giovanni. “They’re meant to be symbols to try to scare off those Heartless things… like those lion statue things at shrines.”

Sora, Toby and Tommy weren’t exactly sure if the Heartless could even feel scared, but decided not to speak up about it.

Giovanni then cleared his throat. “Now before we can continue, you four are now the newest recruits to the Banzai Blasters, meaning that you should dress like one. Normally, we get uniforms for you in our sizes, but we have to stay here to take the amulet.”

“I think I can help with that.” Molly said before taking out a small green kit from her backpack, taking out from within it a yellow bandana, a needle and some red thread. With it, she can embroider the thread onto the bandana into the letters “BB”.

Giovanni seemed interested in this and leaned in closer. “Ohh, you carry around a sewing kit too, huh?” he asked.

“Yep.” Molly said dismissively. “My dad breaks a lot of stuff around the house, so it’s good to have supplies on hand.” As soon as she finished her sentence, she realized something about what he had said. “Wait, you sew?” she asked him.

“No, I…knit.” Giovanni said, with a prideful flair before turning more aggressive. “So wait? You wanna fight about it?!”

The three were about to draw their weapons when Molly spoke up. “No! I just…didn’t take you for the crafting type.”

“Of course I am.” he said, taking out a pair of knitting needles before looking at them. “With these, I can wield the powers of both creation…and destruction!” He then went from holding it like a murderer would a knife to holding it like an innocent grandma, then kept flipping back and forth between the two as if to prove his point.”

As he did, Molly looked at Sora, Tommy and Toby as if asking them with her eyes if she was the only one who couldn’t quite understand Giovanni’s antics. The looks that they gave back told her that no, she wasn’t.

“Hey Giovanni?” Sora asked once he finished with his poses. “Can I ask you something?”

“Of course, Spike-Key.” he said. “Ask away.”

“It’s just that this has been bugging me for a bit but - are you secretly nice?”

“WHAT?! NO! ABSOLUTELY NOT!!!” Giovanni shouted, acting as if Sora had just insulted him instead of just asking a question. “Say that again, Spike-Key, and YOU’RE FIRED!!!” After that brief outburst, he looked around as if to make sure that no one else was listening in before leaning in towards him. “Don’t tell the others, okay? They wouldn’t get it! Only cool minions like you get it!”

So Giovanni was actually nice this whole time? Then why would he affiliate himself with a criminal organization like the Banzai Blasters? Why would he then openly call himself a bad guy? He thought getting an answer would be the end of that mystery, but it only opened even more mysteries for him.

As Sora was thinking about it, Giovanni had been making three more bandanas based on the one Molly had made. The only difference between his and Molly’s were the colors. First was White with Yellow accents, second was Black with Red accents and the third was Red with white accents. Once he was done with them, he passed them over to Sora, Tommy and Toby. “Nice! Now the only thing left to become an official member is to turn in your membership fee.” he said.

“I’m sorry, a Membership Fee?” questioned Toby, voicing the other’s confusion on what was just said.

“Yeah! Anyone can be a villain for the low, low price of $49.99 a month!” The Banzai Blaster captain answered.

49.99 a month?! The three of them knew that they were given a limited amount of Munny for the trip, so it was very unlikely that they would pay for that. But even if they had a source that produced infinite money, they probably still wouldn’t pay for it.

“So you don’t need skill to sign up. Guess that makes sense.” said Tommy, as he wrapped the red bandana around his neck.

“WHAT’S THAT SUPPOSED TO MEAN!?” Giovanni snapped back.

Once again, someone spoke up before any in-fighting had begun, though this time it was from Sora.  “I believe what he is trying to say is that the fee seems pretty lofty, right?” He says as he glances over at Tommy, who shrugged nonchalantly in response.

“I KNOW RIGHT!? IT’S MORE THAN MY ENTIRE ALLOWANCE!” Giovanni still shouted, despite Sora’s attempt to calm him down, though he did calm down shortly after. “But it’s not so bad,” he said. “If you get other people to join, you get a cut of their monthly fee! And if you recruit enough people, you actually make money!”

The others looked between themselves with uncertainty before Molly spoke up, saying what was on everyone else’s mind. “That sounds like a pyramid scheme.”

They braced themselves, expecting another outburst from Giovanni. Instead he remained calm and acted as if she was telling him something really obvious “Psh…yeah! Of course it’s a pyramid scheme!” he said. “They’re scamming you! That’s how you know it's a legit bad guy group.”

Suddenly, it was all making sense to Sora why he joined the Banzai Blasters despite not seeming like a bad guy. Turns out, he wasn’t really that smart. He does have an edge over Indus, but that might not be saying much.

As Sora thought about this, Giovanni also realized something. “How do you know what a pyramid scheme is, anyways? Aren’t you like five?” he asked.

“I run a toy store, so I have to know about common business practices.” she answered causally.

This took the trio aback. They knew that some worlds had their own rules that they followed completely different from the rest but having a kid run a store on her own seemed a little too outside the realm of believability for them.

This seemed to also be the case for Giovanni meaning that this isn’t natural even in this world. “You’re five years old and you run a toy store? That sounds rough.”

“Yeah…I mean, I’m 12 but yeah…” said Molly dourly, further perpetuating the idea that her situation wasn't normal even for her world.

There was silence for a bit until Giovanni spoke up again. “You - uh…you want to talk about it?” As he said this, he went over to the bench in the fort area and sat down. Once he did, he patted the spot on the bench next to him as if asking for Molly to sit down next to him.

Molly didn’t exactly seem comfortable with explaining it at the moment, but Giovanni still tried to encourage her, though he was much calmer than he usually was. “C’mon, Bear Trap.” he said, his words were now as soft as his smile. “Sewing time is bonding time. That’s why they call it ‘close-knit.’”

Molly hesitated a bit before sitting criss-cross on the bench. There wasn’t any room for the other three so if the others wanted to sit, they had to sit on the floor, which Sora did.

“Um…well…” she began. “My family runs a toy store. My dad makes the toys. And my mom used to sell them. But after she died…” As she said this, her eyes began to lower to face the floor and Giovanni’s soft smile had turned. “Dad and my sister kind of just…ignored the situation? But we still needed to eat and no one was doing anything, so…I guess, I just kinda…took over? I thought it’d just be for a little while…but it’s been almost two years now and things still aren’t normal again. I still work at the store most nights because…my dad and my sister are…um. ‘Busy.’”

“I’m supposed to be there now, actually.” she continued. “But…all this happened!” she sighed before glumly putting her hand on her chin. “I hope they don’t get mad at me again.”

The room was heavy with a pound of silence. Whatever the four of them were expecting with Molly’s story, they weren’t expecting it to be that rough for her.

After a while, Giovanni broke the silence. “You’re kind of a pushover, aren’t you, Bear Trap?”

“Giovanni!” Toby scolded. Molly just told them her story and that was how he decides to react to it?

Molly didn’t really seem bothered by this however. “N-No. He’s right. I’m sorry.”

“See?!” Giovanni exclaimed as he stood up. “This is exactly what I’m talking about! You’re doing all of this stuff for your dumb family, and you were fine with giving away your epithet because ‘she might need it’?! What is this crap!? Like, it’s nice to be nice or whatever, but you can’t just let people step all over you! You’re just as important as everyone else is!”

Upon hearing that last part, Molly perked up at that. “Really?” she asked.

Once more, Giovanni scoffed. “Yeah. You’re my MINION now, all my minions are important. I can’t have people stepping all over my minions when I’m not around. You’ve gotta learn to stand yourself, like them!” he said as he  pointed at the other three. “Got it!?”

“No!!!” she said enthusiastically, before smiling. “How’s that?”

Giovanni let out a laugh towards that. “Nice try.” he said playfully. “I’m your boss, so you have to listen to ME! Not bad though! We’ll work on it!”

“Y’know, I’m surprised.” admitted Toby. “I didn’t expect to be as much of a people person as you are.”

“Please, I just want all my minions to be the best that they can be,” said Giovanni. “That way, once I finally become a super-villain, we’ll be the strongest bad guys in the world!”

As he was boasting his plans, a new voice inserted itself into the conversation. “So…I guess that makes you the Banzai Blasters, then.”

The five of them looked around to find the source of the voice, and after a short while, they found it. It was none other than Sylvester Ashling! Currently, he was standing atop the rocks towards the edge of the room.

“Who’s that?” asked Sora. The others didn’t answer back. It seemed as if no one recognized him.

No one, that is, except for Molly. “That boy from earlier…” she muttered. She remembered seeing him earlier today, when her class took the trip here.

“You’re trying to steal the Arsene Amulet. Isn’t that right?” the newcomer asked the five of them as he pushed his glasses up the bridge of his nose. “I don’t go easy on CRIMINALS who get in the way of my RESEARCH!”

This caused Giovanni to snicker. “Yeah? And what are you going to do about it?” he asked. “Think you can stop us, kid?”

“I’m NOT a-” Sylvester began to yell, before he sighed. “Why do I even bother?” he muttered.

He then raised his hand and pointed forward towards the others. As it did, the room seemed to go silent as a golden dust formed high into the air. After a few seconds, the cloud of dust began to slowly inch its way lower.

The five of them could only stare at the dust falling down with cautiousness. For now, it seemed harmless but staying with that sentiment could end up biting them in the ass later on. Sora, Tommy and Toby were the most cautious, summoning their weapons just in case.

Seeing the dust made Molly realize something, however. She’d seen the dust before as well. The class trip was getting loud so she decided to leave in order to get some peace and quiet. As she tried this, she bumped into that man, some dust sprinkling onto her as she did. After that was when…

She gasped at her realization then turned to face the others. “Guys, please be careful! The dust can put you to sleep!”

“Really? How’d you know that?” Toby asked.

“I bumped into that boy earlier.” she began to explain. “Some of that dust rubbed off on me and I passed out. I thought it was just like weird dandruff or something, but I think he might be Inscribed! He must have some kind of sleep epithet!”

“A sleep epithet, huh? How’re we supposed to deal with that?” asked Tommy as he looked at the dust. Most of them could do physical attacks, but they probably wouldn’t want to do that due to the dust’s ability. Sora and Tommy could use their magic, but they weren’t sure if any of the spells would work, perhaps maybe a fire spell could burn it?

As they were pondering on how to get rid of it, Giovanni chuckled. “Not to worry, my loyal minions. A trick like this won’t work against my DEMON ENERGY AURA!”

He then got into a stance and began to growl. That would be weird on its own, but then pink steam began to rise off of him! Upon seeing this, the other four realized that he must be planning some kind of attack, so they backed up to a safer distance.

As Giovanni kept yelling, the dust began to move differently. Instead of slowly falling down like snow, it began to swirl round and round as if it was caught within a whirlwind’s drafts before being expelled in a blast of heat and dissipating into nothingness.

Meanwhile, from his stone perch, Sylvie was watching this play out in front of him with great interest. “He dispelled it?” he noted. “I guess these aren’t just your average street punks waving their epithets around.”

Giovanni had stopped with his yelling once the dust was dealt with. He looked around, chuckling at the fact his attack worked, before turning his attention back to the others. “Listen up!” he said. “Now that we’re all part of the same team, I’ll let you in on all of my secret techniques, including my special move. My lucky number is 13, so every thirteen times I get a hit in, I unleash a SUPER ATTACK!”

“Is that…soup related or-?” Molly began to ask before Giovanni interrupted her.

“Nope, I’m just awesome!” he boasted.

Sora turned his head to face Molly in confusion. “What did you mean by soup-related?” he asked. Tommy and Toby were also confused by this.

“Oh, that is his epithet.” she explained. “He can make bowls of soup out of thin air.”

Upon hearing that, Giovanni froze, like he had been turned to stone. “Bear Trap, don’t tell them that! It makes me sound less cool!” he scolded, once he began to move again.

Giovanni’s ability…didn’t make sense to the other three. Maybe they can somewhat make sense for the Aura to be part of his moveset, they couldn’t figure out where the 13 hits would fit in with a soup-making ability. They eventually figured that it wasn’t really worth questioning and would simply chalk it up to different worlds having different rules.

Once more, Sylvie pointed towards the other five, though this time he announced his move. “Counting Sheep!”

As he says this, more golden dust began to arise from behind him before taking the form of sheep and stampeding down the rock towards the five.

Giovanni made the first attack here, using his epithet “Soup” to create what he called a lava grenade (in actuality, a smoldering sphere of tomato soup) and launching towards the sheep. He only managed to hit two of them within the explosion it made, which didn’t seem impressive due to the vast amounts of sheep heading towards them.

“Dangit! There’s too many of them!” Giovanni said before turning to his allies. “Minions, attack!”

Sora, Tommy and Toby still had their weapons out when Giovanni called for them, so they only had to brace themselves for battle. Molly, on the other hand, was freaking out. “B-but I don’t have a weapon!” she said, clearly nervous.

“Oh, my bad! Here! Take this!” he says as he pulls out a Banzai Blaster-themed peashooter.

“Giovanni, I don’t think we should give a child a gun,” said Toby.

“YEAH, P-PLEASE DON’T G-GIVE ME A GUN!” agreed Molly.

Giovanni wanted to argue with Toby that at least with a gun, she’ll be more protected, but he decided to drop it as he noticed that the sheep were getting really close to them. He put the peashooter away and readied his bat with a knife attached.

All of them were bracing themselves for the sheep’s attack. They got closer and closer to them, pretty soon the two parties will end up colliding with each other. Once the sheep got there…

They merely just nudged themselves into them. The five of them were slightly taken aback by this. Most of the tenseness that they had felt toward the oncoming sheep stampede had vanished at this point. Despite their height being roughly a third of Molly’s height, they were expecting them to still run them over and trample them beneath their feet. But there was still a smidge of suspicion towards the sheep that still lingered, after all, if they didn’t appear to cause harm then why would Sylvester send them out?

That hint of doubt didn’t seem to show in Molly however as she was smiling at the creatures rubbing against her. “They’re so soft…” she said. “A friend of mine would love this.”

“Yeah, they’re actually kind of cute.” Giovanni remarked.

“I mean, I guess they are a little harmless.” Sora admitted, though he still held his weapon.

He might’ve said this at the wrong time however, as shortly after he said it, Molly yelped in pain. “Ah! They nibble! They nibble hard!”

After that, all hell broke loose as the sheep transitioned from just rubbing against the five to full-on biting them. Some of them were even bold enough to try to leap towards them and attack with a headbutt attack, but they were mostly met with Sora, Tommy, Toby and Giovanni attacking them with their weapons back before they could land the hit, causing them to bounce back. However, the sheep were undeterred as more of them began to leap and headbutt as their method of attack.

A few of the sheep were taken out, mostly being the ones that attempted to attack using the head-butt again and being bounced aside though one was eliminated in one-hit by Giovanni, who at that point landed enough hits to perform his super attack, which was essentially a stronger version of an attack. But the number of sheep getting whittled away didn’t matter in the grand scheme of things as more kept coming after them.

“How many of these things are there?!” said Tommy, exasperated.

“N-not sure. But I think I can help you out somewhat.” Molly said. She put her hands out towards one of the nearby sheep and began to concentrate and focused her powers from her epithet “Dumb”. Slowly but surely, the sheep became less and less active till it was at a standstill and closed its eyes before shrinking away into nothingness.

“What was that?” Sora asked. “Is that part of your epithet?”

“Yep.” Molly said. “I dumbed it down to nothing. I’m able to do that with summoned creatures. My sister tends to create stuff with her summoning epithet, which I usually have to unmake before they make too much of a mess.”

So she could despawn things that can be summoned, could that mean she could despawn the Heartless with her epithet? That was the question on Sora, Tommy and Toby’s minds though a different one was on Giovanni’s. “C-Can you do that with people?” he asked, clearly shook by what he witnessed.

“I-I don’t know!” she said, now seemingly terrified of the implications of what her ability could do.

While she was worrying about this, another sheep took this opportunity to do another leaping headbutt attack, though this time it was aimed for Molly. By the time anyone knew what was happening, it was too late to stop it.

As impact happened between the faces of the sheep and Molly, the sheep merely poofed, dissipating into more of the sleep powder. She was unharmed, but not unaffected as she was now tired. “What happened?” she asked groggily, now much more exhausted than she was a few seconds ago.

“Hey!” exclaimed Sylvester, grabbing the attention of the quintet. They turned to see him holding an object in his hands that seems to be an orange yo-yo with a red spiral on it, with him yanking the string back as if he was about to launch it. “You should be more than groggy enough now. How about we see what you’re most afraid of? Nightmare Fuel!”

What happened next began so quickly that they weren’t able to see how it started. One moment everything was fine, except for the herd of Counting Sheep attacking them. The next the sheep were gone, but fires had surrounded the room!

The fire’s sudden appearance startled everyone, except for Sylvester who was just watching on smugly. “Pyrophobia, huh? That’ll do.” 

Out of everyone, Molly was taking the shock of the fire surrounding them the worst. She was hugging herself, hyperventilating and repeatedly muttering the word “No”. 

“Now why don’t the five of you just stay put until the police arrive?” The young doctor said as he finally got down his stone perch. “I’ll keep the fire where it is, so long as none of you does anything funny.”

Sora, Tommy, Toby and Giovanni probably would’ve said something in retaliation if Molly crying out for Giovanni didn’t manage to catch their attention. She then quickly grabbed onto his cape and hid behind his leg in fear. Though the cape is covering her face, the others could hear that she was crying. Aside from the tears, the only thing that came out of her mouth was a weak “Help…”

That ended up being the final straw for Giovanni as he turned to face Sylvester in a rage. “I think I’ve had just about enough of you. You made my minion cry! NOBODY makes my minions cry except for ME!” As he says this, he wraps his right hand around Molly’s back, as if to assure her that he is there for her before turning to face his other three minions. “I’m going to protect Bear Trap, you guys…take care of him for me.”

They nodded in agreement. Making Molly cry crossed a line for them as well.

Meanwhile Giovanni picked Molly up, now carrying her like a mother would her child. Steam then began to build up around him bursting from his feet, allowing him to jump on top of the pillar where their makeshift fort was made.

Seeing that Giovanni and Molly were safe from the flames annoyed Sylvester slightly, but he still had three other criminals caught in the flames. “So, your boss called you out to fight me, huh?” he said before chuckling and pushing his glasses up. “You seriously don’t expect to sprint through the fires in order to get your hands on me.”

They hated to admit it but Sylvester was right. Currently, they were surrounded by a ring of fire. They couldn’t be able to run through the flames without sustaining injury. It seemed like they were trapped at the moment…

…Until an idea formed in Sora’s head. With proper concentration, he was able to shoot out fireballs. Could he be able to shoot out something that could put out fires as well? He hadn’t seen Toby do it yet, but it was worth a try.

He aimed his Keyblade toward the flames, closed his eyes and tried his best to ignore the multiple fires around him as he began to imagine a cool jet of water blasting out of the tip like a hose.

And something did end up happening, though there were no streams of water emerging from the tip. Instead a dodge-ball sized blue crystal with multiple points materialized, spawning in the middle of the fire that was blocking them off from Sylvester. Then it exploded into an icy mist, which put out enough of the fire to unlock a clear path for them to reach him.

Tommy and Toby were amazed at this new power that Sora displayed, mainly for the fact that Sora had figured it out all on his own, and so quickly at that. Toby was just about to teach him that spell, but now there seems to be no need for that.

On the other hand, Sylvester was annoyed at the new display of power. It seems that Molly’s pyrophobia was not going to be enough to stop them. He might have to use the fears of the three against them in order to build a subtle roadblock against them.

He grabbed out his yo-yo once more, this time pointing it towards Sora. “Nightmare Fuel!”

The fire still remained, roaring throughout the room. However, they noticed a change, a giant shadow was looming over them. They looked up in awe and horror to see a car-sized orb made out of a mix of purples and black floating at the top of the room.

Sora was the only one in the room that recognized it. It was similar to the orb that plagued the skies of Destiny Islands the night that it was destroyed, though it was much smaller in size. If he was asked before that night what he was afraid of, Sora wouldn’t really have an idea and would probably default to a cliche answer, like getting old. But the night cemented it as The Heartless.

The Heartless appeared in the room shortly thereafter, three types of them spawning in. There were Shadows, Soldiers and a new, flying type. This type was covered by an orange helmet that resembled a wizard’s hat and a red bell-shaped armored torso with the emblem of the Heartless. The only parts of these Red Nocturnes that were uncovered were their faces and a pair of thin bird-like feet.

Sylvester looked at the new additions to the scene with a sense of curiosity as he had never seen or heard of these creatures before. Perhaps they came from a piece of media that he hadn’t heard of before. “Such strange creatures,” he said. “Surely, these would be enough to put a stop to you!”

The Shadows, Soldiers and a few of the Red Nocturnes began to head towards Sora, Tommy and Toby. The remaining Red Nocturnes flew up to terrorize Molly and Giovanni atop the column.

One of the Red Nocturnes attacking the trio conjured up a ball of flame to launch. Thankfully, Tommy used his shield to block the attack though it left him wide open for a Shadow to scratch his back.

That Shadow was taken care of via a slash of the Keyblade. Sora also used the Keyblade against the Red Nocturne, using his newly-learned Blizzard spell to vanquish it. He figured that that would be more useful against a fire-spawning Heartless than any on his other attack.

Toby used a Thunder spell to try to shorten the large numbers that stood before them, successfully eliminating a few while Tommy slashed through a Red Nocturne by throwing his shield at it.

Meanwhile, atop the pillar. Giovanni was also culling the Heartless that tried to attack them, hitting them with his bat. The Red Nocturnes went down much faster than the sheep did, going out in one hit.

Molly wasn’t helping out at first, choosing instead to help behind Giovanni. He took notice of this and turned his head to face her. “Cmon, Bear Trap.” he said. “You can take these guys on! Just use your un-summoning move.”

Molly was hesitant at first about using it, the questions that Giovanni asked her about it were still wandering within her head. Eventually she ended up using it on one of the Heartless that were still flying around. Like with the sheep, its movements began to slow down before coming to a complete halt and disappearing. Perhaps it was because of the different method that was used to defeat it, but the de-summoned Red Nocturne released no hearts.

Eventually, they began to realize that no matter how many Heartless they killed, more would spawn right after as if to take their place. In fact, it was just like with the Counting Sheep from earlier.

It was then that Sora remembered what Scythe had told them when the Heartless had ambushed them. They had to take out whatever was summoning the Heartless so the Heartless would stop appearing. Unfortunately, due to a majority of the Heartless being directed towards the trio, they weren't able to reach the young doctor. However, much less of them were attacking Giovanni and Molly, meaning that they had a clear path to attack.

“Hey, Giovanni!” Sora yelled, catching the attention of both of them.  “We can’t get a clear enough shot of that guy due to the Heartless. Could you help us out by landing a hit on him?”

“Of course I can, Spike-Key!” Giovanni exclaimed. “In fact, these Heartless being sent our way are giving me fodder for my Special Attack!”

Molly then took off her backpack and sunk her hand in, trying to give Giovanni some ammo for the attack. She ended up pulling out a ball of yarn from her sewing kit. “Here, use this.” she said.

“Thank you.” Giovanni said. Personally, he would’ve gone for the sewing needle, but he was satisfied with using the ball of yarn. After all, it was much more traditional to bean a glasses-wearing nerd like Sylvester. “Now, I just need one more hit before I unleash my attack.”

Instead of waiting for another Red Nocturne to show up, he instead lightly hit Molly in the head with the yarn. It didn’t seem to affect her that much, only lightly saying “Ow.” in retaliation. “Sorry for that, Bear Trap. Standard Minion Procedure.”

“It’s fine, I’m used to being taken advantage of.” she dismissively said.

“Oooookay there! Let’s work on raising our standards in the future, okay?” he said, slightly taken aback by Molly’s pessimistic response.

He then tossed the yarn into the air and began to swing back his bat. While he may admit that he’s not the world’s greatest super-villain…yet, when it comes to baseball, there is no way that he can be beat.

As the yarn came down, he struck it with his bat, causing it to go to impressive speeds before ending up colliding with Sylvester’s noggin. It should’ve been enough to knock him out, however his feet were still firmly planted as his upper-half recoiled immensely from the impact.

He eventually was able to get himself standing back up properly, rubbing the spot on his head that was struck by the yarn whilst he did so. As he did, both the fires and the hordes of Heartless vanished in an instant. “Alright, that’s it!” he said through gritted teeth. “No more Dr. Nice Guy! You’ve forced me into this…my ultimate attack! DREAM BIG!” he yelled. Everyone braced themselves, already exhausted from his previous attacks.

And then, Sylvester passed out and fell face first onto the ground.

That caused the quintet to breathe a huge sigh of relief, despite the anticlimax of it all. “You know, I thought he had a lot more in him.” Tommy remarked, looking at his collapsed body in front of him. “Guess after Giovanni’s special attack, poor guy was running on fumes.”

“Let that be a lesson to you all, minions!” Giovanni cackled as he jumped down from the pillar, carrying Molly with him. “Never mess with the great Giovanni Potage!” he said as he put her down.

As Giovanni was stroking his own ego, the other four noticed something concerning. A bright yellow light was shining from behind Giovanni. It wasn’t shining bright enough for Giovanni to take notice of it. The most concerning aspect of the light was that it highlighted a figure slowly emerging. 

“Uh, Giovanni?” Toby tried to get his attention.

“Please, please. Just call me Boss.” Giovanni interrupted.

“BOSS!!!” Molly shouted nervously as the figure kept emerging, some of the finer details, like their extremely muscular frame now becoming discernable.

Despite Molly’s panickness, Giovanni didn’t seem concerned. “Yes, my faithful minion?” he asked.

Maybe it was because the light behind him had gotten brighter. Maybe he could feel the figure’s breath down his neck. Whatever the reason now he was aware of the figure behind him.

He turned around to see a giant muscle-bound minotaur with bright-orange skin roar at the top of its lungs. It wore a white coat, a red kilt with a green, yellow and white plaid pattern, and a stethoscope and glasses, both in cyan color.

Sora, Tommy and Toby readied their weapons once more at the sight of the minotaur. Molly and Giovanni had a different reaction, both were shaking in fear and screaming at the new threat in front of them in fear.

“Tiny thieves may have defeated Dr. Ashling.” The minotaur figure growled in a Scottish accent. “But they cannot defeat…DR. BEEFTON!”

So this guy was working with Sylvester. But how did he get into the room without everyone hearing? Then it all clicked. Sylvie passing out wasn’t a late reaction to Giovanni’s attack, that was his special move! This Dr. Beefton was summoned by Sylvester as a last-resort!

“Bear-Trap, you can un-summon this thing, right?” Giovanni asked Molly, nervously.

“No!” Molly said, equally nervous. “I can only de-summon smaller creatures! I can’t get rid of something that big!”

“Are you guys seriously scared of him?” Tommy asked the nervous duo. “I’d say what we fought before was way tougher than this.”

“No, it’s just that…they were a lot smaller.” Molly admitted. “We aren’t used to the bigger threats.”

Tommy sighed. “Luckily for you two, we have fought bigger than this.” He boasted before he threw his shield at Dr. Beefton, only for the shield to get itself stuck in its abs.

The dream creature scoffed, as if the attack didn’t do any damage to him. “Is that all?” he asked, before grabbing the shield and throwing it back at Tommy.

He tried to dodge out of the way of his shield coming back towards him, but it still ended with him being damaged. It caused a large cut to form upon his right arm, which he immediately grasped in pain. 

It seemed like with the Large Body before that they had to find some kind of weakness in order to attack. They tried to look for the weakness, but it was hard to do as Dr. Beefton was also trying to crush them beneath him. Eventually, it was Molly who spotted something.

Dr. Beefton was slightly transparent. Thanks to that, Molly was able to see what was inside him. What she saw was Sylvester, curled up with arms hugging legs sleeping and suspended in midair within the beast.

“Guys, I have an idea.” she said. “I think this guy can use his epithet to make dreams and nightmares real. The big cow guy must be HIS dream, so all we have to do to beat him is wake him up!”

“Clever girl…” The monster grunted. “That means Beefton will have to take you out first!” With that, he rushed towards her, knocking her up into the air as he ran into her. He moved so fast that the others couldn’t hardly do anything to prevent her getting hit.

Thankfully, Sora was able to catch her fall, using Dodge Rolls to reach her landing point faster.

“Thanks, Sora.” Molly said, as he put her down.

“No problem.” Sora said. “Just make sure that you get somewhere safe and sound, alright?”

Molly nodded her head in agreement and left the room, hiding in the nearby hallway.

Giovanni whipped out his bat with knife attached. “So, we just got to wake the kid up, huh?” he asked, sounding very angry at how Dr. Beefton had treated Molly. “Sounds easy enough. Take this!”

He swung his bat across the creature’s arms multiple times, knife-side up but the creature was still unaffected. He only reacted by turning to face his attacker, uttering a “Pathetic.”

“I don’t think weapons can harm him.” Tommy said, as he grabbed his shield from where it landed. “We’re going to have to find another way to wake him up.”

Sora had an idea on how to wake him up. He always had trouble sleeping if it was too hot. Maybe he could cast fire spells to wake him up. Sure, they probably won’t hurt him like with the physical attacks, but the discomfort from the temperature change could still affect him.

He tested his hypothesis by blasting out a fireball from his Keyblade. It hit Dr. Beefton in the upper back-area. He made sure to look at where Sylvester was, to see if there was any reaction. As it turns out, there was, as Sora could see him slightly stir from his slumber.

Though this proved his hypothesis, it also alerted the minotaur of where Sora was. “Haven’t you learned that you can’t hurt me, boy?” he growled.

“Yeah, I’ve learned. But here’s the thing - I’m not trying to hurt you.” Sora said, as he readied another spell.

“Then what..?” Dr. Beefton began, before figuring it out. “Very clever, boy.” He grunted. “But you’ve made yourself more of a target.”

He rushed towards the boy, attempting to grab him, but he stopped as another fireball had hit him. He turned around to see Toby, his bee staff pointed towards him. It seems that he had figured out what Sora was attempting to do as well.

Going to rush attack both of them wasn’t going to work, Dr. Beefton realized. As soon as he would go to get one, the other would bombard him with fire which would make Sylvester even more uncomfortable. If he was going to win, he’d have to think of another way to fight.

Sora tried to shoot out fire again, but this time the doctor blocked this, grabbing one of the nearby bear statues to absorb the brunt of the attack. He then threw the statue towards Toby. The president managed to dodge it so the only thing that the statue hit was an exhibit that was behind him.

It did almost manage to hit Giovanni, though who yelped as the statue came flying towards his direction. “Hey, watch where you throw that stuff!” he yelled.

“Giovanni! We need to keep that thing distracted!” Tommy said. “I know what Sora and Toby are planning on doing, but they can’t achieve it if they keep getting bombarded by it.”

“Keep it distracted, you say?” Giovanni repeated, hand on his chin. “I like that! What do you have planned?”

“Easy, just attack it. It won’t damage it but it sure as hell will annoy it!” Tommy said, before dashing towards the minotaur, Giovanni following shortly afterwards.

Once they got there, they began to hit him, dodging the swipes that Dr. Beefton made to get them to shoo. Sora and Toby used this time to fling more fireballs towards him.

It was at this moment that Dr. Beefton realized something critical. Sora and Toby were the only ones out of the four attacking him that were utilizing the fireballs. If he focused on getting rid of them first, then the battle would have already be won.

“Enough of this!” Dr. Beefton yelled as he grabbed the two of them and hucked them towards Toby. He then grabbed the other bear to throw towards Sora, who was just barely able to get out of the way, before tripping and falling flat on the floor.

Dr. Beefton stood over him menacingly, and raised his right foot in the air right above Sora’s head. “Y’know those fireballs that you and your friend keep casting have been irritating me to the core.” He chuckled. “But once I take care of both of you, your friends will have no way of stopping me.”

But something was able to stop Dr. Beefton before he could slam his foot down to crush Sora’s skull. That something was a new noise, one belonging to a fire alarm. In reaction to the new noise, Beefton stepped back, covering his ears and yelling in pain. “What is that horrible sound!?” he questioned angrily.

The others were more curious about who pulled the alarm in the first place. It’s been a while since the fires from Molly’s nightmares were around, so it wasn’t sounded because of them. Someone had to be the one to pull it. It couldn’t be the four of them, as they were too busy with the minotaur doctor. So that only left…

“Don’t worry, guys! I found the fire alarm.” Molly said, coming out of the hallway. “Normally, I wouldn't pull those outside of an actual fire, but I’m already helping a criminal so it doesn’t really matter.”

The doctor was the only one undelighted by the news, as Sylvester finally began to wake up. This led to Beefton slowly getting smaller before dissipating into thin air, leaving Sylvester on the floor, groaning and moaning at the rude awakening.

“Nice going, Bear Trap!” complimented Giovanni, as he, Tommy and Toby were getting up from the ground. Tommy was pulling out a Potion for him to drink before giving it to the others.

“Thanks! Now if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to go mute the alarm now before my misophonia drives me crazy.” she said, before heading back to where the alarm was.

“H-how did this happen?” Sylvie questioned, upset about what had happened. “I’ve never been defeated before!”

Giovanni turned and chuckled. “Yeah, well, that is what happens when you mess with the Banzai Blaster Elite!” he boasted, before turning to face the other way. “For your efforts, you’re all getting promoted!” 

Out of all of them, only Molly seemed to really care about her Banzai ranking. 

“That means that your pay has been up to $100 a month!” Giovanni added at the end.

While Giovanni was talking to everyone else about the pay raise, Sylvie was slowly crawling towards an exit away from them. “Have to…tell the museum staff.” he muttered, panting from exhaustion. “Can’t let you…take the amulet.”

That got everyone’s attention. They turned to look at Sylvie crawling away in confusion. “Wait, you thought we’re here to steal the amulet?” asked Toby.

“We’re here to stop the person trying to steal the amulet.” Molly clarified.

Sylvie scoffed at that. “What a likely story!”

“I didn’t even come here for some stupid necklace in the first place!” Giovanni said, trying to defend himself. “I wanted to get stuff like mummies and dinosaur eggs, perhaps a cursed sword if I could find one! I didn’t even know that this thing had even existed in the first place until she told us she was going to use it to take Bear Trap’s epithet!”

Still, Sylvie stubbornly tried to deny their claims. “...You can’t expect me to believe that!” he said.

“But it’s true!” Molly defended. “She specifically said that she ‘wanted to steal my epithet’.

It was at this point that Sylvie began to stand up, struggling a little bit as he did so. “So you’re saying that I’ve been tricked?” he said in disbelief.

“Y-yeah! But that’s alright!” Molly attempted to reassure him. “Now we can team up to stop her!”

Sylvie laughed in reaction to that information, putting the others off. “Are you kidding!? I am a highly-trained epithet user who graduated college and became a psychologist at the age of 15!” he proudly boasted. “Like I would ever cooperate with criminal scum like you!”

There was a moment of silence as the five mentally sighed. Even though they managed to convince him that he had been played, he was still being stubborn. 

“Seems like this asshole still needs some roughing up.” Tommy said as he pulled out his shield.

“I was thinking the same thing, Guardian.” Giovanni said, pulling out his weapon as well.

Molly was able to stop them before they could make an attack, however. “No, wait. We still need his help.”

Both groaned as they put their weapons away. “You’re really adamant about trying to get him to help,huh?” Tommy asked. “How come you could stand this guy?”

Molly smiled. “I work in retail! Not hitting people, even when they deserve it, is all part of the job!” she said. “When you’re nice to people, they tend to be nice back.”

She turned to face Sylvie. “Hello!” she greeted.

He blew a raspberry in response.

It seemed like kindness was not going to work here.

“Try all you want, but I’m not going to join you.” he said. “I’m not interested in working with outlaws who would defile academia!”

Sora looked around at the destruction that Beefton had caused during his rampage. “Uh…about that…” he said.

It was at this moment that Sylvie had noticed the remains of the destruction that Beefton had left. “Awwww, dangit! Beefton did all that!?” he said, looking around at the chaos.

“Were you really unaware of what happened when you slept?” Toby asked.

“I…don’t exactly have control on what Dream Big does while I’m sleeping.” The young doctor admitted.

“Oooh, but I thought you said that you were ‘HiGhLy tRaInEd’.” Giovanni said mockingly.

“Shut up!” Sylvie retorted, before turning away from him. He was panicking on the inside, and it was starting to leak through. Perhaps there was a way that he could get out of this situation. “Maybe I can plead for self-defense…” he muttered to himself.

“Self-defense!?” Giovanni asked incredulously. “You attacked us first, idiot!”

“YEAH, WELL…” Sylvie began to yell back to Giovanni but stopped. “I dunno, okay!? I just wanted to get a really good look at that necklace…” he admitted.

“Well, we can worry about all this later.” Toby said. “Molly seems adamant that you can help us, but we might change our minds if you keep us waiting for much longer. Either way, we’re going to stop her from taking the amulet.”

Sylvie took a while to think about it. Was he willing to side with criminal scum like them? Eventually, he decided - fuck it. He already destroyed plenty of items in the museum, he might as well join them. “...Fine,” he said. “If it means keeping the amulet safe, I’ll do it!”

Despite the news, or maybe because of the news that a new member was joining their party, Giovanni groaned. “Alright. If I must, I shall let you join the Banzai Blasters.” he said with little enthusiasm.

Sylvie let out a mirthless chuckle at this. “Look, I said that I will help you, I didn’t say that I would join your criminal organization.”

Giovanni let out a chuckle as well, though this one had a more mocking tone to it. “Well, too bad, you have to! I’m the leader, you’re supposed to do everything I say.”

“Even if I wanted to join a criminal organization, I wouldn’t want to join yours anyway!” The young doctor said as he walked past Giovanni. “You’re weaker than I am.”

Giovanni laughed yet again, though this time it felt slightly more genuine than before. “That’s a weird thing for you to say, seeing as how I DEFEATED YOU!” he exclaimed as he got closer to Sylvie.

Sylvie scoffed. “Shut up. Besides, it was only because they did most of the work.” He said as he gestured toward Sora, Tommy, Toby and Molly.

“They are my FAITHFUL MINIONS!” Giovanni yelled, aggravated. “That means they are an extension of MY POWER!”

“Alright, that’s enough!” Sora shouted, putting himself between Sylvie and Giovanni in an attempt to stop them from arguing. “We’re going to get nowhere if you guys don’t stop fighting.” They did stop the trash-talk, however they were still giving each other a nasty glare.

“Sora’s right.” Molly said. “Besides, we better hurry if we want to keep the amulet out of her hands.”

“Really, why’s that?” Tommy asked.

“Well, the fire alarm had been set off.” Molly explained. “Which means that the police are on their way here.”

“The police!?” Giovanni exclaimed nervously, breaking his glare with Sylvie. “That is bad! Come on, my minions! What’re we waiting for!? We have to go now before the cops arrest us!” With that, he ran out of the room in a hurry. The others rushed out of the room shortly after.

- - -

The sounds of the fire alarm had terrified Mera. Currently, she was running around the room she was in, frightened about the thought of the police coming in now, especially since they still haven’t found that damn amulet yet!

Annoyingly, Indus was still asleep due to Sylvester’s sleep dust. Looks like she has to wake him up by force.

She grabbed a nearby crowbar that was discarded hastily in her panic and slammed it into his face as an attempt to wake him up. “Indus, wake up you FRIDGE!” she scolded him as she did so.

That was able to wake him up. Thankfully and somewhat miraculously, he wasn’t harmed by getting hit in the face with a crowbar numerous times. One of the few pluses of having a thick skull. He muttered something about barriers in his daze, before snapping awake. “What do you need, Lady Mera?” he asked.

“We’ve gotta get out of here, Indus!” Mera said in a worried panic. “That stupid kid must’ve tripped the fire alarm during his fight with the thieves. We’ve probably got ten minutes before the fire department, the police, the mayor and I don’t know who else gets here. If they surround the museum, we’re screwed!”

Indus went over to her slowly as he went to go and comfort her while she kept ranting. “They’re probably going to increase security because of this break-in! We’ve lost our one shot at getting our necklace, and it was all because YOU. LET. THEM. GO!” She kicked him in the chest as she punctuated her words, Indus looking ashamed as she did so. It didn’t hurt him physically, but he was upset that his master was disappointed in him.

“I apologize, Lady Mera. I…I did not mean to upset you, I-” Indus began to apologize.

Mera interrupted him before he could finish. “Quit wasting time apologizing and DIG!!!” she shouted, clearly fed up. “If we don’t find this amulet within the next three minutes, the last few months of planning this were a TOTAL. WASTE. OF TIME.” As she said this, she began to dig into one of the more recently opened boxes.

She dug a good amount down, enough that she could climb into it, before stopping in a bout of depression. “Why does everything in my life end up like this?” she questioned as she sighed.

Still upset, Indus went to the other side of the room to search within the boxes there. As he did, his mind wandered to when he was back in his home of the desert. Things were much simpler back then. All of their problems, from housing to food, could’ve easily been solved in one way or another by sand.

Meanwhile, Mera noticed a glint of something shiny from within her box. She dusted away all the nearby dirt so she could get a good view of it. Once she did, she found a pendant with a heart-shaped green gem in the middle and a golden frame that had cat-like ears and tail.

Her eyes widened at the sight of it. After all this time searching, she had finally found it! The Arsene Amulet was in her hands.

“I’ve found it!” She exclaimed as she stood up from within the open box, dangling it by its chain as she showed it to Indus. “Now, how about we go and find out how it works?” she asked, a sinister grin plastered upon her face.

Chapter Text

The group of six walked down the corridors of the museum. Sylvie was at the front, due to the fact he knew where Indus and Mera were. Meanwhile, the others were replenishing themselves with Potions and Ethers. Molly and Giovanni were hesitant to try it at first, but eventually gave in and had some. During this, Sora put on the two rings that Scythe and Pow-Pow had given to him. He wasn’t sure if Mera had an Epithet of her own, or what it would be, but it didn’t hurt to be cautious.

Once they got to the lobby area, they were ambushed by a swarm of Heartless consisting of some Shadows and Red Nocturnes as well as a Large Body. Due to the three additional members fighting alongside Sora, Tommy and Toby, the swarm was quickly taken out. 

The only thing noteworthy during that battle was when Sylvie attempted to use his Nightmare Fuel ability against a Heartless. He was able to get it to sleep, but couldn't produce any Dream Constructs from them. Maybe it was because Heartless don’t dream?

Once the fight was over, Molly asked a question that had been on her mind for a while. “Hey, uh…Giovanni?” she began to ask.

“Bear Trap, please! Call me ‘Boss’.” Giovanni insisted.

“Okay,uh…Boss…” she began as the Banzai Blaster captain turned to face her. “I was wondering, why does your bat have a knife taped to it?”

“Oh, you mean my SOUL SLUGGER DOOM BAT!?!” he asked back as he whipped out his weapon. 

As he was beginning to explain, Sylvie groaned to himself and began to walk on further ahead as if to put as much between himself and Giovanni as possible. Sora, Tommy and Toby stayed nearby, being much more patient with him.

“Well, that is a very good question, Bear Trap.” Giovanni began. “It’s so that it could do extra damage, of course! This way, I can hit someone with all the powers of a knife AND a bat!”

“I think you're supposed to put the knife through the bat to do that.” Molly said.

Giovanni laughed as if Molly said something funny. “What!? And ruin a perfectly good bat? I may be evil, but I’m evil on a budget.” he said before continuing to walk after Sylvie.

This time, it was Sylvie’s turn to stop. “That does raise the question…” he asked, changing the subject perhaps so he won’t have to listen to Giovanni rant anymore. “What exactly is our plan when we confront this woman? Run up and smack her with a bat?”

“Soul Slugger Bat of Doom.” Giovanni corrected, seeming more focused on the fact that Sylvie didn’t say the name of his weapon correctly than the fact he insulted him.

“With your toy!” Sylvie pushed back.

“Oh, like you’re one to talk, Mr. Yo-Yo!”

“Dr. Yo-Yo.” Sylvie insisted as he pulled his weapon out. “ I’m a psychologist.”

“Oh, do they call you that because you got totally psyched by those museum guards?” Giovanni asked mockingly. “Bam! Hah! Nailed it.” he added as he got closer to him, as if to rub it in.

“Y’KNOW WHAT!?” Sylvie shouted but before he could continue his sentence, he found that Sora was in-between them for the second time so far.

“C’mon guys, quit it!” he said, annoyed with how the two of them were bickering like children. “I know you guys can’t stand each other, but can you please be quiet about it!?”

“Oh, good. Talk a lot, four-eyes.” Giovanni scolded as if the young doctor was the only one at fault. “Now I’m setting a bad example right in front of my minions!”

“Like they need you to set an example.” Sylvie snarked, before turning to face the other four. “Why are you guys even following him, anyways?”

“Well…to be honest, me, Toby and Sora joined because at the time, we weren’t sure if they could handle the Heartless roaming around on their own.” Tommy admitted, crossing his arms. “I guess we just wanted to protect them.”

“Hey!” Giovanni yelled, somewhat offended by how the others didn’t think of him and Molly as capable. “I can assure you that we would’ve taken out those monsters on our own!” he boasted before quickly adding “Not that your help isn’t appreciated.”

Sylvie simply said “Huh.” before looking over to Molly. “And what about her, then?”

“The harsh realities of this world have forced me into a life of crime.” she said, clearly being ashamed about some unknown action in the past.

“Sorry if this is too much for you, but what exactly did you do that made you call yourself a criminal?” Sora questioned, wanting to know more due to the young girl’s vagueness.

Molly looked at them, a look of confusion on her face “I told you already, I’m here after the museum closed up. That means I’m breaking and entering.”

The three world-travellers simply stared at her in bafflement. That’s what she was getting upset about? It wasn’t her fault that she was here after it closed, Sylvie, or his powder to be exact, was the one at fault. It technically wasn’t even considered breaking and entering as she was already there as it was closing!

Before they could speak out about it, Giovanni spoke up. “Being forced into a life of crime? Sounds like the start of a cool dark backstory.” he said, not even commenting on what she said made a lot of sense. 

Maybe that is how that train of logic works in this world then. If so, it was best if the three of them kept their mouths shut about what they thought for now.

“Uh…take me for example!” Giovanni continued, clearly about to make up whatever he was about to say. “My parents…are…ghosts! Dead ghosts! You feel bad for me yet?” He smugly asked the last part to Sylvie.

Sylvie however didn’t believe what the Banzai Blaster captain was attempting to sell. “Embarrassed is more like it.” he dead-panned.

Molly didn’t really give any clue as to whether or not she actually believed Giovanni’s tale. “I wish MY mom was a ghost.” she said glumly. “She’s just dead.”

The psychologist then began to walk toward Molly, reaching into his pocket for something as he did so. Once he got to her, he pulled out what he was looking over - an orange card with a white stripe towards the bottom. “Listen…if you ever want to consult someone professional about whatever’s going on, my office is always open.”

This felt unusual to everyone else. So far, the only thing that Sylvie had proved was that he could be quite the egotist. This was the first time they saw him think about and help others for their own sake rather than his own.

Molly seemed to be taken aback by this as well. “Oh! Thanks, but I don’t think I can afford a therapist.” she politely refused.

But Sylvie still persisted. “Don’t worry, the first session is free! My specialty is epithet-based problems, but I have done some domestic stuff before.”

Molly perked up at this. “Oh, okay! You can have my card too!” she said as she pulls out a green and pink card, the bottom of which has the icons of a rabbit and bear head.

“The Blyndeff Toy Emporium?” Sylvie asked as he read the name on the card.

“That’s the name of our store!” Molly said.

“Yeah, you can go there when you’re in the market for a new yo-yo!” Giovanni added.

Before another yelling fight could break out between the two, Sora tried to put things back on track. “Sylvie made a good point earlier!” he said loudly to get their attention. “We don’t know what Mera could have up her sleeve, we need to come up with a solid plan to beat her.”

It was then when Sylvie began to walk on ahead again, with everyone following afterwards, moving them out of the lobby and into a hall with all kinds of jewelry and artifacts, including a sword that Giovanni was eyeing as he walked past it.

“That’s true!” Molly said. “If we wanna stop them, we should create an actionable list of our strengths and weaknesses."

That ended up what grabbed Giovanni’s attention away from the sword. “Good idea!” he said, as he then turned to face Sora, Toby and Sylvie. “So what are your guy’s epithets called?”

Sora and Toby weren’t exactly sure how to answer that correctly. They only knew that some people in this world had powers, they didn’t know if there was a certain way an Epithet could be named. The only one that they knew the name of was Indus’s Barrier. Were all epithets singled-worded like his or only some of them.

Thankfully, Sylvie spoke out before they could say anything. “I’m not telling you what my epithet is! That’s strategic suicide! What idiot would tell his epithet to someone who they just met?”

If Giovanni had an answer that he could muster, the others wouldn’t know what it would be, as a familiar voice had interrupted them. “Intruders spotted!”

They stopped walking as Indus came out of the door ahead of them, which the others assumed would lead to the room where Mera is. “Greetings, small girl and others!” He greeted them. “It is I, Indus Tarbella, whose epithet is Barrier! I have come to retrieve you and also prevent the yellow-suited thief from reaching my Lady! Much like a BARRIER!”

“I-Is this supposed to be some kind of joke!?” Sylvie asked after a short period of silence in a tone that implied that if it was, it wasn’t one that he found funny.

“Is what some kind of joke?” Indus asked, genuinely confused.

“You-” the young doctor began to sputter before ultimately deciding that it is not worth his time fussing over it. “Never mind.”

Indus began to walk towards Molly, stopping when he was in front of her before kneeling down and holding out his hand. “Please come with me. My mistress has located the amulet and wishes to speak with you about amulet things!”

So it was too late then. Mera had already found the epithet-stealing amulet that she was looking for. All she needed now was Molly herself and her plans would be complete.

Molly, of course, seemed the most worried about the news that she had been given. “Um, Indus?” she asked the muscular man. “She said that she wanted to take my epithet, right? Does that mean that the amulet really works?”

“That’s what she wants to find out!” Indus said as he stood back up. “Come along, then!”

As Indus and Molly were talking to each other, Sylvie turned to the other four, and leaned in close so that he could whisper what he had to say to them. “Listen, they don’t know that I’m not on their side anymore. I’m going to convince them to let me pass, then I could buy some time before she escapes with the amulet.”

His plan did seem to make sense at first…until they thought about it for more than a few seconds. Why would he try to convince Indus to let them pass if they don’t know that he’s not working for them anymore? “Wait, hold on…” Toby began.

But Sylvie walked up to the man before Toby could get a full sentence through, pushing his glasses up as he did so. The others decided to just let him be on this. After all, even though in their opinions his plan makes no sense, Indus wasn’t really that perceptive and would probably believe most anything that Sylvie would come up with.

It was a bit odd that Sylvie didn’t begin to talk, given that he was so confident in his plan. But that could easily be rationalized by the fact that he only had a rough outline of what he planned on saying and was just thinking about the more intrinsic details of his speech.

What couldn’t be rationalized was that a little over a minute later, Sylvie still hadn’t begun to talk. He was just standing there, shaking every so often. His near lack of movement had gotten everyone else uncomfortable, even Indus. Maybe this was his plan, acting weird in order to intimidate him?

Whatever was happening with him was getting to be too much for his allies. “What’s he doing?” Molly asked her teammates.

“My guess? He probably just lost it.” Giovanni snarked as he let out a small laugh.

Indus leaned in to Sylvie, putting his hand on his shoulder to check on how he’s doing. “Dr. Ashling? You alright?” he asked with concern.

This was enough to knock Sylvester out of…whatever he was doing. “Sheep beefin’! Deep…what?” he muttered as he was brought back to reality. His sudden movements caused Indus to jump back slightly in surprise.

Perhaps Giovanni’s comment about him losing it had some weight after all.

“I hate to interrupt your manic twitching, but I wish to remind you that the amulet has been found! You can go right on through.” he says, moving out of Sylvie’s way to present a clear path to the door. “I’m sure that you’re quite excited to see it!”

But Sylvie didn’t move just yet, unsure if this was some sort of trap that had been set up for him. As soon as he looked back and saw the others give him affirmation that he should go on, his confidence regrew. “Yeah! That’s right!” he said as he began to walk down the corridor.

As soon as he left, Indus tried his attention to Molly. “Now then, Miss Minion…If you’ll please come with me.”

Molly’s only response at the moment was her hesitation to follow.

“We mustn't keep Lady Mera waiting!” Indus insisted.

Molly still hesitated, clearly anxious about what was happening to her. Eventually, she gave in. “Um…Okay.” the girl said glumly.

Before Indus could bring Molly up to Mera, Giovanni and Sora stepped in front of her, protecting her from Indus. “No! She’s not going anywhere with you!” Giovanni shouted at him, his weapon carried in his gloved hands.

“Yeah, that’s right!” Sora said, his weapon also unveiled. Tommy and Toby followed suit shortly afterward.

Despite the help from her friends that she was getting, Molly was still nervous. “Guys…I’ve seen him fight.” she warned. “I don’t think you’ll be able to beat him!”

“None of that matters, Bear Trap!” Giovanni dismissed. “You are my Minion. That means I have to protect you, no matter the cost!”

“Besides, if you can’t fight for yourself, we’ll have to fight for you!” Sora said.

Surprisingly, Indus wasn’t upset about the four of them preventing him from getting Molly. In fact, he seemed impressed at the gesture. “My goodness.” he said, astonished at Giovanni’s display of selflessness. “She’s your minion, but both of your bonds are so strong that you’re willing to protect her! It’s almost like you’re bodyguarding each other!”

He then shifted to a somewhat more serious tone. “I think I understand now.” he said stoically as he got into a fighting pose. “How rude of me to try and separate a bodyguard from her master… Very well. Then let us do things the honorable way! One-on-one combat! Prepare yourself!”

“Yeah, that’s more like it!” Giovanni shouted. He wasn’t at all worried that he could lose the fight. After all, he had been secretly hitting any objects that he could find on the way to defeat Mera, as a way to power up his special attack. He had 12 hits stored up, meaning that he only had to hit one more time to unleash it and hopefully that would be enough to finish him off. Unfortunately, this meant that he wouldn’t have it during the fight with Mera, but that was a risk he was willing to take. He rushed forward to strike-

-And instantly got knocked out and sent flying back by a barrier that Indus summoned and threw at him. The other four were either not in the way or managed to sidestep before the attack could hit them.

“The battle is over.” he said before he shifted back to his more cheery tone. “I am victorious! C’mon, Miss Bodyguard! We can’t keep Lady Mera waiting!”

But Molly wasn’t listening. Instead, she was staring at the unconscious body of Giovanni, despair flowing through her like a river. She didn’t have high expectations that the others could win in a fight against Indus or Mera, but seeing her boss knocked out like that only lowered them even more. In a state of depression, she lowered herself until she was on her knees.

Sora, Tommy and Toby however, were still defiant towards Indus, putting themselves in front of her so he couldn’t take her. “Hey! You still have to go through us!” Sora shouted as he flung his Keyblade at his muscular body.

A barrier was summoned by Indus, so Sora’s attack only bounced off of it. This barrier wasn’t thrown at them, though this barrier’s massive size made sure that Indus couldn’t get hit by any of the three’s attacks. “I’m sorry, Other Minions, but I won’t be able to duel with you.” he apologized. “Perhaps after I give her to Lady Mera, we could fight.”

“I hate to admit it, Sora.” Toby said. “But it seems that we can’t get past Indus’ barriers. Fighting him is not going to work here.”

After a few moments, Sora relented, though he did so reluctantly. As Sora summoned the Keyblade away, Indus despawned the barrier separating them. No one made an attempt to attack him as he did though, knowing that he could just put up another barrier to block it.

“Indus?” Molly questioned, a slight hint of hopelessness in her voice. “Before you take me, can I ask you a question?”

“I am always happy to help a fellow bodyguard!” Indus said.

“Miss Lady Mera says that she specifically wanted my Epithet, right?” she said as she began to stand back up and face Indus. “I just don’t understand why she would want mine. It’s not very strong and most of the time, it’s not even that useful.”

As she said that, her three friends realized that she had a point with that question. There had to be much more powerful epithets out there than Molly’s that could’ve been taken. Molly’s epithet was also extremely situational, meaning that if Mera specifically needed her epithet, then it must’ve been for a good reason. They just couldn’t figure out what that was though.

This was when Indus showed his first sign of reluctance, by his hesitation for an explanation. He then sighed as if to prepare himself before speaking. 

“Well you see, Miss Bodyguard…” Indus began. “Lady Mera’s epithet is very powerful, powerful enough to beat even me in a single blow! But her power comes with a price…a curse.”

The four’s curiosity was peaked at the mention of this curse. “What kind of curse?” Toby asked. Perhaps this curse would be key to help them win against Mera!

“Lady Mera may not have revealed all the secrets of her Epithet to me…” Indus continued. “But I do know that it keeps her in great pain at all times. Ever since I began to follow her, we have searched far and wide to find a way to rid her of her pain.” A forlorn smile began to form on his face. “Why, you should have seen the way her face lit up when she learned about that amulet! A way to gain a second epithet, a second power that could heal her! Something to dull her constant pain…Lady Mera has waited her entire life for something like that. And now that she finally has it in her grasp? She would do anything to get it.”

No one spoke for a while once Indus completed talking, due to them thinking about what he had said. If any of them considered that she had an epithet, they probably never thought that it could be one that’s actively detrimental to her. At last they think they know why she needs Molly’s epithet; if her epithet can reduce things, perhaps it can be used to limit how much pain someone can feel. 

“I’m not going.” Molly spoke up, breaking the silence.

That got everyone’s attention on her. They were all surprised with that statement but for different reasons. For the trio, it was because this was her first actual act of defiance they had seen her make. For Indus, however, it was because she was going against Lady Mera’s orders. “But…why ever not? Lady Mera is waiting!” he cried out, clearly confused as to why one would go against his master’s wishes.

“It’s because I don’t want to!” she argued, before turning to face the still unconscious Giovanni. “Giovanni…” she stopped before correcting herself. “Boss…stood up for me.” She turned to face the trio. “Sora, Tommy and Toby stood up for me. They were all ready to get themselves hurt to protect me! Giovanni always said that I should stand up for myself! I’m sorry for what your master is going through, but I’m done making sacrifices for those who won’t make them back!”

Perhaps it was due to all his years in Mera’s servitude, his unwavering loyalty to her or a mixture of both, but he was still having problems seeing why someone would willingly cross his master. “But…y-you must! Lady Mera needs it!”

“I’m sorry but I need it too!” she said, taking this opportunity to dash pass Indus and towards another hallway to escape. He wasn’t able to put up a barrier to stop her from getting past him, but he was successful in creating one to block her way to the exit. Her shoes skidded across the floor as she stopped herself from running headfirst into it.

“I’m sorry, miss.” The muscular man began as he started to walk to her. “But as a fellow bodyguard, you must understand. I must do as Lady Mera commands. And she commands that I capture YOU!” As he finished saying this, he held his arms out which caused the barrier to push forward, forcing Molly towards him. 

Molly struggled to push the barrier back, but she could not get it to budge it towards the direction she wanted. As she attempted to push back, she spotted something. Next to her, there was an exhibit showcasing different kinds of sand. They must be in the desert exhibit. An idea was born as soon as she saw it. 

She made sure to put one of her hands into the exhibit, using it to scoop up the sand before clutching her hand closed. At this point, Indus was in front of the entrance to the hallway, his arms outstretched to snatch Molly as soon as she got close enough. The other three hadn’t made an attempt to stop him, believing that he would just send out another barrier that would just end up nullifying their efforts.

As Molly was just about to enter Indus’ grasping distance, she took this chance to throw the sand at him, which ended up landing in his eyes. He reacted accordingly, hands over his eyes as he yelled in pain. In this state, the barrier that was pushing Molly vanished.

Given that he couldn’t cast any barriers in his current state, Sora, Tommy and Toby took the opportunity to sneak past him and towards Molly. “That was good thinking there, Molly!” Sora approved.

“Thanks!” she said. “Now you guys go on and help Dr. Ashling take care of Mera. I'll see if I can find a way to leave the museum.”

“Are you sure that you don’t want us to help you?” Tommy asked.

“Don’t worry, I’ll be fine!” she reassured as she looked back down the hallway. “The police are probably going to be here any second now, so all I have to do is leave the Museum, and they’ll keep me safe until this whole thing blows over.”

They were still a little skeptical of letting her go on her own, but ultimately decided to let Molly leave.

“We’ll see you on the outside once we beat her, then!” Sora promised.

It was at this moment that Indus’ vision became clear, and he saw the four split off into two different directions, the other three entering the room where Mera currently was, and Molly continuing her escape down the hallway. When he saw that, he began to worry, he knew that he would only be able to chase after one, but who should he pick? Maybe he should go help Lady Mera take care of the trio?

No. Though he wanted to protect his master with all his heart, he knew that she would be furious if she knew that he willingly let the girl that can help dull her hurt get away. “Miss Bodyguard, come back!” he yelled as he began to chase after Molly.

Meanwhile, Sora, Tommy and Toby had made their way into the storeroom, where they saw Sylvie and a woman they hadn’t been before standing there. That must’ve been Mera! She was wearing what they suspected was the Arsene Amulet around her neck. She was breathing heavily, a side effect of a fight she had against Sylvie only moments prior. They also noticed that some shards of glass were gutting out from the floor. Was that part of her Epithet?

Despite her rough breathing, she was smiling, an air of confidence surrounding her. “Not bad. You’ve actually got quite the impressive power there, kid.” she said. “But I’m afraid that you won’t be able to keep it from me, even with extra help.”

“You lied to me!” Sylvie angrily spoke. “You’re not a museum worker, you’re just another thief!”

Mera chuckled, not even trying to defend herself. “Really? What was your first clue?” she said condescendingly. She then formed three knife-like shards of glass in her hands and then threw them at the four. They didn’t manage to hit them, but the boxes that they were in front of. “Your move.”

Sora and Tommy were about to charge in, but Sylvie held out an arm to prevent them from attacking. “I wouldn’t go in just yet. Not until we give ourselves the advantage.” He says as he pulls out his orange yo-yo from his pocket. “Let’s see what she’s most afraid of! Nightmare Fuel!”

A few moments had passed before the four of them realized that something was wrong. They knew that Sylvie’s Nightmare Fuel instantly summoned the worst fear of whoever it was targeting once activated, so why was there nothing now? They also looked around the room as if to check that whatever Sylvie summoned had appeared outside of their current POV. “Wh…what? Why didn’t it-?” Sylvie began to ask before they heard Mera chuckle once more.

“What I’m most afraid of?” Mera asked, a bitter sorrow flavored her voice. “You really want to know what I am most afraid of? I’m afraid of this.” 

She put her hands on her chest, indicating herself. Or what she had inside. “I’m afraid of a world where I have to spend the rest of my life like this. Brittle, creaking and constantly on the verge of breaking!” As she was saying this, more shards began to erupt out of the ground and surround her, though these were much larger than the ones that she had previously summoned. “I’m afraid of a life where someone bumping against me on the street means a trip to the  hospital! I’m afraid that this is all there is!” The shards around her were beginning to crack.

“But now?” she continued, spreading out her arms which in turn pushed the shards slightly further away from her. “I finally have an exit. I finally have a way to leave!” The bitterness remained in her voice but her sorrow was being slowly replaced by anger as she pointed towards the four. “And if you think that you can keep me here? Then you’d better be ready to die trying.”

For a while, no one made a sound. Sylvie and Mera were silent because they were waiting for the other to make a move. As for Sora, Toby and Tommy, their silence was due to them thinking over what she had just told them. They knew that her epithet was harmful to her thanks to Indus telling them, but from what she described, it was worse than they thought. Despite the fact that she had been set up to be their enemy, they couldn’t help but to feel sympathetic.

All silence in the room was expelled when a “Quack” was heard. They looked to see that an orange duck had appeared atop the boxes next to Mera. Given that it was orange and its sudden appearance, it was safe to assume that this duck was one of Sylvie's creations. Mera’s unnerved nature towards this bird only solidified this theory further, meaning…

“She’s afraid of…ducks?” Tommy questioned.

“They’re small, fast and they bite, okay?” Mera said, trying to justify her fear of the species. She then kicked it off of the box, causing it to dissipate as it hit the wall. “Whatever! Let’s just get to the part where you lose!”

Sylvie put his yo-yo away and pointed his finger towards her. “Counting Sheep!” he yelled, as a small herd of bright yellow sheep began to form. This time, the trio felt relief when they saw the sheep again due to the fact that they’re now allies and there were a lot less of them than before.

A few of the sheep attempted to rush Mera, but she simply summoned more shards from the ground that ended up finishing them in one blow. Though that attack wasn’t much, Mera began to pant as if she exerted more power than she showed off. “Is…is that all you got?” she questioned, before she groaned as she held her head in pain.

At that moment, Sora remembered what Indus had told them before. He turned to face the young doctor. “Dr. Ashling! While you were gone, Indus told us that Mera can’t handle her own power, like it was some kind of curse.”

Sylvie seemed to understand what the boy was saying. “She can’t handle her own power, you say? So it’s a war of attrition then!” He then turned to face the remaining sheep. “Counting Sheep! Defend us!”

Hearing this, the herd turned to face the four and began to walk towards them. Sora, Tommy and Toby were uncertain as to how Sylvie was planning on having the sheep protect them, especially when it seemed at first that they were just surrounding them in their own circle of sheep. But then the sheep began to get atop of each other until eventually, they had covered every part of them, except their face, providing the four of them with their own sheep protection.

“All that we have to do to win is to survive until your own power inevitably knocks you out!” Sylvie yelled smugly. “And this extra protection is going to keep us in play for a long time, so you might as well just give up now!”

Mera was still panting at this time, but it seems that she had gathered herself in the time it took for them to protect themselves. She didn’t falter at Sylvie’s taunts, a smile appearing on her face instead. “Did you think that you can outlast me!?” she asked with a similar air of smugness “Then you’d better watch your step!”

She then jumped towards the four of them, creating more objects from glass as she was in the air. When she touched down, glass skates had formed at the bottoms of her shoes and a glass spear was in her hands.

She began to skate across the floor, making sure to use her spear to knock off some of the sheep every time that she passed, one time knocking a lot of them off with a spinning jump that she made with the assist of a glass ramp she made.

Eventually, there were only a few sheep attached to each of them. That was when the four of them got out their weapons, their eyes darting across the room as they tried to follow Mera’s movements as she skated circles around them. “Shit, she’s fast!” Tommy cursed.

“Don’t worry!” Sylvie said, trying to keep a cool visage. “She’ll end up tiring herself out eventually! We just need to wait it ou-”

Before he could finish his sentence, Mera grabbed onto Sylvie by his exposed shirt and lifted him up. The other three weren’t exactly sure what, but something about Mera’s grasp on him was affecting him. They could hear that his breathing was turning into a series of choking gasps!

She then proceeded to toss him behind her like someone discarding a used towel. Something else that they noticed that felt wrong was how Mera was acting. She wasn’t breathing heavily like what would happen when previously using her moves.

“Do you feel that?” she asked Sylvie scornfully as she faced him. “How your bones feel like drywall on the verge of caving in!?” She kicked him, causing him to cry out. “That’s how I feel like…all the time. My epithet keeps getting stronger as my body continues to weaken. I’ve only been able to find one trick to circumvent this, and that is to suck the stamina out of people. All I could do was steal from others!”

She began to work towards him. “So when I heard about this amulet? I thought to myself ‘Why not lean into it?’” She outstretched her hand, a green aura began to emanate from it. “Here, let me show you…”

Before her hand and Sylvie could make contact once more, Sora’s voice made her stop. “Hey!” he called out, causing Mera to turn and face him. “You still have to deal with us, remember!?” He knew that grabbing her attention would mean that he would have to risk getting his energy drained as well, but he couldn’t let her just steal Sylvie’s epithet!

As she saw Sora and his two friends stanced and holding their weapons, her face bore a look of mild annoyance. “If you’re saying that you’d prefer that I take your Epithets first, I might as well take you up on your offer.” she said. “Though I doubt they’re worth the trouble.”

She began to get closer, the three followed by beginning to back up. The reaction made sense, they wanted to get as far away from Mera as possible to avoid her life-sucking powers. Sora and Toby readied their weapons as they began to walk backwards, ready to cast a spell if Mera attempted to attack them.

Mera kept walking, her annoyance growing by the second. Won’t those cowards just do something already? She sighed. It seemed that she would have to make the first move against them. She would don her skates again and rush them. They will definitely have a hard time outrunning that.

Looking at them, she saw that their expressions have changed. Their tenseness had mostly ebbed out of their bodies now. But why would that be the case? As far as she knows, nothing has changed about their predicament so what’s with the sudden shift in emotion?

It was then when she noticed that their eyes were no longer on her, but of something past her.

She turned and saw Dr. Beefton towering behind her, a roar escaping his lips as he was summoned the second time that night. Her attacks must’ve been so much on him that he passed out from pain. As soon as she laid eyes onto the monster, she groaned. “Oh, that’s…new.” she said, knowing exactly where this was heading and not liking the outcome.

The minotaur then proceeded to swat Mera away, which ended up sending her flying into the boxes behind her. Sora, Tommy and Toby were able to get out of the way as Mera flew past them. The impact of her hitting the boxes was enough to deplete the health that she had regained from leeching off Sylvie and then some.

She was still pulling herself together when she saw that Beefton leveled his horns and was preparing to charge. She put up large shards in front of herself in an act of defense. “There!” she taunted. “Let’s see you get through those!”

Said act ended up not affecting him in the slightest, as he simply bulldozed his way through. “Oh, fuck! I wasn’t serious about it!” she exclaimed.

She made more shards to prevent him from getting to her, but he kept breaking through them. The aggressiveness that he displayed towards getting Mera was concerning to Sora. Yes, she has been causing trouble for them, but perhaps because he felt sorry for her, she didn’t deserve this ruthlessness. “Beefton, that’s enough!” he scolded.

Beefton stopped momentarily so he could look at the boy. “Leave yourself out of this, little boy!” he yelled. “Dr. Ashling summoned me to take care of the small woman, so that is what I must do.”

“Yes, I know, but we have her on the ropes now!” Sora retorted. “You can stop now!”

While Sora and Dr. Beefton were arguing, Mera balled her fist. She hesitated a moment as she raised it into the air and then proceeded to slam it into the wall behind however. It ended up breaking two of her fingers in the process, but it was a sacrifice she was willing to make.

As soon as she touched the wall, a fissure began to climb up the wall behind her until it had encompassed a good amount of the ceiling. This made that part of the ceiling begin to crumble.

Sora noticed the ceiling beginning to crack as well as the fact that the part of the ceiling was right above where Beefton was. “Beefton, look out!” Sora shouted to try and get his attention.

Beefton looked up to see the crumbling ceiling but it was too late to do anything else. Mera stood up and slammed down her hand on the wall behind her to cause that part of the ceiling and part of the pipe that was connected to it down upon his head.

The trio stared at the rubble in worry. Was Sylvie still alive beneath that? Amongst their thoughts about Sylvie’s safety, they were also thinking about how the ceiling collapsed. Was that part of Mera’s epithet? Before this, they thought that her ability was to generate glass, but could her epithet also allow her to cause things to break? If so, then that’s double the reason why they should keep their distance from her.

Mera however had no worries about how Sylvie was, grinning at the spot where he fell. She was about to say something about a bull in a china shop as a cool one-liner, but decided against it. She didn’t want the other three to hear it just in case it turned out to be bad.

Instead she said something else, something that she definitely knew would have sounded somewhat cool. “Now, where were we?” she asked rhetorically before faking a moment of realization. “That’s right! It was the part where I take you out of the picture.”

She began to head towards the trio, the amulet and one of her hands glowing an unearthly green. However, before she went far, she stopped, something pulling her back. That something was Sylvie’s hand, having partially dug himself out of the rubble. “Don’t…touch them…” he said in a strained voice.

She moved her leg out of his grasp, which was easy to do as most of his strength at the moment was focused on trying to keep himself from collapsing. “Fine!” She said as she turned to face him. “If you can’t wait your turn, I’ll just take your epithet first!”

She then proceeded to yank him out of the rubble by his shirt collar. As she held him, he began to get covered in an orange aura. At the same time, the amulet began to glimmer. The aura then began to flow across his body, snaking itself down Mera’s outstretched arm and into the amulet, causing the color of the gem to briefly turn orange.

Feeling the power flow through her, Mera began to laugh. “Oh…I can FEEL it! All your STRENGTH! All your POWERS! They’re mine!” she yelled, a maniacal grin upon her face. “...Thank you for your contribution to the museum’s collection…kid.” she added demeaningly, as she tossed the now unconscious Sylvie aside like a ragdoll.

“Now what did he call his ability again…?” she asked herself before outstretching her hand. “Oh right! Nightmare Fuel!”

As soon as she says this, Sora, Tommy and Toby notice a large shadow looming over them. They look up and see that a small orb of darkness was hovering at the top of the room, just like the last time this ability was cast. The only difference was that the orb was now a slight blue. Shortly afterwards, Soldiers and Red Nocturnes began to appear around where Mera was, surrounding her like bodyguards.

Mera looked at the creatures summoned. “So these are the Heartless that Indus told me about. Guess they really do exist.” she noted, before grinning. “Whatever. Hopefully these will be enough to wear you down.”

The Heartless then began to run towards the trio, who did their best to block their attacks and fight back. Sora shot down a Red Nocturne and grazed two more with a Blizzard spell. Tommy finished off one of the grazed ones with a throw of his shield while Toby shot one of the Soldiers down with a Fire spell.

Unfortunately, this had left him open to be attacked by the other Red Nocturne. It shot out a fireball that ended up hitting his shoulder, leaving behind a scorch mark on his clothes and some pains where he had been hit. 

He should have been focusing on the battle to prevent getting hit again, but part of his mind began to wander. It was thinking about Mera and the amulet, and eventually he realized something. “If your Epithet is hurting you, then shouldn’t you use the amulet to get rid of it?” Toby asked, as he finished the Red Nocturne off with a Thunder spell.

This question ended up unintentionally offending Mera. “ And then what!?” she shouted. “Lose what little I’ve gained from all my efforts in the past 10 years!? This training? This is all I have! Why should I throw away all my hard work!?! So WHAT if other people get hurt, huh!? I have been hurting my whole life. I just want it to stop, even for a little bit! Is that so wrong!? Now that I’m so close to the answer, there’s no way that I’m going to let you stop me!”

She then proceeded to jump off of the rubble, now joining in on the action. Once again, glass skates appeared at the bottom of her feet, leaving her skating across the room.

From what she could gather, the three of them could only attack either with their weapons or by channeling power through them. If she could destroy them with her Epithet, then they’ll have nothing to defend themselves with.

The first person that she chose to target was Tommy, who was currently vanquishing a Soldier. However, he was able to see her skating towards him in time and Dodge Rolled out of the way, causing Mera to end up laying her hands on one of the shelves. It crumbled as she used it to propel herself forwards.

This time, she decides that Tommy is not the best person to pick off first. He and Toby could only rely on one type of attack, either physical or magical. On the other hand, Sora can use both types of attacks. Out of the three, he could be the one to be the most trouble, meaning she should make sure to get rid of him first.

Before that, however, he needed to be distracted to better the odds of her grabbing his weapon. She summoned a small horde of Soldiers and made sure to sic them all on him.

Sora began to take out the oncoming horde, mainly using Fire spells against them and only resorting to physical attacks for the ones that got close to him.

As soon as there were only a couple of Soldiers left, Mera made her move. She skated on forwards , making sure to summon some more to prevent the other two from aiding Sora. When she got close enough, she lunged at his Keyblade, hand outstretched just as he finished off the last Soldier.

He managed to notice Mera about to grab onto the Keyblade, but it was too late for him to move it out of the way. Her smile widened. There was no way that he could dodge her now!

But as she reached for it, it disappeared from his hand. Her cocky expression quickly dropped at this development. He then proceeded to spin around, rematerialized his Keyblade in his hands and struck her from behind. The attack sent her flying into the wall, a crater forming upon impact. She was stuck on the wall for a little bit before peeling off and falling onto the floor, knocked out. Since she was unconscious, the Heartless created by her Nightmare Fuel vanished.

Sora stared at the aftermath in shock. He only hit her once, and yet his attack did so much to her! Was this extreme reaction due to her Epithet amplifying the damage that she took? Or was he stronger than he thought?

As Sora was pondering this, Tommy and Toby were breaking pieces off of an elixir to replenish their magic and health. For the next few moments, the room was silent.

Then the door to the storeroom was kicked open. The three of them pulled out their weapons instinctively, but relaxed once they saw who was entering. It was Giovanni Potage, along with three people in similar suits. They might’ve been the same three people that were knocked out trapped behind the barrier from earlier. One of them had star decals across his suit, another was tall and muscular, and the third was female and had spikes on her gauntlets.

“DON’T WORRY, MY FAITHFUL MINIONS!” exclaimed Giovanni as he strolled on into the room. “The great Giovanni Potage is here to…” He stopped as he saw Mera lying on the floor unconscious. “Come on! Don’t tell me I missed the fight!” he whined.

“Well, we would’ve liked to have your help, but you were knocked out at the time.” Sora said.

Giovanni opened his mouth to argue, but closed down as he couldn’t think of a response. “Well, you got me there.” He then walked over to Mera’s unconscious body, leaned down and snatched the Arsene Amulet from off her neck. “Oh, well. At least I’m still able to nab this!” He looked around, noticing that something was missing. “Hey, uh…Where’s Bear Trap?”

“Oh, Molly? Last time we saw her, she left because she wanted to find a way out of the museum so her Epithet wouldn’t get stolen.” Tommy answered. “By now, she must’ve gotten out safe and sound, protected by the police.”

“THE POLICE!?” Giovanni shouted. “Why on Earth would you think she’d be safe with them? She’s part of us, The Banzai Blasters - A CRIMINAL ORGANIZATION, IF YOU RECALL!”

“Yeah, I know that, but they don’t.” Tommy defended himself. “And she’s not going to tell them that she’s hanging out with a criminal. No one would be stupid enough to just announce to the police that they’re bad guys…” He stopped as he realized who he was talking to. “...No offense.”

“None taken.” The Banzai Blaster leader said before sighing. “I guess all that matters is that she’s safe now.”

As he and Tommy were having this conversation, Sylvie began to regain consciousness. He was still too weak to stand up, so the best that he could do was lay on the ground and lean against the nearby boxes. “What happened?” he asked groggily.

Toby, the closest to him nearby, turned and was about to talk, but Giovanni rushed in and interrupted him. “Unfortunately, I wasn’t here to see this, but it seems as though you were dumb enough to get knocked out. Thankfully, some of my trusted minions were here to save the day!” He began to cockily laugh.

Sylvie had merely rolled his eyes in response, not in the mood for Giovanni’s bullshit at the moment. That was, until he noticed the Amulet in his hands and remembered that before he got knocked out, Mera took it from him.

It looked like since Giovanni had the amulet on him, he would have to be the one to give the power back to him. Sylvie sighed. “Giovanni, I was wondering if you could give me the Amulet for a little bit.” He asked, trying to hide his reasoning why because he knew that if he told him about it, he would mock him relentlessly about it.

Unfortunately, Giovanni was able to figure it out. “Don’t tell me that you also managed to lose your Epithet!” He cackled. “Fine, I might give it back to you, but only if you BEG!”

Sylvie raised an eyebrow as he stood up. “And why would I ever do that, you cretin?”

Giovanni scoffed and began to walk away. “Oh well, that’s a shame. I guess that means that you’ve just forfeited your Epithet to the BANZAI BLASTERS!” As he shouted this, he posed with the other three minions joining in.

This was the breaking point for Sylvie. He got back down onto the floor, this time with his elbows and knees on the ground. “No, please! I want it, I want it, I want it, I want it!” He blubbered, tears forming in his eyes.

It was honestly a pathetic sight to behold.

“Giovanni, just give him his Epithet back.” Toby said. “He’s already been through a lot, he doesn’t need you to make it worse.”

The Banzai Blaster captain sighed before handing it over. “Fine, Sting, I guess I’ll humor him this once.” He turned his head to look at Sylvie. “You’re lucky that I’m such a nice guy.”

Toby walked over to Sylvie, still on the ground but at least his begging stopped. The new L’manbergian was unsure as to how exactly he would be able to give Sylvie his power back. Maybe he and the Amulet would have to touch for the power to return? 

He tried that out and surprisingly enough, it worked. The Amulet’s jewel glowed orange as a similarly-colored energy flowed from it onto the young doctor before vanishing.

For a few moments, Sylvie didn’t say anything. Then he quietly muttered a “thank you.”

Toby was able to hear him however. “You’re welcome.” he answered back.

“Well, that takes care of almost everything.” Giovanni said, before turning to face the three. “So are you three planning on staying with us, or would you prefer to leave like Bear Trap did?”

Before any of them could answer, however, the wall at the opposite end of the room exploded! Out of the hole where a good chunk of wall once stood was entered three figures. Two of them wore a blue shirt, white gloves, gray pants and hats with a yellow star on it. This must be what a typical police uniform looks like in this world. The other one was a slightly androgynous woman with short blond hair, freckles and thick eyebrows. Her outfit was different, signifying a higher rank. A black tie and yellow shoulder tassels were added to the standard outfit. “Freeze!” shouted one of the two cops, who both had their guns ready in case anything goes screwy.

“Oh right, the police. Forgot about them.” Giovanni noted, as his three minions prepped their guns as well.

The androgynous officer stepped out in front of the other two. “Well, well, well…The notorious Banzai Blasters.” she said. “We should have known that you were responsible.”

“That’s right, Coppers!” shouted Giovanni. “This museum’s treasure is ours for the taking! And we are not afraid to go through your peashooters to get it!”

“We’ll see about that.” The officer said as she removed something from the sheath at her side and pointed it at them. That something turned out to not be a gun, but a sword with a yellow handle.

This was not a development that anyone was expecting. The other cops had guns, which were typical police weapons, so the fact that she had a sword as a weapon doesn’t really make that much sense.

Whatever the reason behind her bringing it, it seemed to freak out the Banzai Blasters. “Whoa! Is that a real sword?!” exclaimed Giovanni.

“Holy shit!” exclaimed the minion with spikes on her gauntlets.

“We’re not supposed to mess around with any swords.” shouted the minion with star decals.

“Yeah, that’s above our pay grade.” added the muscular minion.

“We gotta get out of here, boss!” yelled a fourth minion that bore an exact resemblance to the one with star decals.

…Wait, weren’t there supposed to be just three minions?

“Interesting, that was what your friends said before we captured them.” The officer with the sword said. She pointed the sword to her left to reveal three more of Giovanni’s minions. One had a dented helmet, another had a metal rim around his visor, and the third just had a plain uniform. Currently, they’re tied up together with rope. They were not even trying to escape, instead whimpering like cowards.

At this sight, Giovanni only facepalmed. “C’mon, guys, really?”

“And of the four with you that are not in uniform?” questioned the officer. “Are they also part of your criminal cavalcade?”

The four tensed up upon hearing this. They knew that they themselves could say no to get out of this situation, but Giovanni… they were afraid that he would begin to boast that they were proud members of the Banzai Blasters, putting them into even more danger.

He turned to look at them, and then back at the officer. The tension on the four was getting to be like a rhino’s skin.

“As IF!” Giovanni finally shouted. “Why would the Banzai Blasters hire random people off the street? They probably aren’t useful in anything. These are our hostages.” He grabbed Sora by his arm and placed him in front of him. “So you’d better not think about shooting!”

Sora tried his best to improvise in this situation. “Oh no, I’ve been captured. Hopefully, no further grievances will befall me today.”

Yeah, his acting could use a lot of work, but hopefully his wooden acting would be enough to convince the officers.

The officer put her sword down and grunted. “Stand down, men.” She addressed her colleagues. With that order, they put their guns down as well.

Giovanni cackled at this. “That’s right! You wouldn't want to hit one of the hostages through the fog by mistake!”

“Through the fog?” The policewoman repeated in confusion. “What fog?”

“The fog…OF LOST SOULS!” he dramatically shouted as a pink fog began to engulf the room. Pretty soon, it completely encompassed everyone’s visions. They could no longer tell who was who anymore. Strangely, it also gave everyone a feeling of rejuvenation.

By the time it had finally begun to clear, all seven (or possibly eight, they were still unsure where the other guy came from) members of the Banzai Blasters had vanished, their only trace that they had even been there in the first place were the cut up pieces of rope that once held three of them and Giovanni’s echoing barks of laughter. “So long, suckers! Spike-Key, Sting, Guardian - I believe that we’ll meet again soon!”

“Drat!” the officer cursed before turning to her compatriots. “Split up and search for them! We can’t let them get away! I’ll look after the civilians.” The two nodded their heads and left the room through the exit that they had made.

As soon as the two had left, the officer walked towards the four. “Is everything all right? Have the Banzai Blasters harmed you in any way?” she asked.

“No, they haven’t hurt us.” Sora reassured her before gesturing to Sylvie. “But our friend here got hurt by someone else.”

“I see.” She turned to see the unconscious Mera. “Is she another one of your friends too?”

“Who, her?” Tommy asked. “No, she’s another thief. In fact, she tried to steal the Arsene Amulet.”

“Thankfully, we were able to retrieve it and return the powers that it stole.” He began to lift up his hand. “I have it right…” He stopped as he realized that the hand that was holding the amulet was now empty-handed. “…oh.”

He patted his pockets, hoping that there was a chance that he put it in there, but the only things there were his phone and the munny bag.

“Oh, shit…” he said, as he realized that he didn’t have the amulet on him. “It’s gone! The amulet’s gone!”

“The amulet’s gone!?” Sylvie asked. “What happened to it?”

“I don’t know!” Toby said worriedly. “I had it in my hand when I restored Sylvie’s power and then…” It suddenly dawned on him where it could have gone. “Giovanni…he must have stolen it when he made his escape.”

“That’s worrisome…” the officer noted. “The Banzai Blasters have only been nuisances that weren’t ever worth the trouble, but now that they have something like the Arsene Amulet in their possession…”

She grabbed onto a radio attached to her side, pressed a button and spoke into it. “To those after the Banzai Blasters, approach with caution. They have the Arsene Amulet in their possession. I repeat, they have the Arsene Amulet in their possession, approach them with caution.” After she had finished with the message, she put it back on her side.

Shen then pulled out a pair of handcuffs with a green line running across the cuffs. She walked to Mera, who was beginning to regain consciousness, and slapped the cuffs onto her hands.

“Ma’am, please be careful.” Sora warned her. “Her epithet can cause things to break apart and wither.”

“I assure you that I don’t have to worry about that anymore, citizen.” said the policewoman. “Not as long as she has these Eraser cuffs on her.”

“Eraser cuffs?” Sora questioned.

“They’re something that the police use to capture criminal stand users. It can make them forget their own epithet.” Sylvie answered, before looking at the boy with suspicion. “How do you not know about this?”

“We,uh… don’t really have a need for those where I come from.” Sora hastily answered.

“Seems like there’s not a lot of crime where you come from.” noted the officer.

“Yeah, not really.” Sora said. Now that he was thinking about it, he couldn’t remember a single time in Destiny Islands that a crime had been committed. The only way that he even learned the concept of crime was from shows and books. The Islands were a peaceful place, perhaps that was one of the reasons that they wanted to leave.

Meanwhile, the officer was busy helping Mera get up as she was beginning to regain consciousness. “Nngh…what happened?” she moaned.

“You’re under arrest for attempted theft of the Arsene Amulet.” The officer informed her, holding onto her shoulder with a firm grip. “Now, you wouldn’t happen to be Mera, would you?”

Her words snapped Mera out of her daze like cold water. She looked at her hands, and noticed that they had been cuffed. She tried to shoulder the policewoman to loosen her grip, but as soon as she attempted this, a massive pain began to sear in her shoulder. That was enough to quell her resistance to capture. “Yeah, I’m Mera. What about it?” she sighed.

“We captured your partner, Indus Tarbella, a short while ago. Maybe if you don’t put up any more resistance, the two of you would be lucky enough to share a cell.”

Mera groaned, but other than that, she remained silent.

The officer turned to face the four. “Now that that is settled, it’s time I get you civilians to safety.”

“Thank you, Miss…uh…” Sora began.

“Percival King.” Percy answered. “Though I would prefer if you called me ‘Percy’.”

“Right. Thanks, Percy.” Sora said.

The six of them then walked out of the room, Percy and Mera taking the lead and Sylvie limping behind. For a while, no one spoke a word. They stopped once they got to the lobby, which now had a few other officers residing. 

“Men!” Percy called out, getting the officer’s attention. “Make sure that this man gets some medical assistance, pronto! As for her, make sure she gets put in the same car as Indus.”

All of the officers obeyed her orders. Some of them grabbed Mera from Percy and began to escort her out of the museum. The others assisted Sylvie out, making sure that he was put onto a stretcher from an outside ambulance.

Once the two had been taken outside, Sora asked Percy a question. “Hey, is Molly alright?”

She turned and looked at him in confusion. “Pardon?”

“The girl with the bear hoodie. Is she alright?” Sora reiterated. Perhaps Molly didn’t give the police her name, and Percy will recognize her from her description.

She was still confused, however. “I’m sorry, I’m afraid that I haven’t encountered anyone with that description. Was I supposed to meet this Molly?”

“Well, she was with us in the museum.” Tommy explained. “Mera wanted to steal her epithet so that her own would hurt her less. She ended up getting separated from us, but before she left, she told us that she was going to escape here and find you guys so that you can protect her.”

“Well, clearly, that didn’t happen.” Percy said. “Though I hate to admit it, it’s possible that after you last saw her, a kidnapping might have taken place.”

“A kidnapping!?” Sora yelled. “But…why would someone want to kidnap Molly?”

“Not sure.” she said. “This doesn’t seem like something that the Banzai Blasters are capable of. You said that Mera wanted her epithet. Maybe she and Indus had other partners hidden in this museum. Now, are there any other people that I should look out for?”

“Uh…yeah there is actually!” Sora realized. With everything that happened, he forgot that one of the reasons that he joined Tommy and Toby was so he could find Riku and Kairi. He told her about the two and made sure to give her descriptions on what they looked like. Tommy and Toby also chimed in, letting her know of Phil and what he looked like. There could be a chance that he was here at some point.

“I have not encountered anyone fitting any of those descriptions, unfortunately.” Percy said as soon as they finished. “However, I will notify my team about them. We’ll let you know if we see them.”

“Thanks.” Sora said.

Suddenly, Sora’s keyblade rematerialized. Unlike the other times that it has been summoned, it began to jerk around in his hand, until it forced him to point it at the wall. Without warning, above the angel statue on the fountain, a bright light shone until it took on the outline of a keyhole. A beam shot out of the Keyblade and went into the keyhole. As it entered, a click was heard, as if a door had been locked. After a while, the beam vanished and as it did, the keyhole disappeared into particles of light.

For a while, no one spoke. Instead, they just stared at where the keyhole once was. Then, Percy spoke. “I’ve never seen an Epithet react like that before. What was that?”

“I’m…not sure.” Sora admitted. “It’s the first time I’d ever seen it do that as well.” It seemed like there was a lot more about the Keyblade than he first thought.

“Well, as long as nothing else is happening, we’ll be on our way.” Toby said.

“We will!?” Sora asked, shocked as he turned to face him.

“Yeah. There’s nothing else for us here, we might as well leave.” Toby answered.

“But Molly-” The spiky-haired teen began.

“I’m sure that Percy and her team will be able to find her.” Toby interrupted. “Besides, I can see our way out.” As he was saying this, his head was nudging towards his left behind him.

Sora took a look at where Toby was asking for him to look and saw that by the receptionist’s desk was a glowing green spot. He then remembered what Sam had told them, that those spots were ways to get back onto the ship.

Sora sighed. “I guess you’re right.” he said, a bit of depression in his voice, before turning to face Percy. “Let us know if you find any of them, ok?”

“Don’t worry, citizen. I’ll be sure to let you know if anything happens.” she promised, before turning away to walk out the entrance.

With her back turned, the three of them made their way over to the glowing spot and stood on it, making sure that their eyes were closed this time. After a few seconds, they disappeared in a flash of green light.

Percy briefly stopped what she was doing to look behind her, only to see that the three were no longer there. She merely shrugged this off however as one of them using a teleportation Epithet to leave. She then continued her way out, grabbing her radio and talking into it. “All units, in addition to the theft of the Arsene Amulet, there are also four cases of 10-65s.” she reported. “I repeat, four cases of missing persons. Their descriptions and names are as follows…”

- - -

The figures in the dark room were once again watching Sora and his friends as they were leaving Sweet Jazz City from their monstrous-looking crystal ball.

This time, the egg on the TV screen was the first to speak. “So the kid’s found and locked a Keyhole without even knowing what it is?” he scoffed. “Talk about lucky.”

“It might not be as much of a coincidence as you would think,” said the horned man. “From what I saw, the Keyblade was the one who unveiled it. It could’ve led him to it.”

“Guess it’s safe to say that the Keyblade’s the real brains of the group, then?” the vampiric woman chuckled.

“Let’s not stray from the point at hand.” the woman in the blue dress said. “He locked a Keyhole before we could get to it. Surely you see the detriment in that.”

“But that’s the only one he’s reached.” the pale man pointed out. “It’s nothing compared to the possible millions that we’ve found.”

“He’s right, you know.” spoke Salem. “It’ll take him ages to find and lock enough of them in order for him to become a true burden for our plans. Speaking of them, he still remains unaware of what else we have planned.”

As she says this, a figure was shoved out for the others to see. The one who stepped out was none other than Molly Blyndeff, safe and sound!

“Who are you? H-have you come to steal my Epithet as well?” Molly asked, trying her best to try to not act scared towards the unusual figures.

“Nonsense.” Salem answered as she turned to face her. “Your Epithet could serve no purpose to us. You have another power that we want, one hidden within your heart.”

“Another power? What do you mean?” Molly asked, her facade breaking.

This time, Salem ignored her question, instead looking at two wolf-like figures that appeared behind the young girl. “Take her to the Grand Hall.” She ordered.

The wolf-like figures obeyed, each of them grabbing her by one of the sleeves and beginning to drag her out. Molly tried to struggle against them, but to no avail. She could only look at the unusual figures getting further away, until they left her field of vision.

Chapter Text

STORY:

Sweet Jazz City:

Sora, Tommy and Toby landed in what they thought was an empty museum, until they met Molly Blyndeff and Giovanni Potage. They told them about Mera Salamin, who was trying to find the Arsene Amulet, an amulet that can steal superpowers, here called Epithets, from their users. The trio agreed to help them out and together, they ventured further into the museum.

While Giovanni was creating a base for them in the Animal wing, the five encountered Sylvester Ashling, a young doctor who Mera tricked into believing that the five are thieves trying to steal the amulet. After a fight, they were able to convince him that he was deceived, and after some hesitation, he decided to join them.

On the way to encounter Mera, they ran into her bodyguard, Indus, who told them the reason why Mera was trying to steal the Amulet: her Epithet was hurting her, and she plans on using Molly's to lessen her pain. They confronted Mera and ended up defeating her and handing her over to the police, but not everything ended well. The Banzai Blasters stole the Amulet from under everyone's noses and Molly was missing!

Before Sora, Tommy and Toby left, a mysterious force jerked Sora's Keyblade forward and had it shoot a beam into a mysterious Keyhole...

CHARACTER ENTRIES:

Molly Blyndeff

First KHY Appearance: Y-1 Chapter 8: Fight At The Museum (Chapter 8 Overall)

A young girl who had found herself within Sweet Jazz City Museum after closing. She started out as shy and passive, but is learning to stand up for herself. Her Epithet, "Dumb", allows her to lessen certain concepts like pain, sound or summoned beings like the Heartless.

She dumbed things down in "Epithet Erased I EP1 - Quiet In The Museum"(JelloApocalypse - 2019)

Giovanni Potage

First KHY Appearance: Y-1 Chapter 8: Fight At The Museum (Chapter 8 Overall)

A member of the criminal organization called the Banzai Blasters. He may claim to be nothing but a rotten bad guy, but secretly, he has a good heart. His Epithet is Soup, which allows him to create and control soup. He also can deal massive damage with every 13th hit, but that's an unrelated ability.

He cooked up a surprise in "Epithet Erased I EP1- Quiet In The Museum"(JelloApocalyse - 2019)

Sylvester Ashling

First KHY Appearance: Y-1 Chapter 8: Fight At The Museum (Chapter 8 Overall)

A snooty young boy who also happens to be a psychologist. He's also after the Amulet, but he's looking into it to learn more about how Epithets affect the human psyche. His Epithet, Drowsy, allows him to create construct made from people's dreams.

He dreamed big in "Epithet Erased I EP1 - Quiet In The Museum"(JelloApocalypse - 2019)

Dr. Beefton

First KHY Appearance: Y-1 Chapter 9: Welcome To Your Nightmare (Chapter 9 Overall)

A dream construct that forms whenever Sylvie knocks himself out using his move, Dream Big. Out of the other dream creations, Beefton is the only one with his own personality, one that is extremely aggressive.

He shook the scene in "Epithet Erased I EP2 - Bear Trap"(JelloApocalypse - 2019)

Percival King

First KHY Appearance: Y-1 Chapter 10: Lost and Found (Chapter 10 Overall)

A member of the Sweet Jazz City Police Department. She encountered the three shortly after Mera had been defeated.

She first appeared as a voice-only cameo but her full appearance was shown in "Epithet Erased I EP3 - The Doctor Is In"(JelloApocalypse - 2019)

Banzai Blasters

First KHY Appearance: Y-1 Chapter 8: Fight At The Museum (Chapter 8 Overall)

A group of criminals, with one of the sections being led by Giovanni Potage. Giovanni's team has six members - Ben, Car Crash, Flamethrower, Dark Star, Crusher and Spike, but a mysterious seventh member can be spotted at times.

Their obedience shone in "Epithet Erased I EP1 - Quiet In The Museum"(JelloApocalypse - 2019)

Mera Salamin

First KHY Appearance: Y-1 Chapter 8: Fight At The Museum (Chapter 8 Overall)

A woman who posed as a member of the museum staff in order for her to find the Arsene Amulet. The reason she need the amulet was because her Epithet "Fragile", was slowly damaging her as she used its powers. She plans on using Molly's Epithet to lessen the pain of her own.

Her breakout appearance was "Epithet Erased I EP1 - Quiet In The Museum"(JelloApocalypse - 2019)

Indus Tarbella

First KHY Appearance: Y-1 Chapter 8: Fight At The Museum (Chapter 8 Overall)

Mera's personal bodyguard. He's a sweet guy underneath, but his niceness can be removed if his Lady's orders necessitates it. His Epithet is Barrier (and boy, will he make sure that you remember it), which allows him to create, well, barriers.

He protected his master like a Barrier in "Epithet Erased I EP1 - Quiet In The Museum"(JelloApocalypse - 2019)

HEARTLESS:

Large Body

First KHY Appearance: Y-1 Chapter 8: Fight At The Museum (Chapter 8 Overall)

A big and round variant of the Heartless. If left alone, they can actually be pretty docile. Unfortunately, they're almost always surrounded by chaos, so it's rare that you see them in that state. Make sure you're careful around them as they can inflict great damage.

They made sure to watch their backs in "Kingdom Hearts" (Disney - 2002)

Red Nocturne

First KHY Appearance: Y-1 Chapter 9: Welcome To Your Nightmare (Chapter 9 Overall)

A spell-casting Heartless whose speciality is fire. They are weak so they have to keep their distance, so attack them from afar. They also absorb fire attacks.

They started the fire in "Kingdom Hearts" (Disney - 2002)

Chapter Text

Sora sighed as the sight of Sweet Jazz City was slowly getting smaller. He hated the fact that another one of his friends went missing and he couldn’t do anything about it.

“Why couldn’t we have stayed?” Sora said to himself aloud.

Though he wanted to keep to himself for now, Toby was still able to hear him. “I told you, it’s because there was nothing left for us there. After we defeated Mera, the Heartless seemed to have stopped showing up.”

“But, aren’t you worried about whether or not Molly is ok?” Sora asked.

Toby sighed. “To be truthful, I am concerned about her whereabouts. But we can’t stay in each world long enough to solve everyone’s problems. The longer that we dilly-dally in one world, the more others will get destroyed by the Heartless. Sooner or later, we would have to move on to the next, no matter what.”

He stopped for a bit before speaking again. “But we can check back on that world later, see if Percy managed to find who we’re looking for.” He began to assure the boy. “It might be a while before we head back though. That world could have a slow internal clock.”

“Wait, what’s an internal clock?” Sora asked, confused.

“Well, time between worlds isn’t exactly consistent.” Dr. Collingwood explained. “What could be ten minutes in one world could be eleven in another. It doesn’t seem like that big of a difference, but it adds up over time, until eventually the other one is hours to days ahead of the first.”

“That’s why we should wait a while before heading back, we want to make sure that Percy and her team have enough to look before we check in.” Toby finished.

“...I guess that makes sense.” Sora said, his mood slightly improved. He wished that they wouldn’t have to wait for so long, but at least they were actually considering going back.

Before Sora could go back and stare out into the stars outside the cockpit, a grumbling, slightly wet sound slithered its way past his ears. He recognized this as his stomach and a realization hit him; he hadn’t had anything to eat since the katsu fish from the night his islands were destroyed!

“Uh…would you guys happen to have brought anything to eat along with you?” He asked the others.

“I know that Toby and I didn’t bring anything with us.” Tommy admitted before turning to the doctor, who was writing away in her notes about the recent adventures that the three had taken. “Do you bring anything, Molly?”

“Not really.” she replied before turning to the boy. “Why’d you ask?”

Before Sora could speak, another growl emerged to answer her question, this time much louder than before.

“Ah.” The journal writer noted. “Hey, Sam, how long till we reach the closest world?” She asked towards the console.

Once more, Sam’s voice emerged from the speaker. “It should take a few hours to reach.” he informed them. “Why’d you ask?”

“Well, it’s just that Sora’s getting a little hungry and we didn’t bring any snacks with us.” she recapped. “I thought that maybe we could stop at a nearby world and get something from there, but now that seems like an unlikely course of action.”

“Oh, you don’t have to stop at a world for food.” Sam reassured her. “The ship has a kitchen in it, you can probably make food from there.”

As soon as he heard that, Toby turned to look at Sora. “What was the last meal you had?”

“Oh, it was breaded fish.” Sora said, a curious look forming on his face. “Why’d you ask?”

The president ignored his question, at least for now. “And was that for lunch or dinner?”

“D-Dinner.”

And with that answer, Toby got up from his seat. “Well, guess that means we’re having breakfast then. I’ll see what we got in the kitchen to make.”

For reasons the non-New L’manbergians didn’t know, upon hearing this, Tommy’s eyes widened and he gulped. “Wait, y-you’re going to cook?” He asked, his voice filled with fear as he turned to face his companion.

“Don’t worry, Tommy.” Toby reassured him. “I’ll make sure to be careful this time, just like every other time.” He then left the cockpit room to see where the ship’s kitchen was.

Once he was gone, Sora turned to face Tommy. “Should we also be scared that Toby’s cooking or is this just a ‘you’ thing?” he asked.

“It’s not really anything to concern yourselves with.” The blonde answered. “It was just a one-time thing, probably won’t happen again! Despite that, I’m still cautious everytime he goes to cook.”

“If you don’t mind me asking, what exactly happened that one time?” Molly inquired.

Tommy seemed reluctant to tell the story at first, but eventually he gave in. “Well, at the time, I was about to go on my first date,” he began. “Before I went to meet her, I asked Toby if he could be the host for our date and he agreed.”

“Things had been going alright - well, me and my date weren’t exactly getting along, but we can ignore that part for right now.” He added. “Toby gave us our dinners and, I guess he must’ve forgotten to turn something off cause when he went back inside, his whole kitchen was on fire!” To emphasize the dramatics of the situation, he used the motions of his hands to imitate a burst of flame.

“I’m, uh, sure that made for a memorable first date at least.” Dr. Collingwood remarked.

“Oh, you have no idea.” Tommy mused, a nostalgic grin upon his face.

After that, there wasn’t a lot of commotion within the cockpit area. Sora, Molly and Tommy were sitting there silently, each of them containing a twinge of nervousness, hoping that Toby’s one-time mistake won’t happen again.

Thankfully though, there were no fires in the ship’s kitchen today. Once Toby was finished cooking, he went back in to let the others know that it was breakfast time.

They made their way down the ship, following where Toby went, until they found themselves in a medium-sized room. This room had all of the essentials a kitchen should have; a fridge, an oven, a few counters, etc. In the middle of the room was a table. On the table were links of sausage, pancakes and even a few hash browns. Glasses of juice and water as well as containers filled with ketchup and syrup were splayed out alongside the food. Toby smiled with pride as he looked at the others. “Bon Appetit!” he said.

And with that, the four dug into their food, with all of it ending up tasting good. If every time Toby cooked it would risk the kitchen being burnt down, then that risk was worth it.

Normally during meals with other people, there would be at least some form of communication. But from this meal, no one had anything to say. Sora already said a lot after they had left Traverse Town and didn’t feel like more needed to be said. And as for the other three, they still didn’t feel comfortable to reveal much.

A few hours after they finished their meal, the ship had reached a new world. This one was mostly covered by ocean, with a few islands and ships dotting it occasionally. Like with Sweet Jazz City, there was one area that was standing out. It was an island surrounded by a wall of rock that had only one opening, with a carving of a fist depicted on either side. From where they were positioned, they could see part of the island. It was surrounded by a circular ring of water and they could even make out a large circular building on the island at one of the wall’s edges.

“Ok, Sam.” Toby said. “What were you able to find for this world?”

“This world is called Joaldo Island.” Sam explained. “The people you’ll meet there are either some kind of Pirate or some kind of Viking.”

“WE GET TO MEET PIRATES!?” Sora interrupted, being much more interested in the prospect of pirates than he was with superheroes. He had always heard tales of pirates back on Destiny Islands, and ever since he was first told a story about them, he wanted to meet them. He never got the chance back home, but now it seems as though his wish will be fulfilled.

After his sudden outburst, for a moment, there was just silence as the three other occupants turned to face the boy.

“Sora, I appreciate your enthusiasm, but can you please stop interrupting me?” Sam asked exasperatedly.

“U-uh, yeah sure. Sorry.” The boy apologized sheepishly.

“As I was going to say…” the plant man continued. “Joaldo Island also has a yearly event every year called the Paramount Tournament. Perhaps you’ll be lucky enough to have it happen while you visit.”

The mention of the tournament piqued Sora’s interest, not just because he was excited about it. He knew that Riku and Kairi were competitive like he was, so if they had landed here, the coliseum seemed like the perfect place for them to go. 

The only thing that he was worried about regarding that was were they skilled enough to participate. He and Riku had fought each other with wooden swords back home, but Kairi never had a weapon to fight with. Maybe she picked up her own weapon after they had separated, just like him and the Keyblade.

“Good to know.” Toby said, before turning to face his two adventuring companions. “You guys ready to head out?” 

Upon seeing them nod their heads in confirmation, he pressed the blue button and closed his eyes. Shortly afterward, the three vanished from the ship.

After a few moments, the three opened their eyes to find themselves in front of the massive circular marble building, whose back wall seems to be part of the wall that they saw on the world before they landed. There were multiple archways and entrances into the building, each with letters next to them indicating who should go where. None of them were closed or blocked off, meaning that they arrived at a time where the Paramount Tournament was active. A road was leading up to the building that also splits into a left and right branch, one leading to a vertical path flanked with buildings on both sides and the other leading to a cul-de-sac area with a fountain in the middle.

The trio looked around and noticed that, thankfully there was no one around who would have seen them teleport down. “OK, so there doesn’t appear to be anyone out now.” Toby had noted.

“How likely do you think that is because they’re all in there?” Tommy asked, pointing to the coliseum.

“I’d like to assume very likely.” His friend answered.

“So what are we waiting for?” Sora asked as he began to run towards the entrance in the middle. “Let’s go sign up!”

“Wait a minute, hold up.” Toby said as he realized what the Keyblade Wielder had said. “No one had mentioned anything about signing up.”

“I know that.” Sora argued. “It’s just that I think if my friends were somewhere around here, they’d probably be participating in the games. They were always the competitive type."

"Yeah, but..." Toby began before stopping himself. He wasn't particularly fond of having to sidetrack the mission just to help him look out for his friends. But it felt like the only reason Sora stayed with the two was for the chance to look for them.  It seems that he must keep up the charade of wanting to help him look, but that doesn't mean that he was willing to join an entire tournament just to look for them. "Do we really have to participate in the tournament to do it?"

"Would you rather ask every individual audience member about who they know is participating?" The spiky-haired kid asked.

Toby opened his mouth to try to come up with a counter-argument, but he closed it almost immediately. As much as he hated to admit it, Sora had a point. If their friends have managed to sign up for the tournament, it would be more efficient, as well as less tedious, to check with whoever was running the place and to see if they have joined or not.

"Oh, all right." Toby conceded. "We'll go and check it out. But if it turns out that, for some reason, we aren't able to join, we'll might have to look somewhere else for them."

"Sounds good to me!" Sora said as he led the three down the middle entrance; the one where a sign specified that those who want to sign up for the games should go down.

The entranceway led into a tunnel that got deeper and deeper. Soon the only sources of light were the torches and lanterns that dot the walls. Eventually, the tunnel led out into a small room. They noticed that there was someone already in that room. He was an older man with very thin orange hair. He had a somewhat fancy green suit with brown pants and was of very short stature. Given how he was the only one there, the three assumed that this was who they would have to talk to if they wanted to enter.

Sora cleared his voice and began to address the man. “Uh, excuse me-?”

The short man ended up interrupting him, however. “You’ve got some good timing there, boy!” he said, not once looking up from his clipboard. “Now give me a hand here, and move that pedestal over there a little bit to the right.” He pointed his thumb towards the wall on the left of him. “We need this place to look perfect for the games.”

The three of them followed where the man’s thumb was pointing, and saw a square block the size of the small man resting against the wall. It was off-center, only needing to be pushed slightly to the right in order to center it.

Sora figured that he might as well try to help the man out. After all, he could always let him know that he wasn’t who he thought he was until later. He then went over to the block’s right side.

He rubbed his hands together bracing himself. Then he put them out and went to push.

Unsurprisingly, this ended up doing nothing. No matter how hard he pushed, it wouldn’t even move an inch. Eventually, he had to stop so he could rest his hands.

“This thing is too heavy!” The boy complained, loudly enough to alert the man checking the clipboard.

“Wh-Too heavy?!” He said incredulously as if this was supposed to be shocking as he turned around. “Since when have you been such a little-”

He stopped as he noticed who he was talking to. It was also now that the three were able to get a good look at what the man looked like from the front. He had a large nose with tiny glasses sitting on the top that he was currently adjusting. On his arms, there were silver chain bracelets on each of his forearms.

“Apologies, boy.” The short man said after a few moments of analyzing the three. “I mistook you for someone else. Now what’s someone like you doing here?”

“Isn’t it obvious?” Sora asked. “We’re here to join the games.”

The man’s eyes narrowed. “Are you sure about that, kid? You know that this dangerous tournament is, well, a dangerous tournament?”

“Of course, I’m certain!” Sora proudly boasted. “We’ve beaten some tough enemies in the past.”

The short man stared at the three for a few moments, before looking back at the clipboard. “If you say so, boy. All you need to do is give me your pass and you’re in.”

He only got blank stares in return. “A pass?” Tommy asked.

“You haven’t heard?” he questioned. “Normally, we wouldn’t need one as you would just have to sign up. But things are…different this year.” He paused. “I take it that your reaction means that you don’t happen to have one on you.”

“Yeah, you’d be right.” Toby admitted.

“But we can still get a pass and then come back, right?” Sora suggested, hopeful.

“Afraid not. All of our passes have been sold out.” The small man broke the bad news to the trio. “Guess you’re gonna have to miss out on the games this year, boy.”

The young boy sighed at this. He really wanted to go and check out the tournament, but it looks like he’ll have to wait at least a year for that to happen. “OK…” he said begrudgingly.

“Before we leave, sir, there’s something that I want to ask you.” said Toby. “We were also looking for some people. I was wondering if you could check to see if they signed up to participate.”

“Welp, I guess I could do that.” The short man said. “Give me their names and appearances, and I’ll check to see if they have entered.”

After the three of them proceeded to give the names and descriptions to the man After the three gave the names and descriptions of those they were looking for, the man looked through the pages and pages attached to his clipboard before he spoke up again.

“Sorry, I checked and double-checked. It seems as though your friends haven’t signed on yet.” he informed them.

“Thanks for letting us know.” the older brunette said, a little disappointed. “We’ll be on our way now. C’mon, Sora.” He said as he and Tommy began to head out.

Sora stood there for just a moment before following Tommy and Toby, leaving the man once again alone in the room.

The trio went back the way that they came in, though one of them was less excited going out the opposite way. "I wish we could find some other way to enter." Sora lamented.

“I know that.” Toby said. “But there’s not really a point in staying here. The people we’re looking for aren’t here and it doesn’t seem like the Heartless are here.”

Sora was about to come up with some type of argument against Toby but a new voice spoke out before he could.

“The Heartless?” the new voice said. “What kind of creature are you talking about?”

The three turned to face the voice’s source. It was a tall man with dark purple skin, long black hair that had parts of it in braids and horns that curled. His eyes were pure black, making it difficult to distinguish sclera from pupil. He wore a black vest with puffed sleeves above a purple undershirt that showed a good deal of his chest and black boots. There were multiple traces of gold on his person, from bracelets on his horns, neck and hands to the filigree on his vest to the scarf tied around the waist. He seemed like a charming man but was the owner of a smile that didn’t seem trustworthy.

“And why would you want to know?” Tommy asked, suspicion in his voice, and for good reason too. There was just something…off about this man.

“Oh, it’s just that the name was unfamiliar to me, that’s all.” the man said. “I’d never heard of these creatures until now.”

The three of them looked at each other. Despite the fact that the man seemed suspicious, it didn’t feel right to not warn him about the Heartless. They ended up deciding that they should tell him.

Before they could speak, the horned man spoke again. “Could it perhaps be the name of those creatures in the coliseum? That would explain the symbols some of them have.”

That certainly ended up catching their attention. “Wait, there’s creatures in the coliseum?” Sora asked.

“The ticket master didn’t explain it to you?” the man asked.

“Well…he did tell us that there were some new restrictions added this year, but nothing beyond that.” The Keyblade wielder admitted.

“Simply put, one day a few weeks ago, these shadowy creatures arrived without any prior warning.” The man began to explain. “They were hostile, but thankfully, none of them ever tried to leave the coliseum. The island simply adapted to these creatures, deciding to make them obstacles for the fighters to face during this year’s game. If fighting these creatures is as important as you’d suggest, then I’d suggest that you participate in the games.”

This got Sora to perk up. Now he had an excuse to join the tournament, one that Toby couldn’t argue with.

“Unfortunately, I’m afraid that we can’t.” Toby said, causing Sora to deflate as he remembered. “We’d have to get an entry pass first, but they’re all sold out.”

The stranger only chuckled at this. “I suppose that would mean you’ll be interested in this then.”

He held out one of his hands to Sora. It was clenched at first, but then it opened a piece of papyrus paper. A wrestler’s mask with a cat-like appearance was depicted on it, with depictions of fists on its left and right. The thing that interested Sora, however, were the words that were above these images - ‘Entry Pass’. “Is that…?” Sora began.

“A gift from me to you.” The man explained. “Normally, I only give things away for a price, but for you…I’ll be happy to make an exception.”

“Okay, what exactly did we do to get in your good graces?” Tommy asked with suspicion. Despite the fact this man seemed to be helping them, he still couldn’t shake off the bad vibes he felt from him. “And who are you, anyway?”

“I’ve gone by many names in the past; ‘The Wish Doctor’, ‘Desire Daddy’, ‘Papa Possibility’...” The man began to list out. “But my true name… is Niklaus Hendrix. As for why I’m helping you, let’s just say you’ve piqued my interests.”

Niklaus then began to walk away, but the trio wasn’t done with him yet. “What’s that supposed to mean?” Sora asked.

He stopped and turned his head to look at them. “I’m sure you have more pressing matters to get to than interrogating me.” he said. For the first time in this conversation, annoyance snuck into his voice before he continued along his path.

This time, no one attempted to bother him, instead choosing to watch him until he vanished from their sight. “Glad he’s gone.” Tommy sighed once the figure was out of sight. “He was sending fucking chills down my spine.”

“We can forget about that now.” Sora said. In truth, that guy had felt off to him as well. Hopefully, if they focused on something else, then those weird vibes they got from him would vanish. “Let’s go back in and show the guy that we have our ticket!”

And with that, Sora began to run back to the coliseum in excitement, with the other two following behind shortly afterward.

- - -

As the trio were heading back into the coliseum, Niklaus continued on his way, walking down the streets of Joaldo until he stopped within an unoccupied dark alley. It seemed as though he was the only inhabitant within it, until something emerged from the shadows.

It was a jellyfish-like creature, with a small black crystal ball-like main body covered in bone-like plates and six long red tentacles dangling down. Niklaus wasn’t afraid of this creature’s sudden arrival or nightmarish appearance. He knew that this was simply one of Salem’s Seers. She never left that castle of hers, so she used these to as her eyes on other worlds, as either scouts or means of communication.

It seemed that the latter was true this time, as Salem’s face had appeared from within its small round head. “I trust that there’s a reason that you decided to give them an entry pass.” she said.

“I’m simply got tired of watching him from afar.” Niklaus stated simply. “Now that he’s in my world, I couldn’t let him leave until he gives me the chance to see how strong he really is.”

“And yet at the same time, you letting him linger here risks the chance of him sealing the Keyhole for this world.” The witch pointed out. “Be careful not to let your heart get clouded by your desires.”

The horned man merely scoffed at this remark. “Darling, I deal with people clouded with desires for a living. I would know better than to be controlled by them myself.” He assured her.

Salem said nothing as her visage vanished from the Seer as it began to move away, leaving Niklaus in the alley on his lonesome. He then turned to face the direction of where the coliseum was and grinned. “Best of luck, Sora. I hope you won’t let me down. If not, I pray that your downfall will at least entertain me.” he said before continuing his walk into the shadows.

Chapter Text

The short man examined the ticket he was recently handed closely, checking it to see if it was genuine and for good reason too. The trio of people that stood before him wanted to sign up without knowing they needed a pass to enter, and despite all the passes being sold out, they somehow managed to get their hands on one. That was enough for the man to get suspicious.

Despite all his efforts to find a flaw that could point it out to be a fake, no such flaw was present. Perhaps it really was genuine after all. But that still begs the question - how did they get their hands on one?

“Looks legit enough.” he spoke aloud. “Now, tell me how you managed to get a hold of this?”

“Well…someone was kind enough to give us their pass, that’s all.” Sora said. He didn’t want to mention Niklaus by name just in case it turned out that he was part of some kind of Joaldo Island blacklist and getting a ticket from somebody like that being grounds for disqualification.

“Got it from somebody else, huh?” The ticket master muttered under his breath.

“Is that a bad thing?” Tommy questioned.

“Normally, due to the circumstances of how you got it, I would suspect this to be a fraud.” The man explained. “But I’ve checked, this is the real deal. Whoever gave this to you was either a coward who tried to find a way out at the last moment or they gave it to try to get you killed in the games.”

“Joke’s on them, we’re not going down this easily!” Sora boasted. “Ignoring that, however, are we able to enter the games now?” he added, to try and shake off any feelings of worry he felt. He had still felt unnerved by Niklaus and what the man said only made it worse.

“Not yet, boy. There’s still one thing that we need to settle before you’re officially entered.” The short man said as he pulled his clipboard back out alongside a pen. “I need to write down your names and the name of your group.”

“Well, I’m Sora, and these guys are Tommy and Toby.” As for the team name, normally there would’ve been some planning and conversing about it before coming up with something all the members could agree on. However, Sora had a name in his back pocket that he wanted to use for a while, and now seems like the perfect chance to do it.“And we’re called Excalibur!”

“Just Excalibur?” The man questioned.

“I mean, if it’s all right with these guys.” The younger brunette answered as he looked back at his friends. The responses were a shrug from Toby and a nod from Tommy.

“Alright then, Excalibur it is.” The man said as he wrote the name down on his clipboard. “Now, there should be an open room for you down there, just look for the one with your team name.” As he says this, he motions his finger to point to one of the two hallways that lead deeper into the coliseum, the one marked for competitors.

“Thanks, Mr. …uh” Sora stopped once he realized he lacked knowledge of this man’s name.

“Wimfrey.” The man answered.

As the three passed him, the gnome man swiftly and causally put a thin silver bracelet around the wrists of each of the three. Despite him not tying any of them, each of them fit the three perfectly, as if by magic.

The deeper they went down the hallway, the more that it was beginning to feel like they’ve entered an entirely new location. The walls became decorated with brass pipes, metal and steel - a contrast to the magical and fantasy elements of this world that they’ve already encountered.

After a slight curve, they came across rows of doors, each having a technological screen that showcased the team names on them. Eventually, they came across the one labelled “Excalibur”, which was open. 

The room that it led to was pentagonical in shape and small in size. The colors in there were either whites or grays. A grid cubby was built into one of the walls and a few chairs were present. As the three walked in, the door began to slowly shut behind them.

“So now what?” Sora questioned after a few questions after the door closed.

“I guess we just have to wait till we get called up.” Toby said.

After about an hour of waiting, a hissing noise alerted the three that something was happening. In this case, that something was an octagonal platform that was once part of the ceiling descending, with enough room for each of them to get on. From the hole that it left, they could hear the cheers and cries of a very large crowd of people.

“I think that means that they’re ready for us.” Tommy remarked as the platform touched the ground. Once it did, the three could see that a patch of plastic grass was covering it.

The three of them made sure to get on. Once all three of them stepped foot onto the platform it began to rise back up. It stopped once it had reached a circular area with large steel archway entrances similar to the ones on the coliseum’s outside. Beyond the arches is a larger field of similar grass.

As the trio walked out onto the field, they saw that there were others walking alongside them, coming out of their own entrances. Once they got out of the entrance, they saw that above them were four rows of seats above the archways where spectators were sitting. The top of the domes showcased a virtual sky where digital fireworks were displayed as celebration for the preliminaries beginning.

A circular platform began to emerge and descend from the ceiling once all the competitors were on the arena. On it was a figure that the trio recognised to be Wimfrey.

“Greetings, everyone!” he shouted into a nearby speaker. “I humbly welcome you all to this year’s Paramount Tournament!”

Everyone in the audience began to erupt into a loud cheer. It kept going for a few moments before dying out. Wimfrey waited for that to happen before he could speak again.

“This year, things are different…” He said, his voice now with a twinge of melancholy. “Some of you might have heard the news already but a few weeks ago, this coliseum was invaded by shadowy monsters, attacking everyone in sight. They just kept coming no matter how many we destroy, but thankfully they never venture outside the coliseum. So we adapted, making them opponents in the games. But I must warn you, these beasts aren’t going to stop just because you lost a fight against them. In fact, that was why you or your team had to bring in an entry pass, it’s likely that you could die by their hand.”

After hearing this, both the members of the audience and some of the players began murmuring at the news. But while most either kept their voices low or were completely silent, one of the fighters was louder with his complaints.

“Wait, you're telling me that we’re risking our lives by competing here?” shouted a man with a white, open collar shirt and dark grey trousers with suspenders. He was a human with a head that had been recently shaved. “That’s bullshit, I didn’t sign up for this!”

“Fret not, Chip.” assured what could be presumed as another member of the man’s team. He had blue-green skin and fin-like ears and wore dark armor over a dark sleeveless turtleneck. His hair was as green as seaweed and was constantly moving as if it was underwater. “I believe that we’ll triumph through this gauntlet. It shall be our DESTINY!”

“Besides, it’s probably too late to turn back now.” someone next to them spoke up. She appeared to be much older than the others, looking like she was old enough to be a grandmother. She had long hair and wore a dark-blue coat with white fur lined on the top.

“I know that most of you joined this fight because you wanted to prove yourself in one way or another, and these fights will be your chances. Don’t let the thought of death discourage you.” Wimfrey continued.

“Though I wish that La Alma would be here to watch these events unfold…” The gnome lamented. “He unfortunately has business elsewhere on the island. But he will still be with us in spirit, long may he reign!”

“Viva La Immortal!” shouted the audience in a vigorous response.

“Now, for the preliminaries, in the first set, each team will get a chance to fight a batch of these monsters. Those who make it to the next set will end up fighting other fighters, and the winners of those will be participants in the next tournament.”

“The participants of each match have been randomly chosen ahead of time. Speaking of which, let the games commence!” he finished. “Will all teams except Excalibur head back to their tunnels?”

The other teams did as they were told, leaving Sora, Tommy and Toby alone on the arena, at least at first.

A group of seven Heartless materialized after a short while. Four of them were Soldiers, the other three were a new type - the Blue Rhapsody. They looked very similar to the Red Nocturnes, except for their color palette. Their hats were yellow instead of orange and their bodies blue.

“For our first match of the preliminaries, Excalibur versus Shadow Scouts!”

“They gave the Heartless team names too?” questioned Tommy.

They didn’t have time to dwell on that for long as one of the Soldiers lunged towards the blonde. He retaliated with slamming it with his shield, destroying it.

The other Heartless attempted to attack the Excalibur trio. The Blue Rhapsodies also behaved exactly like their red counterparts, except they blasted out ice spells at the three instead of fire.

The airborne menaces were taken care of with a Thunder spell from Toby, which also struck down another Soldier. Meanwhile, Sora and Tommy were taking care of two Soldiers that were coming after them, slaying them before they could even land a hit. The young brunette also dealt the final blow, knocking the last Blue Rhapsody out of the sky with a few strikes of his Keyblade.

“And just like that, Excalibur wins!” Wimfrey shouted over the crowd erupting into somewhat middling applause. “Next up is Deudross vs The Sinisters!”

As Excalibur was heading back to their tunnel to make way for the next team, a man walked out of one of the tunnels near theirs. He wore blue Viking armor over a darker blue shirt. He had neck-length black hair, part of it covered the right side of his face. In his hand, he carried a shining teal sword.

Both Sora and the man (presumably Deudross) took a look at each other as they passed by. As their eyes met, the spiky-haired boy shuddered. There was this bad feeling he felt towards him, but couldn’t explain why. Perhaps it was because he was fighting on his lonesome when everyone else was part of a team, even the Heartless.

As the man stepped onto the arena, a new group of Heartless emerged, consisting of 10 Shadows and 3 Blue Rhapsodies.

They all began to rush toward him. As they did, however, purple lightning began to crackle from his sword’s tip.

He then proceeded to jut it forward, releasing a lightning strike from it that eliminated a majority of the Heartless. The lone survivor was a Shadow, due to having sunk into the ground like an actual shadow.

It navigated itself behind the man in an attempt to sneak attack him. But Deudross was able to react fast enough, trying around, grabbing it by one of its antennae, slamming it onto the ground in front of him, and stomping it out until it vanished.

Once more the crowd erupted into applause, this time it was a little more intense than before. But the man paid them no mind as he turned back towards his tunnel. Meanwhile, there were others that were less excited about his victory.

“I really hope we don’t have to go up against him in the future.” Toby said.

“Same.” Sora seconded. He still had the bad feeling about that man, and that wasn’t helped by the violent tendencies exhibited during the fight.

“Just like that, the fight is over, and in record time as well!” Wimfrey shouted as Deudross headed back down his own tunnel. “Now, for our third match, it’s Chibo and Chums against Heat and Freeze!”

This time, a trio consisting of Chip, the man with fish-like features and the old woman, exited onto the grassy field, where they were greeted with a group of 5 Red Nocturnes and 5 Blue Rhapsodies.

The ten Heartless proceeded to swarm around the trio. The Red Nocturnes were the first to attack, with two of them firing fireballs at them.

They didn’t hit, their targets moving out of the way in time. The closest they had gotten was close enough to Chip’s shirt, causing a small flame to grow on his shoulder. He was able to put it out though before it grew.

Meanwhile, the old woman pulled out a pistol and began to fire. She managed to eliminate the two Red Nocturnes as well as wounding one of the Blue Rhapsodies.

She turned to face the fish-man. “Gillion, would you be a dear and use your powers to take out the red ones?” she questioned.

“Right away, Grandma!” Gillion shouted as he held out his hand. A long and short wall of water began to form before it got shot out in the direction of the remaining three Red Nocturnes.

Before it could hit however, the wounded Blue Rhapsody flew out in front of it and casted an ice spell, turning it into a wall of ice, but not stopping from moving further.

It didn’t need to be stopped however, as upon contact, the ice wall was absorbed in the Heartless. Not only that, but the wounds inflicted onto it have now been cured!

“...Maybe you should save the water powers until the blue ones have been dealt with.” Chip noted.

“An excellent point, Chip!” the fish-man agreed. He then wiped out a longsword that had been kept in a sheath by the thigh. The blade was a bone white in color and depicted on the silver hilt was an octopus. This blade was used to chop up the Rhapsodies at the same time the old woman was firing shots at both types.

Chip however was doing his best to make sure to stay out of the conflict. He only attacked whenever a Heartless attempted to get too close to him. He didn’t have any weapons on him, so instead he simply tried to punch them in their face.

Once all of the Rhapsodies were dealt with, there were only two of their red cousins left on the arena. Two that Gillion finally had the chance to wipe out with a wall of water.

“And with that, Chibo and Chums take their first win of the games!” The gnome announced, before the crowd clapped yet again. “Let’s see if they can keep up that streak in the future.” The applause continued as the three made their way back to their tunnel.

There weren’t really any more fights of note to talk about without getting monotonous. Every one of the teams were given the chance to fight the Heartless, and even a second one if they survived the first.

Most of the teams had survived both rounds, with only a few becoming casualties. Sora could only stand there, paralyzed with fear as those unlucky few got their hearts nabbed from them. Perhaps this was due to PTSD from seeing what happened to that man in Traverse Town. 

Eventually, it was Excalibur’s turn for their second match. Once they stepped onto the battlefield, they were met with a sleeping Large Body and 4 Blue Rhapsodies. There were also 4 barrels plastered at their own separate corner.

“For our last match of Round 1, Excalibur vs Barrel Rollers!” Wimfrey announced.

The trio decided to attack the flying blue Heartless first before they fought the Large Body, so that they wouldn't be overwhelmed in battle. Toby fireballed one of them while Sora was able to knock out two in one combo. Meanwhile, Tommy trickshotted his shield, throwing it against the remaining Blue Nocturne, which destroyed it before bouncing off and slamming itself into the Large Body’s back, forcing it to slam into the ground instantly waking it up.

This attack caused it to go berserk immediately after getting its bearings. Once it did, it attempted to use an attack none of the other Large Bodies in Sweet Jazz City attempted to pull. It lunged forward, sliding across the ground like a penguin to try to run over the trio, going for the Keyblade wielder first.

Sora managed to block the attack, causing a majority of the Heartless’ momentum to decrease as it barely bounced off the blade. He then retaliated by striking it back, causing it to go flying into the nearest barrel.

To everyone’s shock, as soon as the rotund creature came into contact with the barrel, an explosion occurred that ended up as the final blow against it.

“Those barrels are explosive!?” Sora questioned as he stared at the smoldering soot stain where the barrel and Large Body used to be.

All of a sudden, he heard noises of something breaking out of a shell from the inside. “That’s not the only thing those barrels are.” Tommy said.

The Keybearer turned around and saw that the other barrels stationed were changing. For each one, four legs colored purple and pink with talons at the end burst out. The damage from the legs bursting out led to a hole towards the bottom forming, which showcased one of its eyes. Despite only having four legs, these creatures were called Barrel Spiders.

They hadn’t finished the fight at all like they first thought. Instead, they only beat the first phase.

The spiders began to slowly move from where they were originally posted like a predator to move towards the trio, who backed away from them. They were expecting that the Heartless would use the barrels' explosiveness to their advantage, so they kept their distance. 

As they did, Sora realized something. Explosive barrels were explosive due the gunpowder inside being lit aflame. But if the Barrel Spiders were hiding themselves inside explosive barrels, there should have been gunpowder leaking out from the cracks caused from their emergence. Instead there was nothing. That meant it was the creatures themselves that were explosive.

He also noticed that as the spiders were getting closer to them, they were also getting closer together. Maybe they didn’t have to do another full-on fight, maybe only one hit will win them the round.

He waited and waited, backing up with Tommy and Toby as the Barrel Spiders got closer until he quickly whipped the Kingdom Key out and cast a Fire spell towards them once they got close enough together.

As soon as he casted it, the spiders ran at a much faster pace towards them, presumably for the chance to land an attack before they got hit. But it was too late. The spell hit one of them, triggering a chain reaction that exploded all three.

Tommy made sure that his teammates were protected when the explosion happened, running out in front of the other two with his shield in front of him. Thankfully, it was able to save them from the brunt of the damage, only leaving a few burn marks on it.

After a few moments, the shield was lowered to reveal that another soot stain marked the arena where the barrels once were.

“Everyone, give Excalibur a nice round of applause for being the last team to qualify for the second round!” Wimfrey announced. In response, the crowd erupted into an applause much bigger than the one they had for their first match.

This time, the trio decided to bask in their victories. Sora pumped his fist and twirled his Keyblade, before putting over his shoulder, the blade pointing behind him. Tommy held out his hands open, as if to absorb the crowd’s cheers. Even Toby was getting in on accepting the praise, giving a polite bow to the audience like an actor at the end of a play.

“Alright, you fine folks.” The gnome announcer began to speak again after a few moments. “We’re going to be taking an intermission before the next match. Not only will this be giving our remaining fighters some more time to collect themselves, this is also a chance for you in the audience to stand up and stretch your legs before we continue the fights. I will see you all back here after half an hour.”

With that, the circular platform that Wimfrey was on began to rise back up to rejoin the rest of the ceiling. As it did, the fighters went deeper into their tunnels to go back into their rooms whilst some of the audience members began to move from their seats.

- - -

The rooms that the fighters have been assigned to were all made so that each team could have a room to themselves and themselves only. Despite this, there was still one room that had an intruder - one that was somewhat welcomed by the room’s owner.

“Your next fight should be against the Keyblade wielder.” Niklaus Hendrix noted as he was talking to Deudross as he was leaning against one of the walls. “Make sure that you don’t hold back this time.”

“As if I was before.” the blue armored man snarked. “Still, I don’t understand why you want me to get rid of the kid for you. With your powers you should easily finish him off - unless you’re scared.”

The horned man scoffed at this. “I know that I can beat him easily, that’s why I’m not the one going to fight him. I merely want to see how strong he is, and what better way to show that than to have him fight someone as strong as you.”

Deudross merely groaned at this. “When I agreed to make that deal with you all those years ago, I would’ve never thought I’d do something so fucking menial.”

The tiefling smiled mischievously at the mention of Deudross’ deal. It had been about 8 - 9 years ago when both of them met each other for the first time. Apparently, after some incident in the past, Deudross wanted to improve himself. Niklaus had agreed, on the condition that Deudross would follow his orders whenever he asked for it.

However, Niklaus’ deals tend to sour if an individual’s heart isn’t pure enough, and unfortunately, that was true for Deudross. He had been improved, but for the worse. What had once been a man who was a loner and a bit grumpy is now cruel and cold-hearted. Now Niklaus was certain that the armored man forgot why he wanted to improve himself as well, but that didn’t matter at this point.

“Of course that doesn’t mean that you’re not able to kill them off.” Niklaus added for intentional incentive. “I personally don’t care what you do to them, as long as you make the fight interesting.”

“You really think that the Tournament will just let me off someone during the games like that?” questioned Deudross.

“Oh, I know they will.” Niklaus answered. “You heard what the announcer said when the preliminaries began, because of the Heartless, causality is expected this time around. Surely they would know that the players could use that rule to off their competition as well.”

Before any of the two could save anything else, an octagonal platform descended from the ceiling, signaling that it was time for the next match to begin.

“Well, go on then…” Niklaus prodded. “Give us a good show.”

Deudross merely looked back at the purple-skinned man before grumbling something under his breath as he walked onto the platform.

The tiefling stared at the man in blue-armor as he and the platform ascended. “It’s not everyday you get to see a Keyblade wielder fight. Let’s hope it’s as interesting as I thought.” He spoke once the platform and Deudross had vanished before chuckling. 

There was always the possibility that the encounter would end anti-climatically, but that was a scenario that Niklaus had a plan for. In fact, he hoped it would happen.

After all, what is a good story without a little Deus Ex Machina sprinkled in?

Chapter Text

During the wait for the next round of matches, the Excalibur didn’t really do much besides refreshing themselves with a few Potions and Ethers. Conversation was few, but that doesn’t mean that it wasn’t there at all.

“So, what do you think we’ll get if we beat the tournament?” Sora asked.

Tommy thought about it for a while before he answered. “…I don’t know.” he admitted. “I thought that Wimfrey might have mentioned it before, but I don’t remember any moment where he brought it up. Probably a trophy or something.”

While the two of them were discussing, Toby rolled his eyes. They had a mission from Phil; to help the Keyblade Wielder to stop the Heartless. A mission such as this where the fate of the universe is on your shoulders would be considered very important. And yet, his two companions weren’t acting that way. They were too focused on this competition that they didn’t even need to be in in the first place.

Yes, the Heartless were in this tournament, so this counts as stopping them. But both Niklaus and Wimfrey told them that the Heartless never tried to leave the coliseum. They weren’t causing any trouble elsewhere on the island, the only casualties being those who failed their fights against them. It didn’t feel like this world needed them saving it from the Heartless.

The only reason that the three of them were here in the first place is because they had to follow Sora. He didn’t like how it felt like they kept sidestepping the mission just to make the Keyblade Wielder happy.

In the president’s opinion, the boy had been keeping them distracted for too long. Perhaps, Toby should have a talk with him. A talk about how just because they were supposed to be following the Keyblade Wielder didn’t mean that he should be leading them astray. They should be focusing on their responsibilities and that’s it.

And he was about to open his mouth, but the platform coming down from the ceiling grabbed their attention before he could.

“Looks like they’re ready for us again.” Sora said before heading for the platform.

Toby sighed as Tommy followed after the spiky-haired boy. It looks like he was going to save his speech for after this fight. As soon as Toby stepped foot, the platform began to rise back up.

Once the platform rose all the way back up, the three began to walk out of the corridor, all the while hearing Wimfrey announcing to the audience. “-tlemen, to the second round of the preliminaries! This time, the fights are going to be team against team. First up, it’s Excalibur against Deudross!”

A sweat began to form on Sora upon hearing the name. He wasn’t happy with the fact that the man in blue armor was their first non-Heartless opponent of the tournament. With his sword capable of shooting lightning powerful enough to one shot any group of Heartless that didn’t get out of the way in time and his cruel attacks on those that did, Sora knew that they had quite the fight ahead of them.

Eventually, four people were standing on the arena; the Excalibur team and Deudross. For a few tense moments, they just stared at each other, not speaking a word until…

“Make this fun.” the trio finally heard the armored man murmur after a while.

“What?” Tommy questioned.

“I said, make this fun.” Deudross reiterated. “My…sponsor wants this fight to be entertaining and he’s not one you want to disappoint. So do me a favor, try not to die on me too quickly.”

A malicious grin formed on his face afterwards as he held up his sword and pointed it at them.

Thankfully, due to them witnessing Deudross’ previous fights happening, they knew what move he was trying to pull. They all managed to get out of the lightning attack’s range as soon as the sword was jutted forward to activate it.

A scowl briefly formed on Deudross’ face before he simply shrugged it off. “A challenging match. It’s about damn time.”

Tommy was the first to retaliate, rushing towards the man with his shield in front of him to block any attacks he tried to make against him. He was fast enough that he was able to slam into Deudross’ side before he could attack or move out of the way.

The injured man took a moment to grasp his aching side, and then swung his sword at his attacker, only succeeding in giving the blonde a small cut on his shoulder.

Sora and Toby were the next to attack. The spiky haired boy swung his Keyblade, but his attack was swatted off by Deudross’ sword. Toby, on the other hand, kept his distance, choosing to blast off a fireball at him.

His target was able to notice this before it hit him. “Trying to hit me from a distance, are you?” he asked. “Well, guess what?” 

He dashed a very short distance away, but it was long enough that the fireball began to dwindle before it even reached him. “Thunder attacks have a larger range than fire attacks.”

With that, he thrust his sword forward once more, releasing another lightning attack that this time had a majority of the bolts manage to hit Toby.

As a result, the magic caster collapsed onto the ground, unconscious.

Tommy then began to run towards Deudross as an attempt at retaliation, but Deudross did not seem worried by this. In fact, a large grin was present amongst the features of his face.

Since most of his fights were short so far, he barely got a chance to use most of his tactics. Given how long this one’s been going on however, now would be the perfect time to use them. And he knew just which one he had to start with - The Sonic Blade.

Deudross held his sword pointed in front of him and began to thrust himself towards Tommy with an inhuman amount of speed. He was able to block that, however that wouldn’t end up mattering in the long term.

The armored man began to thrust back to the direction he had just come from, catching the new L’manbergian off guard as he got struck in the back. This attack stunned Tommy long enough for Deudross to get another attacking thrust in. This process kept repeating itself until the blonde was hit by 6 of the 7 attacks. As soon as Deudross stopped his attack, the blonde collapsed to the ground, bloody, battered and bruised.

After that assault, only Sora was left to take care of. The armored man began to run towards the boy, as he was running towards him as well. Both swung their weapons at each other, with both connecting. They then began to push against each other, both struggling to force the other off-balance so that they could get a few hits in.

Suddenly, something out of the corner of Deudross’ eyes caught his attention. As soon as he turned to look at it, a look of recognition and shock colored his face.

He stopped pushing against Sora’s Keyblade and dashed a brief distance away from the boy, causing him to nearly fall over due to the sudden lack of force pushing against him.

He was about to go and attempt another attack on the blue-armored man when…

“That device on your arm. Where…where did you get it from?”

The spiky brunette stopped in his tracks when he heard the man ask his question. He turned to look at his left hand, the one where the man had looked. There, he saw the A.T.L.A.S. gauntlet that Core had given him.

It had been a while since he’d thought about the shape-shifting device that he was given. He remembered putting it on between his visits to Traverse Town and Sweet Jazz City, but he must’ve forgotten it afterwards, mainly due to the fact that its powers had not been required yet.

But, more importantly, did Deudross recognize the A.T.L.A.S. gauntlet’s design? Does that mean that he knew who Scythe and the others were?

If he did, Sora didn’t want to tell him the person who gave it to him. Given the man’s prior actions, it didn’t seem like he knew these people as a friend of theirs. But there were things that the boy noticed that the man changed once he saw the gauntlet.

First was his expression. The only expressions that Sora had seen on his face were uncaring and sadistic. However, now there was a new shade on his face: one that was a mixture of hope and desperation. That same mixture was present in his tone of voice as well.

He simply decided to just play it safe for now. He’ll answer but he’ll keep it vague for now, just in case he has it out for Scythe and the others. “A friend of mine gave it to me.” he replied.

“A friend, huh?” Deudross spoke up yet again. “Tell me, what was this friend’s name? Scythe Cyvotix? Core Harris?”

That at least answered the question of if he knew about Scythe and the others, but Sora still was unsure about whether this man can be trusted with knowing that he had met them before. “Why do you want to know? Do those names mean something to you?”

The man sighed as an uncharacteristic sad smile formed on his face. “They do, actually… They were friends of mine.” he said, letting out a small chuckle as his eyes began to glisten like water. “And after all of this time, I thought they were dead. Tell me, are they okay? Are they safe?”

This moment of worry for his friend’s well being eased Sora, but only slightly. “Yeah, they’re safe. But they’re far away from here.” 

Another sigh, this time one of relief, escaped Deudross’ lips. “At least they’re all right.”

“You, uh…sure seem to miss them a lot.” Sora pointed out. “What happened between you guys?”

This time, he wasn’t able to get a response out of the man in blue armor. Perhaps he crossed a line that he shouldn’t have. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to dig up any bad memories…” he apologized.

“No, no…It’s alright. It’s not your fault.” The man assured him, before going silent once more. He was telling the truth that the silence wasn’t due to Sora’s fault, at least technically. It was just that the sight of the A.T.L.A.S. brought back memories that he hadn’t bothered to think about for a long time.

But…why hadn’t he thought about them for the past 8 to 9 years? Yes, he was very much ashamed about what he had done, and knew that people in situations like this try their best to forget. Even then, there should have been some moments where he thought about what he did in shame, but he couldn’t think of a time before now where it even crossed his mind. At least not since he made that deal with…

His expression quickly turned into one of anger once he had figured out what was happening. He quickly looked across the coliseum as if to find the man he made a deal with somewhere hidden amongst the audience. “Niklaus! Show yourself!”

The audience murmured amongst themselves, not knowing who Deudross was talking about. Though there were a few people who recognized that name.

Sora's eyes widened. “You know Niklaus?” the boy asked. Seemed like he wasn’t the only competitor that had met the Witch Doctor.

Meanwhile, the Chibo and Chums team members were looking at each other in shock. “Wait. Did he just say…?” Chip began.

Before he could finish with what he was going to say, a new figure suddenly appeared in the arena between Deudross and Sora. It was none other than Niklaus, whose attention was focused on the man in blue armor. “You called?” he asked.

“Cut the crap, Niklaus!” Deudross yelled. “I know what you did to me when we made our deal. You messed with my mind, turning me into your personal assassin and making me forget what I was fighting for!”

The tiefling merely chuckled at the man’s accusation. “I cannot take responsibility for that. The deal only manipulated you like that due to the impurities in your heart, so the only one to blame for your changes is you. Besides, you should have suspected that something like this would happen. Haven’t you heard the phrase ‘Be careful what you wish for’?”

If that was meant to be an attempt to calm Deudross down, it failed spectacularly. “Was I supposed to believe you there?” he growled.

Niklaus ignored that question. “I can tell that you’re upset, but you are not the only one.” he said, the irritation in his voice becoming more present as he kept talking. “I told you to make this fight interesting and you forgo all that to talk and reminisce with your opponent.”

“Oh, yeah? Well, news flash, Hendrix! I’m not going to be following your orders any more!” Deudross boasted back.

Surprisingly, Niklaus seemed unaffected by the armored man’s cry of rebellion. “Oh, you poor, misguided soul.” he tsked. “Hopefully, this will let you learn that you don’t have a choice in the matter.”

He snapped his fingers, causing Deudross to freeze up and let out a “gkk!” Once he was able to move again, he forced himself onto his hands and knees and began to vomit out black liquid, not only from his mouth, but concerningly from his eyes as well.

This uncomfortable display went on for a few moments before it finally stopped, leaving the man unconscious, collapsed on the ground, with part of his body laying in a puddle made from the excreted black liquid.

Sora ran up to go check up on the armored man, but he stopped in his tracks when a giant paw nearly swatted him.

Stopping, he noticed that the puddle from the black liquid that Deudross emitted had shifted and pooled behind him. Though now, something had emerged from it - a Heartless slightly larger than the Darkside on Destiny Islands!

Its pinkish purple-skinned head was a chimera of different fish parts. The top of its head looked like a giant squid’s mantle which also had an anglerfish’s lure atop it drooping to the right. The mantle also partially covered the top of its sunken yellow eyes. Towards the bottom were a set of frills similar to those of a fish. Based on where it was placed it looked like a mustache. The head was placed on top of a torso with a design that looked like an armored version of a blue vest with golden trim. There were no sections on the torso for arms to come out of, instead the only limbs were the four positioned at the bottom like a tripod’s.  The front two legs were pillar-like while the back two were arms that ended in three-fingered paws with red claws at the end. The legs' colors were turning from pinkish-purple to black towards their ends. The Heartless symbol was on the middle of its forehead.

“If he won’t fight, I guess I’ll give that opportunity to someone else.” Niklaus said before chuckling. “Let’s see how you fare against this.” 

And with that, he vanished as he had appeared, without a trace. 

Once he did, the Lure Lurker began its rampage. It began to walk towards the audience, the puddle under its legs moving with it. Upon seeing the massive Heartless heading towards them, the audience panicked, moving out of their  seats as fast as they could to try and avoid whatever it could’ve had planned for them.

Meanwhile, from his platform, now ascending upwards, Wimfrey was shouting into a speaker for all to hear. “Everyone, get out of here while you still can! A giant monster has emerged onto the battlefield! Thankfully, it’s one of the shadowy monsters, so it shouldn’t be able to leave the coliseum. So do your best to hightail it out of here! That goes for all the fighters as well!”

By the time that the Lure Lurker got within striking distance, most of the audience had already left. However, that didn’t stop it from swatting at the stands with its paws. Thankfully, no one had gotten hurt by this attack, but it did destroy a good chunk of the seats.

While this was happening, Sora was running, not towards the exits but towards the unconscious bodies of Tommy and Toby. He didn’t want to leave them behind in the very possible case that they would be crushed during the creature’s rampage.

He managed to get both of them on his back and was about to head out when the collapsed body of Deudross appeared in his vision from the corner of his eye.

He stopped and turned to look at the collapsed body. He stared at it for a while, conflicted. Sure this was a man who was attempting to possibly kill him earlier, but from what he had said before he went unconscious, he might’ve only done these actions because of Niklaus’ manipulations.

Ultimately, Sora decided to go and give him a helping hand. He ended up having a difficult time walking to him thanks to also having to carry the added weight of his friends, but he still managed to pull through. However, unbeknownst to him, the Lure Lurker decided to change course, seeking something else to destroy, until its focus shifted towards the Keyblade Wielder.

He didn’t notice that the monster was getting closer to him until he got over to Deudross. By then however it was too late as the gargantuan Heartless was now towering over him, paws ready to strike.

Normally at this point, Sora would have brought out his Keyblade in order to protect himself. But currently, his hands were occupied with carrying his friend's bodies. Even if he were to drop them briefly in order to free his hands, there probably wouldn’t be that much time to react anyways. This only left him with the option to close his eyes and brace for impact.

An impact that never came. He wasn’t sure what happened but he did hear the roar of a jungle cat and the scratching of claws. Slowly, he opened his eyes to see a new figure standing in front of him. That figure was a humanoid with short orangish fur and a tail. He wore white leggings with purple flames detailed onto them and a luchador mask that had a cat-like appearance. If he was properly given time, Sora would have recognized the mask to be the same one depicted on the entry pass he was given.

He turned to face Sora. “Get out of here, now!” he told them.

“But…what about him?” the boy asked.

“I can take care of him, now go!” the cat man insisted.

Despite still wanting to stay, at this point Sora conceded and began to head out, taking just Tommy and Toby’s bodies. He wasn’t planning on leaving the cat man to fight the Lure Lurker all on his lonesome. Once he could wake up and heal his two friends, they would head back to either assist the stranger or deal with the gigantic Heartless themselves.

As he entered his tunnel, someone else was charging into the arena. He stopped and turned to see that it was Gillion. “GILLIOOOOONN!” The triton proclaimed.

“Gill, wait! Where are you going!?” Sora heard Chip chided him. “We need to get out of here!”

Gillion ignored him however, only stopping his charge once he was next to the cat-man, who was now carrying Deudross over his shoulder. “Greetings. Do you need any assistance dealing with this foe? My team and I may help you in this endeavour."

“And now he’s roping us into this?!” The young man shouted incredulously. 

The third member of Chibo and Chums was annoyed by this development as well but her annoyance was much less vocal and was more of a begrudging tolerance. “It’s too late to argue with him at this point.” she said. “We might as well just go with him. Though if we are battling that thing, I think a change of wardrobe is preferred.”

Sora had no idea what the woman was talking about first, until she began wiping something off her face. As it turns out, she was not actually an old woman at all, the makeup on her face just made her look that way.

Once the makeup and other items, such as a wig, were removed from her, the woman looked completely different. She was much more youthful, looking like she was in her early twenties with reddish orange hair.

“C’mon, let’s help them take that thing down!” The once-disguised woman said, as she began to walk towards the area, where currently the masked cat and Gillion were already battling against the colossal Heartless.

Chip however did not share the woman’s confidence. “How!? What’d you expect me to do against this thing, Jay? We’ve never fought something this big before.”

Jay didn’t stop in her tracks as she gave her answer. “We do what we always do - Improvise.”

It was then that Sora remembered what he was going to do, and headed further into the tunnel, standing on the octagonal platform as it began its descent.

As soon as it finished its downward path, the boy got off of it and placed the unconscious two against one of the empty walls. He pulled out their Elixir, broke off a few pieces, and fed both of them their own piece before giving himself his own. In normal circumstances, he would’ve just used a Potion to get them up and running, but since he wants them to go as soon as they are ready to fight the Lure Lurker, he’ll need them to be full strength in both strength and magic.

The two were beginning to regain consciousness when their door opened up, revealing Wimfrey standing behind it. “What are you kids still doing here!?” he shouted frantically at them. “We’ve got to evacuate!”

Though they were groggy upon waking up again, hearing the gnome yell at them was enough to snap them out of it. “Evacuate? Why? What happened?” Tommy asked.

“Right, you guys weren’t conscious for that.” The gnome reminded himself. “A giant monster emerged during your fight thanks to that mysterious man that showed up. Niklaus, I think his name was? Anyways, we got to leave and wait for that thing’s rampage to calm down.”

“I’ve got a better idea. The three of us are going to take that Heartless down!” Sora said, before turning to face Wimfrey. “Uh, could you lower the platform for us? We need to get back on the arena if we’re going to be dealing with it.”

“Are you crazy, boy!?” Wimfrey exclaimed. “You try and pick a fight with a beast of that size, you’ll die!”

“I know that! But I can’t let it roam free up there causing who knows how much damage.” Sora countered. “Besides, wasn’t that what the passes were about? Because there was a good chance that the Heartless could kill you?”

The ticket-master opened up his mouth to try and make an argument against Sora’s reasoning, but closed as he found that he couldn’t. “Fine. I’ll get it ready for you.” he sighed. “Though if you perish during your fight, that’s your own fault, got it?”

After getting nods of understanding from the three, Wimfrey exited from their view. A few minutes later, the platform went down once again, before heading back up once the trio got on.

As soon as they got back up and exited their tunnel, they saw the cat man and the Chibo and Chums crew as they tried to attack the Lure Lurker.

The masked stranger used his claws to damage the Heartless’ own, impressively still carrying Deudross on his back. Gillion had gotten onto the creature’s back and was stabbing its head with his trident. Jay was shooting at the torso with her gun. Chip was using a more unorthodox method, trying to trip the creature with a rope made out of pants that he somehow had with him.

But each attack they made didn’t seem to matter. It showed no signs of pain when the stranger and the triton struck their blows, Jay’s bullets left small dents on the creature’s armor and nothing else and its legs were unaffected by the makeshift rope, only causing them to dark and wetten from the oil-like substance it was made of.

“Hey!” Sora called out to the four. “You guys get out of here. We can take care of this for you.”

The cat in the mask let out a little chuckle at this. “Do you really think you can beat this thing?”

“Don’t worry!” The Keyblade Wielder grinned. “We fought these kinds of monsters a lot lately. We’re essentially experts on them!”

“Look, just worry about getting to safety and we’ll handle this.” Toby advised.

“Funny, we could say the same about you.” The masked cat said.

“If they say they are experts, just let them take a crack at it.” Chip said. “Maybe they can find out how to affect this thing.”

“...I guess you have a point.” Jay admitted. “All right, everyone, let’s leave these guys to it.”

And with that, all of them stopped doing their attacks and ran towards one of the tunnels. All, that is, except for Gillion, who was still trying to attack the Lure Lurker.

This didn’t go unnoticed, as Chip had stopped running in order to yell at him. “Gil, what are you doing!?” he called out.

“Isn’t it obvious, Chip?” the triton answered back. “I’m trying to take this behemoth down.”

“Yeah, but you don’t have to do that anymore!” the man with the shaved head replied. “Someone else’s going to take care of this for us.”

“Then I shall gladly assist them in combat!” Gillion asked, not understanding what Chip was trying to go for.

“You want to learn another rule of the Pirate Code, Gil?” What Chip had said managed to get Gillion to stop what he was doing and look at him. “‘If someone offers to take over for you, you let them!’ Now, c’mon!”

“If that’s what the Pirate Code says…” Gillion muttered as he got down and began to head towards the tunnel with Chip. As he did, he called out to the trio. “I apologize if I couldn’t be of any assistance to you!”

“Yeah, that’s alright.” Tommy said. “Hey, before you go, since you’ve been fighting this thing before us, you wouldn’t happen to know any tips that could help us beat this thing?”

“Why, certainly!” The fish man said as he stopped in his tracks and turned to face them. “I can’t offer much in terms of advice, but I have noticed that despite our efforts, it doesn’t seem affected by our attacks. Perhaps there is only one area where it can be hurt that we have not hit yet.”

“So this thing has a weak point, good to know.” Sora said as the trio readied their weapons.

“GIL, I SWEAR TO GOD, JUST GET YOUR ASS IN HERE ALREADY!” The four heard the voice of an irritated Chip yell from within the tunnel.

“Looks like I have to go now.” Gillion said as he resumed his sprint into the tunnel.

As soon as the triton vanished from their view, the trio looked back to see the Lure Lurker looming over them, paws raised ready to swat them. 

They dodged out of the way as the paws slammed onto the ground. As they did, small blots of ink jumped out towards the three. They didn’t know if the blots could damage or affect them, but they didn’t want to find out the hard way.

Once Sora was a safe distance away, he looked all over the gigantic Heartless to see if there were any spots that could be considered to be the weak point. He thought back to when the quartet from earlier were attacking it to eliminate the spots that it couldn’t be.

The easiest to cross off were the legs, which weren’t even affected by the makeshift rope that Chip had made. Next up were the paws and head. While they can be hit, it didn’t seem to affect the creature when they did. There was a strong possibility that it was hidden under the armor on its torso. It would be incredibly difficult to get it to crack if bullets could barely make a dent in it, but hopefully after enough hits, they would be able to open it.

However, before he could let the others know of his hypothesis, he noticed the Lure Lurker’s lure and realized that he never saw the quartet attack it. Could that actually be what its weakness was?

“Guys, I think I know where the weak spot is!” He alerted his two companions. “I think it’s the lure!”

“If that is true, then how are we supposed to reach it?” Toby asked as the Heartless began to attack again. Due to its height, it was outside of the throwing range of his shield and even if Sora and Toby used magic to reach it, it would probably fizzle out before it had the chance to hit it.

“Don’t worry!” Sora reassured him. “I’ve got an idea!” He waited until the Lure Lurker swatted its paws down once more, dodging the ink blots it spewed before jumping on and grabbing one of its arms. Once he got on, he began to climb his way up.

He felt very confident in his climbing skills, as he had climbed up a lot of trees back on Destiny Islands, either to retrieve something from the tree’s top or just for the sake of it.

Climbing up the arm, however, was a much more difficult task as unlike the trees he had climbed, the arms were moving and wanted to get him off.

Though, instead of trying to swat him off like the Darkside had done, the Lure Lurker merely wobbled its arms in a steady pattern. This ended up being much more effective, as it forced Sora to cling to where he currently was and stay still.

Since he wasn’t able to move without risking falling off, it seemed like he had to attack the lure from his current position. However, it didn’t seem like he was close enough to successfully unleash a Fire or Blizzard spell and he was definitely too far to attack it with his Keyblade.

His mind then remembered something from the Deudross fight; The man’s Thunder attacks had a bigger range than the other spells, after all that was how Toby was defeated then.

He pointed his Keyblade at the lure and focused on the idea of lightning coming out of it, just like it did with Deudross’ sword.

Lightning did emerge, but not from the tip like any of his other spells. Instead, it came from the skies above, raining down on the Heartless’ head. There were about ten lightning strikes that came down, but only three managed to hit the lure.

Those three strikes ended up being enough, as it caused the giant’s body to jolt in surprise before it came crashing into the ground like a discarded doll, not dead but stunned.

That meant that the Lure Lurker’s arms were no longer moving and now touching the ground, meaning that Sora was able to get off safely.

“Good thinking there, Sora!” Toby complemented, who along with Tommy managed to dodge the falling body of the Heartless. “Now it’s on our level.” With that, the trio began their assault on the lure, Sora and Tommy slamming their weapons against it while Toby shot it with crystals of ice from his staff.

The assault ended up lasting for about four seconds before the body suddenly jolted back to its standing position. The three braced themselves for another attack from the creature. Instead, the monster’s body went down again, faster than before and sank into the puddle that was constantly below it before said puddle vanished.

Despite all signs showing that the Heartless had vanished, the three kept up their guard as they suspected otherwise. After all, no heart emerged like what happened in the deaths of most of the Heartless they encountered.

Sure enough, they got the answer that it was still alive a few moments later. The black puddle remerged, this time it showed up behind the three. They were able to find this out through feeling the sudden flow of liquid underneath their feet, but weren't able to get out of the way as a mostly submerged Lure Lurker batted its paws at them. Thankfully, the blonde’s shield took the brunt of the damage, which led to them only getting knocked back.

Once they got back on their feet, the Heartless and the puddle had already vanished from its spot. At that point, they had realized what was happening. “It’s hiding!” Sora said. 

The three had seen this tactic used before by the Shadow variety of Heartless, but they usually left a visual indication of where they were when they sank into the ground, something that the Lure Lurker lacked. The only way they would know where it is would be to have it reveal itself.

And it seemed like Tommy had a plan to make it easier to figure out where it could be. “I’ve got an idea!” he said to the other two. “Head towards the wall!”

“The wall, why?” Sora questioned. “Wouldn’t that make us more easy to attack since we have less places to go?”

“It will, but that also limits where it can strike.” The blonde answered as he ran to the wall, motioning for the others to follow him, to which they did shortly afterwards.

Once they got up to the wall, Tommy informed them of his game plan. “Okay, now that we’re here, it can only attack us either from behind or in front of us. We’ll be on the lookout to see which one it goes for and as soon as the lure is visible, we go to attack it.”

Sora and Toby nodded in response. Guess their doubts towards the plan were for nothing as it turned out to be a pretty solid one.

The three of them stayed cautious, looking for any signs of the Lure Lurker peeking out from its hiding spot. For a short while, there was nothing to note despite their vigilance.

Then Toby noticed out of the corner of his eye, something peeking out above him. It must’ve begun to pop up from behind them on the wall! He didn’t dare look or alert the others yet, as he didn’t want to alert the Heartless that he was aware of his presence so it could slip away before they could get a hit in.

A few seconds later, once the lure was more visible to him, that was when he shouted out to the others. “It’s right above us! Now!”

Each of them turned around and attacked as quickly as they could upon hearing the president shout. Sora and Toby both used magic spells, with the former shooting a ball of Fire and the latter casting a crystal of Blizzard. Tommy simply threw his shield at it. Each of them attacked at the same time and each produced a successful hit, despite the Lure Lurker’s attempt to sink back after getting spotted.

The damage done by the three attacks at once must have been great, as it caused the yellow orb of the lure to pop! This sudden event caused the giant Heartless to freeze in its position for a few seconds. After that, it slumped in defeat before slowly disappearing into a purple mist, leaving nothing but a giant heart gem floating towards the sky.

Nothing else happened for a while, until the sounds of footsteps were heard from behind the three. They turned around to see Wimfrey, Chip, Gillion, Jay and the masked stranger coming out from one of the tunnels. The new arrivals stopped walking once they got a little bit into the arena and looked around in awe.

Chip was the first one to speak out of the group. “Holy shit, they actually managed to take it down.”

“Congrats on your victory!” Gillion walked forward to thank the trio. “Defeating such a monster is quite an amazing feat.”

“Gee, thanks.” Sora said, smiling and putting his hands behind his hand as he attempted to act humble.

“Yeah, but not before it took a chunk out of the stands with it!” Wimfrey exclaimed in upset, motioning towards the coliseum which now showcased massive holes replacing where some groups of seats were supposed to be. “Looks like we have a lot to fix up before we can host another match here.”

“So, the games are done early then?” Sora asked.

“The preliminaries are, yes.” The cat man specified. “Everyone who survived will automatically go forward to participate in the first real cup.”

“Oh, so we qualified then!” The spiky haired teenager said excitedly. Said excitement was also shared by Tommy and the Chibo and Chums crew.

However, Toby was the only competitor who didn’t share these feelings of excitement. “Well, if the games are over for now, I guess we’ll get ready to head out.”

“Before you do…” Wimfrey said. “Could you follow me to the sign-up room? There’s something that I want to give your team, as thanks for getting rid of that monster.”

“Oh, okay.” Toby responded. It seemed like they’ll be staying in this world for a little longer.

“Hey, uh, do you also happen to have anything for my team as well?” Chip asked the ticket master.

“Nope.” The gnome put it bluntly.

“Well, why not!?” The man with the shaved head began to argue. “We fought against that monster as well!”

“Yes, you did-” Wimfrey cleared his throat. “-try your best against it, but they were the ones that finally beat it. Besides, they only beat it because you tried to get yourself and your teammates to leave the scene the first chance you could.”

Chip didn’t attempt to argue back that time, instead choosing to cross his arms and stay silent. However, that didn’t mean that none of his teammates spoke up either.

“Can we still go with you?” Gillion asked. “I just want to check in on that guy in the blue armor.”

Wimfrey was much more agreeing to that than Chip’s suggestion, as he shrugged his shoulders. “I don’t see why you couldn’t, seeing as if they’re both in the same room. Alright, now, if no one else has anything to say, let’s go.” With that, he began to head back, everyone else following after him.

As the seven of them followed Wimfrey, Sora couldn’t help but feel like he had seen the masked stranger before. It ended up hitting him a little later. “Wait, your mask was on the entry pass!” He realized.

The cat man just chuckled at this. “Yeah, I guess that’s one of the perks of being the champion.” he said.

Sora had to double-take when he heard this. “Wait…champion!?” he yelled.

“Yep. Have been for years. The name’s La Alma.” La Alma responded as he extended his hand to be shaken.

“Name’s Sora.” The teen responded as he met the champion’s hand with his own and began shaking. “Maybe I might take your place as the new champion some day.”

“With what you did today, I’d say it’s possible.” La Alma noted.

The seven kept moving until they had reached the room where the trio had first met the gnome. There were just two noticeable changes added since they last saw it, Deudross’ unconscious body was slumped against one of the walls and on the opposite side, a rack with various trophies on it, presumably to be given to the winners of certain games.

The ticket master went over to the wall with the trophies and reached not for any of the trophies, but for something else hidden behind them. He ends up pulling out a small crystal, with a large dot of yellow in the middle and orange lines going across the sides.

“I found this left outside the coliseum a few weeks ago.” Wimfrey said as the crystal was placed in Sora’s hands. “I’ve checked with everyone I could, but I still can’t figure out what this thing’s made of or what its purpose is. Hopefully, you’ll find a better use for it then I did.”

The boy looked down at the gift he was given. He thought at first that he would get one of the trophies, so he was a bit disappointed in that regard.

He was about to speak his thoughts aloud, but suddenly the gem was snatched from his hand by Toby. “We will, sir.” He said as he pocketed it.

He was still able to note the look of confusion that Sora had given him, as he turned to face him. “Don’t worry, I’ll explain when it’s just the three of us.” he assured.

“So he still has the mark on him.” They heard the voice of Gillion say.

They turned around to see the triton at where Deudross was, lifting up the hair at the back of his neck. If they were to see what he saw, they would see a tattoo that was black and crescent shaped, with the letters “NK” placed in the middle. Tommy was also there, giving the unconscious man some of a Potion.

“What is this mark you’re talking about?” La Alma asked.

“Those who’ve made a deal with Niklaus bear his mark on their neck.” Gillion explained. “The fact it’s still on there means he’s still a slave to the deal he made.”

“You’re talking about this as if you’re familiar with him.” Sora pointed out. “Do you know Niklaus?”

“We are familiar with his work.” Jay answered. “We’ve met people who made a deal with him before, and every time that deal ended up twisted against them.”

“So this guy gets his kicks from twisting other’s wishes?” Tommy asked as he placed the Potion next to Deudross.

“Not exactly.” Gillion clarified. “I talked with him before. He said that the deals only go the way they do if the person’s heart ends up being impure.”

As they were talking, Deudross began to open his eyes, looking around as he realized he was no longer on the battlefield.

He was surprised at the fact that he recovered as quickly as he did. Yes, his breathing was still ragged and he still felt pain in some areas, but it should’ve been worse. The vomiting should’ve given him a lot more exhaustion.

Then he noticed the potion next to him, it being partially drunk. Was that why he was feeling better than he should’ve? He stared at it in silence, not letting the others know he woke up.

Meanwhile, the conversation continued. “So what exactly does this Niklaus fellow’s deal then?” Wimfrey asked. “Why make deals with people if there’s a good chance that they end up getting corrupted?”

“I’m uncertain.” Gillion admitted. “I was not able to get much of a motive from him, aside from the fact that he likes a good story.”

Sora was silent for most of the conversation, thinking about what the others have said as well as his own encounter with Niklaus. He was lucky that the man decided to give him the pass for free, for whatever reason that may be. He felt sorry for Deudross, how he ended up getting twisted into something he probably wasn’t.

Finally he spoke up. “Is there a way to free him from the deal?”

“Well, it is possible…” Chip said. “We do know two ways to break a deal. Unfortunately, none of them are that good.”

“The first is to make a deal with Niklaus to nullify an existing contract.” Gillion began to list. “And the second is if the person who made the deal died.”

“Well, maybe we can try to find another way to break the deal.” Sora replied, trying to remain optimistic.

"It doesn't seem likely..." Jay said. "But you did manage to knock him back to his senses when he saw that thing on your wrist. Something like that could be the key to…” she stopped as she went to face where Deudross was…or where he should’ve been, now that he wasn’t there anymore. “...Where did he go?”

This ended up bringing everyone else’s attention to the missing man. As they did, Sora noticed something. “Hey, the potion is gone too!” He pointed out.

“Do you think that he went outside on his own?” La Alma asked.

“That, or Niklaus wasn’t finished with him.” Chip said.

“Either way, we got to go check on him!” Sora exclaimed as he motioned for everyone to follow him. “Let’s go!”

With that, the two teams raced out of the room, leaving the ticket master and champion by themselves.

“So you’re not going with them?” the gnome asked.

“Not really planning on it.” La Alma answered. “What’s going on seems to be more related to them than it is to me. Besides, I want to help patch up the coliseum. Gotta make sure that this place is ready for the next games.”

The mention of getting ready caused Wimfrey to remember something from earlier. “Oh, I just remembered!” he realized as he turned to La Alma. “There’s something I want you to do for me.”

- - -

Outside of the coliseum, Deudross sat on the ground, with only the buildings to rest against. Currently, he was drinking the last drops of the potion he took from Excalibur before leaving them.

Once he finished with his drink, he put his hand on the side where Tommy had slammed his shield into it. When he did, there was no pain. Guess that Potion really can heal injuries. He looked away from his side, only to see someone else standing in front of him: Niklaus.

Despite having just healed his injuries, Deudross was still too exhausted to attempt an attack on the man so he only just gave the man a glare against him. “What the hell do you want?” he muttered.

“Now, now, that’s no way to speak to your employer.” Niklaus chided. “As for what I want, I’m here to talk about how that fight of yours ended. Do you really think that anyone in there paid for Paramount Tournament tickets just to see people talk it out?”

“And let me guess, you’re going to punish me some more?” Deudross asked.

“Not at all. You already suffered enough from the vomiting.” The tiefling answered. “The tournament may be closed for now, but it’s bound to open back up sometime in the near future. Once it does, you are going to have a rematch against the Keyblade Wielder.” His face got closer to Deudross’, with his tone becoming more serious. “And this time, I want the fight to go properly. Understood?”

The man said nothing at Niklaus, simply glaring at him.

Upon hearing footsteps approaching, the horned man turned his head to see the Excalibur and Chibo and Chums team walking out of one of the archways. 

The six of them stopped once they saw the tiefling glance at them. “As much as I would love to stay and chat with you,” Niklaus began. “I feel like it’s time that I sink back into the background. But don’t you worry, I can assure you that we will meet again.”

Sora rushed at him, Keyblade out, hoping to make a strike against the Wish Doctor. But the man vanished just before Sora could make contact with him.

He growled as he stared at the spot where Niklaus had once stood. He got away again! Sure, the first time could be excused as he was busy trying to defeat the Lure Lurker, but this time, there was no such excuse for him.

But he could worry about that later. Right now, he had to check in on Deudross.

“Hey, are you all right?” Sora questioned. “Niklaus didn’t do anything to you there, right?”

“No more than he already did.” Deudross said, as he looked up to see the Keyblade Wielder.

“Really? He just let you go scot-free after disobeying him?” Jay asked with suspicion. She had encountered a few people who made deals with Niklaus in the past. It didn’t end up going well for most of them, so the fact that the armored man was as unscathed as he was felt off to her.

“Not quite. He did leave me with one condition.” The man in blue armor answered. “I have to fight the kid in the arena again. This time, he wants a clear winner and loser, no forfeiting.”

“Why did you make a deal with him in the first place?” Tommy asked. When he first encountered him, he had a bad feeling about Niklaus. It was shocking to him how anyone was able to trust him.

Deudross sighed. “About eight or nine years ago, I made a huge mistake. One that cost me my friends. I wanted to make it up, in the hopes of getting them back. And that was when I met Niklaus. He promised that with the power of darkness, he would improve parts of me to achieve my goal, but only if I followed whatever orders he gave me.”

“But I ended up falling into darkness’ thrall and I lost sight of the light.” Deudross smiled as his attention went back to Sora. “At least, that was until I saw the A.T.L.A.S. device on your arm. That reminded me of what I was fighting for.”

Sora met that smile with his own. “I guess I can relate to what you’re going through. I lost my friends a while ago too.” Sora’s smile turned somber upon remembering the destruction of Destiny Islands. He turned his head to look at the sky above. “I hope that they’re still out there somewhere.”

“If you do, make sure that you don’t lose sight of it, like I did.” Deudross warned as he began to walk away.

Before he could get too far, Gillion walked up to him and placed a hand on his shoulder, causing the man to stop.

“Yes?” he said as he turned to look at the triton.

Gillion cleared his throat before he spoke. “I’ve seen many people like you go down the wrong path, but not as many can claim that they shifted themselves back to the right side.” He outstretched his other hand to the armored man. “If you would join our crew, we would do our best to keep you on that path. What do you say?”

Deudross let out a small smile as well as a scoff. “I’ll pass. I’d rather have some time alone before I try to connect with other people again.” After that, he continued to walk away. This time, however, no one attempted to intervene with him.

Once he was out of view, Jay spoke up. “I guess that it’s time we leave as well. You guys have a place to stay, right? If not, we know a hotel we can direct you to.”

“No, it’s alright. We have our own place to stay.” Tommy assured them.

“Welp, guess we’ll be going then.” Chip said as he began to walk away, with Jay and Gillion following shortly afterward.

“Bye!” Sora called out to them, waving goodbye. “Hopefully, we’ll see you again. Maybe we’ll even get the chance to fight against each other!”

Gillion turned his head and smiled while continuing to walk away. “To be truthful, I’m hoping for the same thing.”

Once the three pirates had left, Sora turned to face his two companions. “So what was important about that thing Wimfrey gave us?” he asked.

“Well…” Toby said. “We believe that piece is Gummi in origin.”

Sora perked up when he heard this. “You mean Gummi as in the Gummi Ship? So you know what this is for, then?”

“Not exactly…” answered Tommy. “As we told you earlier, we just got it recently so we don’t have a knowledge for all things Gummi.” He put his hand on his chin. “In fact, we weren’t sure it was Gummi until Toby got his hands on it. It had a similar texture to the materials on the ship.”

“Sam knows more about that than we do though, so maybe he can help us. If not, maybe there could be someone in Traverse Town who knows about them.” Toby added. “There was a docking bay there. Perhaps we aren’t the first people there with a Gummi-based vessel.”

“Yeah!” Sora exclaimed enthusiastically, before shifting to a more uncertain look. He remained silent before he continued to talk. “If we have the time to see Scythe and the others again, could we let them know about Deudross? I just want them to let them know that he’s alive and sorry for…whatever he’s done.”

Toby sighed. “I suppose a little detour like that wouldn't hurt.” he admitted, causing Sora to smile once more.

“Now that we know where to go next” Tommy said. “How about we go and find the beacon to head back to the ship.” 

And with that, the three began their search. Unlike the one in Sweet Jazz City, they had a much harder time looking for it. They did eventually find it down an alleyway and, once they made sure that there was no one there that could see them, stepped on the glowing green spot and were whisked away.

- - -

At the same time that Sora and his friends blasted away from Joaldo Island, Niklaus had returned back to Salem’s Castle. When he got there, however, the others weren’t very fond to see him.

“How dare you come back here with the job unfinished!” The pale man scolded as soon as he saw the Wish Doctor enter the room.

Surprisingly, The egg on the TV screen agreed with the man who’d he usually torment with insults. “Yeah! Do you really think that Salem would allow you back considering you did more to support the Keyblade wielder, our enemy might I remind you, than hurt him!?” he questioned, sounding more smug than angry.

It had been a rhetorical question, Niklaus knew that. Though that didn’t stop him from answering it anyway. “Why, of course.” he said pridefully. “And I must clarify this misconception you have. I’m not working for Salem, I’m working with her. Unlike you, I don’t have to force myself to bend to her every beck and call.”

The egg and pale man didn’t respond back, instead choosing to give the man dirty looks.

The woman in the blue dress, however, spoke to Niklaus much more calmly than the two had. “He did bring up a good point.” she addressed. “You do seem to want the boy to continue his journey, but I can’t fathom a reason why that would be.”

“You heard what Salem had said, that boy had potential.” he shrugged. “Wouldn’t want to squish him out before he’s able to showcase it.”

“Then just corrupt him like you did with the other guy.” the vampiric woman suggested snidely. “If you really want the brat to live, at least make him useful to us.”

“I’m afraid that it’s not as simple as that, my dear.” the horned man replied back. “Deudross changed because of how his heart was, but Sora’s a much different individual than him. He’s a smaller, more honest soul.”

Suddenly, Salem stood up and slammed her fists onto the table, turning the other four’s attention away from Niklaus and towards her to see her glaring daggers at him. The attention went back to the man as the crystal ball raised itself from the table and sprouted tendrils as it became a Seer. Said tendrils were sent towards the tiefling’s direction and wrapping around his neck and hands, pinning him against the wall and squeezing tighter.

For a while, no one moved. Niklaus and Salem stared at each other while the tendrils attempted to choke the purple-skinned man. None of the other people in the room attempted to intervene, not wanting to face the witch’s wrath as well.

Eventually, the Seer loosened its grip on the man, causing him to fall onto the floor. The creature went back to its place and retook its crystal ball form. Salem simply stared at Niklaus, less pissed than she was before. “My apologies.” he said, his breathing shockingly not that ragged from what happened. He didn’t even sound threatened. “Simply a poor choice of wording on my part. Won’t happen again.”

“I hope it doesn’t…for your sake.” The witch spoke back, sitting back down in her seat.

The other four didn’t even make an attempt to speak. They weren’t sure what it was that Niklaus said that riled up the normally calm Salem like that, or if he had done it intentionally. Not speaking was currently the safest bet to keep themselves living.

Niklaus simply scoffed, heading back to his seat. “That’s enough distraction for now, wouldn’t you think?” he said, changing the subject as he sat in his seat and he observed Sora’s image through the crystal ball. “Let’s get back to watching the main event.”

Chapter Text

STORY:

Joaldo Island:

As soon as the trio got onto Joaldo Island, Sora tried to enter the Paramount Tournament, but was turned away due to a lack of an Entry Pass. However, with the assistance of Niklaus, Sora and friends were able to get the ticket necessary in order to complete.

They weren't the only notable competitors though. There was a trio called "Chibo and Chums", consisting of Gillion Tidestrider, Chip and a disguised Jay Ferin as well as Deudross, who was ordered to fight Sora by Niklaus to test his strength.

When it did get to the fight between Sora's team, dubbed "Excalibur", and Deudross, the man eventually refused to fight after being reminded of his friends by looking at Sora's gauntlet. In retaliation, Niklaus summoned a massive Heartless to fight them instead. In the end, after some help, Excalibur ended up defeating the Heartless.

Though they defeated the Heartless, the tournament was too wrecked to continue going until it was all fixed up and Deudross was still under deal by Niklaus. Sora promised him that he would find some way to break him out of the deal in a non-deadly way.

CHARACTER ENTRIES:

Gillion Tidestrider

First KHY Appearance: Y-1 Chapter 12: Let the Games Begin (Chapter 12 Overall)

A Triton who's a member of the Riptide Pirates. He does everything with complete confidence, saying that it's his destiny to do so.

He splashed onto the stage in "Riptide Episode 1: Starting From Zero" (Just Roll With It - 2021)

Chip

First KHY Appearance: Y-1 Chapter 12: Let the Games Begin (Chapter 12 Overall)

The man who brought the Riptide Pirate Crew together. He may insist that their ship is called "The Millennium Chipper", but everyone else knows its true name is The Albatross. The Riptide Pirates weren't his first crew, as he was once part of a crew called the Black Rose Pirates.

His exploits with pirates were first seen in "The Hole In The Sea" (Just Roll With It - 2021)

Jay Ferin

First KHY Appearance: Y-1 Chapter 12: Let the Games Begin (Chapter 12 Overall)

The navigator of the Riptide Pirates as well as the main voice of reason between the three. She wore an old lady disguise when participating in the Paramount Tournament in order to hide her identity , but her reasons for why she did this remain unclear for now.

She helped lead the way in "Riptide Episode 1: Starting From Zero" (Just Roll With It - 2021)

Deudross

First KHY Appearance: Y-1 Chapter 12: Let the Games Begin (Chapter 12 Overall)

A man who formed a deal with Niklaus Hendrix after an incident caused him to drift away from his friends. When Sora and company first met him, he acted cold and sadistic. His personality changed after being reminded of his friends, though he is still under the tiefling's deal.

His mysterious past with Scythe was first hinted at in "Avisterra: Fleeing The Shadow" (Mattercell Entertainment - 2020)

La Alma

First KHY Appearance: Y-1 Chapter 13: The Light That Guides (Chapter 13 Overall)

A tabaxi that holds the title of Paramount Champion. He held that title for years, making him a household name to the inhabitants of Joaldo.

He fought for his title in "Riptide Episode 33: Thunderdome of Destiny (ft. Pokay)" (Just Roll With It - 2021)

Wimfrey

First KHY Appearance: Y-1 Chapter 11: The Paramount Tournament (Chapter 11 Overall)

The Paramount Tournament's Ticket Master. He also serves as the Tournament's Announcer.

He was first found on-duty in "Riptide Episode 29: The Paramount Tournament" (Just Roll With It - 2021)

Niklaus Hendrix

First KHY Appearance: Y-1 Chapter 7: All For One, One For All (Chapter 7 Overall)

A mysterious man calling himself the Wish Doctor. He grants people wishes that go sour if that person's heart is impure. He seems to have picked up an interest with Sora, going so far as to use Deudross to fight him in order to test out his strength.

The Riptide Pirates first dealed with him in "Riptide Episode 8: A Hero's Burden" (Just Roll With It - 2021)

HEARTLESS:

Blue Rhapsody

First KHY Appearance: Y-1 Chapter 12: Let The Games Begin (Chapter 12 Overall)

A spell-casting Heartless whose speciality is ice. They bounce around and attack with Blizzard, which they can also absorb.

They first froze their foes in "Kingdom Hearts" (Disney - 2002)

Barrel Spider

First KHY Appearance: Y-1 Chapter 12: Let The Games Begin (Chapter 12 Overall)

Gunpowder barrel turned Heartless. They charge into their enemies and explode. Any physical damage or fire will set them off.

They attempted an ambush in "Kingdom Hearts" (Disney - 2002)

Lure Lurker

First KHY Appearance: Y-1 Chapter 13: The Light That Guides (Chapter 13 Overall)

A large Heartless that Niklaus had summoned to fight Sora once Deudross refused to, formed by goop that was forced out of the armored man. It can only be damaged by attacking its head. Deudross seemed a lot less hostile after it emerged, maybe the Lure Lurker was created from his darkness.

Chapter Text

Like the other flights, there wasn’t much conversation that was had in the Highwind as it sailed the oceans of stars. Toby made sure to let Sam know that they were heading back to Traverse Town, to make sure it was heading in the right direction. 

But besides that, no one spoke much. Molly continued to write her discoveries in her journal, Tommy and Toby were just hanging around in their seats and Sora was thinking once again thinking of the world that he just left.

He wished that he could do more to help Deudross’ predicament, but at the moment, he couldn’t. Hopefully, they would be able to free him eventually and if what Jay had theorized turned out to be correct, they could bring Scythe and friends to Joaldo Island with the reunion being what ends up breaking the deal.

Though, as he was thinking about it more and more, doubts began to form. Maybe, that still won’t be enough to free the man from his ties with Niklaus. This then led to him thinking that they wouldn’t be able to find a way to break the deal before he succumbs to death.

He didn’t want to think about it anymore, so he decided to focus on staring at the outside of the cockpit instead. After looking outside for a few moments, Sora began to drift away into a deep sleep.

A few hours later, he woke up as he noticed that the ship was slowing down into a halt. Did they reach Traverse Town already?

What he saw from the windows, however, was nothing resembling what Traverse Town looked like. It was a circular world covered in snow. The top of the building had a city with towering buildings, the middle had a ring of trees covering it and the bottom was home to what appeared to be a large shelter-like building. A thin, barely visible ring surrounded the planet.

The others were also aware of their sudden stop. “Sam, why did we stop here?” Toby asked. “We’re supposed to stop at Traverse Town, not wherever this is.”

“I know that.” Sam replied “But I had programmed the auto-pilot to stop at any world that we come across.”

“If that’s true, then we should’ve stopped here earlier, right?” Molly questioned. “We are heading back to somewhere we’ve been before so we should have come across it sometime before.”

“That’s probably because we are not following the exact same path that we took when we went from Traverse Town to Joaldo.” The plant man explained. “If we went this way in the beginning, we would have encountered this first instead of Sweet Jazz City.”

Toby was about to say something, but Sora spoke before him. “Are you able to get any information on it?” he questioned.

“I can, in fact.” Sam answered, clearing his throat before speaking again. “This place is called Copper Nine. It’s a planet used by this company called JCJenson for mining purposes and…” He stopped. “…oh.”

“What do you mean by ‘oh?’” Tommy questioned, concerned by the plant man’s brief bout of silence.

“Well, the planet’s core ended up getting disrupted, killing all human inhabitants in the process and turning the planet into a frozen wasteland…” Sam informed them.

With this new knowledge in mind, the four of them looked back at Copper Nine, now noticing how dead the world was. The trees were lacking of any leaves and most of the buildings available were wrecked to some capacity with none of them having any form of lights on. They also noticed some strange tall hills in the city, hills that none of them could identify the building materials for. The only structure that was intact and had the lights on was the building at the bottom.

“So, no one lives on that world anymore, right?” Toby asked.

“Not exactly…the robots that JCJenson used to assist with mining are still there and have formed their own society.” Sam informed.

“Either way, I say we just keep moving forward.” Toby decided. “Not much we can do on a dead world.”

“Well, hold on…” Sora interjected. “Don’t you at least want to check it out? Phil or my friends could be down there.”

“There’s no way that he’s down there!” Toby countered.

As the two continued with their conversation, each of them started to get irritated, with that feeling only growing when the other began to speak. “Well, how do you know?” Sora asked. “We haven’t even been there yet!”

“I know because Phil’s the kind of person who focuses on the task at hand, especially if it’s an important one!” Toby replied. “He wouldn’t go and dilly-dally on some other world while the fate of the entire universe is at stake, unlike you.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” The spikey brunette questioned accusatorily.

“What happened in Sweet Jazz City was fine.” Toby began to explain. “We helped save the people inside the museum from the Heartless, and we left after letting people know to look for our friends. But then Joaldo Island happened. We followed your hunch that your friends could be participating in the tournament, we asked and they weren’t there. But even after that, you still wanted to play in the games, despite it not being necessary.”

“But the Heartless…” Sora began, but was quickly stopped as Toby began to speak again.

“They weren’t attacking people that weren’t in the coliseum. Everyone there could’ve just left it alone, but no, they just had to incorporate them into their tournament. If you ask me, it was their own fault that they were in trouble with them.”

For the first time in the conversation, Sora didn’t have an immediate counter, as he was in shock that Toby could say something like that. From the time that they’d spent together previously, he never knew that he could end up saying something so…cold-hearted.

Meanwhile, the green-suited brunette continued saying his piece. “You know, the three of us were given instructions to follow you, but we are not going to bend to your every desire. You wield the Keyblade so that you can save the worlds and that’s it. Nothing else matters.”

Upon hearing that, a look of shock appeared on Sora’s face, which quickly morphed into that of a melancholy that could be made through betrayal. A silence had followed after Toby had finished with his speech, one heavy enough that it could sink the Highwind if it was solid.

The Keyblade Wielder hoped that Toby didn’t mean what he thought he meant. “‘Nothing else matters’? B-but my friends could still be out there somewhere. Do they not matter?”

Toby didn’t answer, instead choosing to ignore him.

“Toby…” Sora grunted as he got closer to the president, that feeling of betrayal he had was shifting from melancholy to pissed. “Do my friends. Not. Matter?”

Still nothing.

“Toby… Answer the question.” The spiked haired boy said, now inches from Toby’s face.

Finally, the president talked. “We’re not landing there, and that’s final.” he said, as he danced around Sora’s question.

Tommy decided to intervene before it was too late. “OK you two, break it up…” he began to say.

However, despite his attempts, he wasn’t able to stop something rash from happening. As soon as Tommy had finished speaking, Sora began to attack Toby, not with a strike of his Keyblade, but by throwing a punch at his face.

This quickly led into a scuffle between the two, both resorting to using their hands to fight the other instead of their weapons. They began to throw each other around as they fought, causing them to bump into nearby objects. As they were tussling, the other two tried their best to break them up, but to no avail.

Things only got worse when the scuffle forced Sora onto the console, hitting one of the buttons in the process. As soon as it got hit, the ship began to move again, though not in the directions that the four were used to it moving. Instead of moving forwards or backwards, it began to plummet towards Copper Nine!

The suddenness of the fall forced the quartet to hang on to the nearest object that was fastened on. “What’s happening?” Molly asked.

“What happened is that you idiots disabled the auto-pilot!” The voice of Sam yelled from the controls. “It’s going to take time to set it back up on my end, so either you guys need to turn it back on now or the ship will crash into that planet!”

“Don’t worry, I got it!” Sora exclaimed, attempting to assist as he was closest to the console compared to the rest of them. Looking at the console however, he realized that he had no idea what button was pressed.

“Uh…this might take a bit to figure out.” the boy said to himself as his eyes darted across, trying to figure out what the auto-pilot button was.

“We don’t have time to figure it out!” Tommy yelled. “Just press it!”

Before Sora could find the button, the tumbling that the Gummi Ship did as it fell caused Molly to fly from her spot and collide into him. As they collided, the force caused Sora to accidentally press another button - the big blue one that sends those in proximity of it down to the world.

Seconds later, a white flash blinded everyone, and once it was gone, Tommy and Toby found themselves to be the only ones left on the ship. “OH, FFUUUUCCCKKKK!!” Both of them yelled as they realized how much shit they were in as the Highwind continued its trajectory downwards.

- - -

Sora was disorientated.

At one moment, he was grabbing onto the console of the Highwind as it was veering into Copper Nine. The next, he was suddenly standing in the middle of one of the planet’s forests. The sudden change from being on a crashing space-ship to standing still was probably the cause behind the boy’s feeling of disorientation.

Though, maybe the cause was something else. His body did feel different than how it was supposed to be. Nothing concerning, just… different.

He realized why as soon as he looked down at his hands.

Despite having his white gloves cover up all of his hands besides his fingers, he could easily notice that they have changed massively. His fingers were no longer made of flesh and bone, but inside a white metal with segments in them, probably for articulation. He also noticed that his arms and legs were also segmented, though the metal they were made of was silver instead.

His eyes widened as he saw the massive change that his hands had made. At first, the islander had no idea as to how this could have even happened, but then he remembered - The A.T.L.A.S. Gauntlets. The device that he had attached to his hand would change whoever is wearing them to more closely fit the world so that they would not be able to stand out. It probably activated now due to the fact that most of the population on Copper Nine are robots.

He quickly patted around his entire body to see if there were any more big changes to him to note. When he did, the only major change of note was his head. It was probably twice as big as it normally was, much more circular and seemed to be made of three parts.

The bottom part was made of a smooth metal, the same color as his hands if he could’ve seen it. He still had a mouth that moved just like his regular mouth, but there wasn’t any sign that he still had a nose on him. The middle part was not made up of metal, but instead appeared to be made of glass, to act as a display of some sort. Currently, it was displaying a version of his eyes made up of blue LED lights. The top part was covered up by a hard hat. His spiky hair was still there, poking out from the bottom at the sides.

Wait, if he’s supposed to be a robot now, then why does he still have his hair?

His thoughts were interrupted when he heard a familiar voice calling his name. “Sora? Are you alright?”

He turned to look at the source of the voice and saw another robot similar to him in appearance standing behind him. She appeared to be a female, wearing a tan button up shirt with black collars. He could see that her eyes were made of brown LED lights from behind her glasses. Her helmet was covering all signs of her hair.

Despite her having a vastly different appearance than earlier, Sora still recognized her. “Dr. Collingwood? Is that you?”

“Please, call me Molly.” she responded.

“Wait, how are you like that?” Sora realized. “You don’t have one of the gauntlets with you.”

“Well, I didn’t, at first.” Molly began explaining before she put her left arm out, showcasing that the gauntlet was now on it. “I went to grab this while we were crashing down. I wanted to make sure that I was prepared for whatever this world had to offer.” She stopped, as her hand moved to scratch her neck in shame. “Sorry about knocking you into the button.”

“It’s alright.” The spikey-haired boy admitted. Sure, he was still a little upset at what happened, but most of his anger was more directed towards Toby and how he didn’t care about whatever happened to his friends.

Suddenly, Molly began to look around as she realized something. “Hey, Tommy and Toby aren’t here.” she pointed out.

It was at that moment that Sora realized that it was just the two of them as well. “Yeah, you’re right. They must’ve been out of range when the button was pressed.”

“Wait, that meant that they crashed with the ship!” The doctor shouted. “We got to find them and see if they’re OK!”

As soon as she said this, she could see Sora getting frustrated and looking off to the side upon hearing the name of the person that he was arguing with mere moments before. Molly sighed. She wanted the fighting to be over with quickly, so she might as well expedite the process so the relations of the two could mend faster. “Look, I know that you and Toby aren’t exactly on the best of terms right now.” she began. “But he’s one of two people that know where the Highwind is, so we better get to finding him unless you want to stay here forever. Besides, I know that you don’t have that harsh of a feeling towards Tommy, so at least worry about him.”

Sora remained silent and unmoving for a while before sighing. “I guess you’re right.” Sora admitted before making eye contact with Molly. “We’re also going to look out for Phil and my friends as well, right?”

“Umm…I don’t think they’re here…hopefully they aren’t.” she said.

“…And why is that?” the islander asked skeptically, internally hoping that it wasn’t for the same reasons as Toby.

“Well, it’s the environment that this world has.” The group’s chronicler began to answer. “Sam had mentioned that humans died out and this planet became a frozen wasteland due to the core collapsing, but that must not have been the only thing that happened. Now that I’m a robot, I can sense that the air is now toxic to humans. So if your friends are here, they probably are either suffering or dead at this point.”

“…Oh, I see.” Sora said as he breathed a sigh of relief. He was happy to see that she actually cared for his friends and their well-being, instead of being obsessed with their mission like he believed Toby was. For the time in his journey, he was hoping to not encounter his friends in the world he’s in, unless on the off chance they had protection like he did. “So where do you think that they landed?”

“Not sure.” Molly admitted. “But I think that we should try looking for them instead of them. They would probably be looking for us as well.”

“Yeah, but where would they…?” the boy began, before he noticed something behind Molly. It was a sphere of purple light surrounded by a yellow line. It was slowly getting larger until it was slightly smaller than an average human. It then began to fade as a figure began to materialize.

As the figure became clearer, he could now identify it as a new type of Heartless! Its face was flesh-colored, with a jagged mouth and one of the eyes hanging out of its sockets like the cork plug to a bathtub. Speaking of the eyes, though they were still round and yellow, they were not completely blank, they had pupils in the form of black angled spiral symbols. Its hands were white gloves detached from the body but still moving like it’s connected to it and the legs were replaced with a tan tail with a purple gradient at the end.

Once the Search Ghost was fully materialized, it raised its hands as it readied an attack against Molly. At this point, Sora began to act. “Look out!” he cried as he pointed his Keyblade at the Heartless and unleashed a fireball at it.

The chronicler managed to dodge out of the way before the fireball could hit her, causing it to hit the Search Ghost instead. It didn’t kill it, but it did manage to briefly stun it.

As it was, Molly ran from her spot to behind the Keyblade Wielder. “Sorry, but I’m not really a fighter like you are.” she told him. “So you’re on your own for now.”

“It’s all right, I can handle these guys!” Sora boasted with confidence. As he said it, three more Search Ghosts made themselves known as well as five of another new type of Heartless - Winterhorns. They were reindeer with blue fur and brown saddles on their backs. Their large antlers and hooves were made of ice.

His first action was to attack the Search Ghost that he had stunned before, which he managed to vanquish in 2 additional hits. The next to attack were the five Winterhorns who all began to rush towards the boy in an attempt to stab him with their antlers.

The boy managed to Dodge Roll out of the way in time and released another fire ball. This attack ended up hitting one of the reindeer heartless at the back of the head, which also caused the ice antlers on its head to break, making it less threatening.

However, he was not able to dodge getting swiped by one of the remaining Search Ghosts. While it still hurt, it didn’t hurt as much as it could have, due to his now metal exterior.

He retaliated against it with a few hits of his Keyblade. He would’ve gotten more in, but it began to vanish, making itself intangible before he could do so.

Another Search Ghost began to make an attempt on Molly, grabbing her to prevent her from moving. As it was struggling to keep the girl still, it began to drain her, using her life force to increase its own. It wasn’t able to get much as the Keyblade Wielder managed to whack it, disrupting the process.

It was about this moment that Sora realized that this fight was going to take a lot longer now that it was just him against this team of Heartless, especially if he kept resorting to attacking with the Keyblade. 

Maybe the Thunder spell that he learned in Joaldo Island would expedite the process. With that, he casted it at the Heartless. Out of the ten lightning strikes, only half of them hit a target, hitting 2 of the Search Ghosts, which were also the ones that Sora had struck before, and 3 of the Winterhorns. Each attack ended up vanquishing what it hit.

One of the Search Ghosts that got struck was close to Molly at the time, with the female robot barely avoiding getting struck herself. “Careful with those attacks!” She yelled out.

“Sorry about that!” Sora replied as one of the remaining Winterhorns leapt in the air and began to rain down icicles shot from its antlers on him. He managed to get out of the way before they could hit him and shot it with a fireball, taking it down.

At this point, there was one Search Ghost and one Winterhorn left, each of which ended up defeated by a few hits of the Keyblade.

After the battle finished, Sora turned to face Molly. “You all right?” he asked her.

“I got a little drained from the attack earlier, but other than that, I think I’m good.” she responded.

“Hey, I don’t think I’ve seen you around here before.” They heard a voice say outside of their vision.

They turned to see a male robot, who seemed to be at least a few years older than Sora, walking out from behind some of the trees. He wore a maroon-colored vest with yellow sleeves over a black shirt with a white 0 plastered on. His visor showcased green eyes, and at the top of his head was a backwards facing maroon baseball cap instead of a helmet like either Sora or Molly had. Silvery blonde hair was poking out from the gap on his hat.

As soon as he laid eyes on the newcomer, Sora quickly tried to come with an excuse as to why the bot didn’t recognize him. “Oh, uh, that’s because we’re from…someplace further away.” He awkwardly chuckled after that, hoping that his excuse would end up working.

Thankfully, it seemed like it did. “Oh, that makes sense.” the robot with the cap said with a grin on his side, before it quickly faded. “But what are you doing here then?”

The Keyblade Wielder opened his mouth to attempt another excuse, but Molly spoke before he could. “Because we got lost.” she said. “We had other people in our group with us, but then an argument happened and we ended up separating from them. In the process, we ended up losing where we’re supposed to go.”

The robot simply let out a “hmph” as he nodded at this. “You said that you two were part of a group. Is that group your colony’s defense force?”

“Why’d you ask?” Sora countered curiously.

“I saw the way you took out those monsters with your big key-thing.” he answered. “I came over here because I overheard the commotion that your fight was causing. Your colony must be glad to have you protecting it.”

“I guess so.” The Keyblade Wielder said, a small smile forming as he rubbed the back of his neck with his hand. In truth, he never really thought about how he impacted the worlds he visited in the past. The visits usually just consisted of helping people get rid of the Heartless and then off they went to the next one.

“Excuse me, but I heard you mention ‘our colony’s defense force’.” Molly pointed out. “Does your defense force have a base somewhere nearby?”

“Yep, the Outpost is a little while’s walk over there.” the true robot said, as he looked and pointed to his right. “In fact, I was on my way there before I overheard the fight. Why’d you want to know?”

“I believe that me and Sora here should find somewhere with others to speak to.” She began to explain. “That way, they could let us know when they see them.”

“Why don’t you let me know what they look like too?” The robot stranger offered. “Maybe I’ll encounter them on the way to the base as well.”

Molly nodded, and began to give descriptions to the stranger. Sora didn’t hear anything that was said however, as his focus was on something else instead.

He noticed a familiar person standing behind the robot stranger, not in a creepy fashion, just in a way where that’s just where she’s standing. The creepy part was the fact that Sora recognized who the figure was.

It was Kairi.

Her identity wasn’t the part that was creepy, for the most part. Part of him was relieved to see her again. What was creepy was the fact that she lacked any protection from the environment of Copper Nine, and yet she seemed completely fine. She wasn’t even breathing hard.

Kairi said nothing as she simply smiled at her friend from the islands and began to walk past the robot while still behind him. Once she was briefly obstructed from him, she vanished. Or at least she must have, because Sora couldn’t find her again.

Her disappearance meant that Sora’s focus shifted back from her to the conversation held by Molly and the robot with the hat, which was now finishing up. “-for offering to help.” he managed to catch as she finished talking. “You sure that you don’t want to come with us to the Outpost with us? You might need all the help you can get in case more of those monsters show up.”

“Don’t worry, I’ll be fine.” The young robot reassured her. “I’m able to protect myself. Being part of my school’s football team helps out in an environment like this more than you’d think!”

“Well, if you’re so certain, we’ll be on our way now.” The chronicler said, before turning to face the Keyblade Wielder. “You ready, Sora?”

Though his focus was rerouted back to Molly, he couldn’t help himself from thinking about seeing Kairi here, finding that he kept glancing over to where the girl should be. He now somewhat knew what he saw was some kind of hallucination given how quickly she both appeared and disappeared and why no one else seemed to acknowledge her presence. He had no idea why he had a hallucination like that, but that could be figured out later. “Yeah, I guess I am,” he responded after a little while.

And with that, the two began to run towards the direction that the young robot had pointed towards earlier. As they were, the robot called out to them. “Oh, I nearly forgot! At the Outpost, there’s a girl there, Uzi! If you see her, tell her I said hi and good luck!”

That was the last thing they heard from the robot as they got out of the range where they could hear him. After that, the only thing that they did hear were their own breathing and thoughts. And currently, their thoughts were preoccupied with thinking about if Tommy and Toby were okay, though Sora cared more for the wellbeing of one than the other.

- - -

As it turned out, both of them were doing fine and were also making their way through the woods. The Highwind took the brunt of the damage during its fall, luckily leaving the two with barely any scratches on them. Because of the crash, a majority of the ship was no longer functionable at the moment. The only thing that worked properly was the speaker that Sam would speak from.

After yelling at the two about the fight that caused the ship to crash, Sam told them the good news and the bad news. The good news was that Gummi Blocks slowly heal themselves over time, so the ship is slowly repairing itself and will soon be able to be flown once more. The bad news? Due to the process happening slowly, it was estimated to take 4 to 5 hours until it was considered operational again.

The two decided to leave the ship whilst it was healing up so they could find where Sora and Molly landed when they teleported down. Thankfully, the glass covering the cockpit was not broken and they both had their A.T.L.A.S. Gauntlets on so they were safe from the harsh conditions of Copper Nine’s weather.

They had been walking around the forest with no real clue on where they were supposed to go. They’ve heard that robots populated this place but so far, they have yet to have encountered another soul besides the groups of Heartless that occasionally ambushed them.

“So, you think Sora’s all right?” Tommy asked his companion.

“He better be.” Toby answered. He tried his best to sound uncaring about the whole thing, but a hint of anger slipped on through anyway. “I hope he’s learned his lesson once we’ve seen him again.”

“Oh right, speaking of that…” the blonde began. “Don’t you think that you were too harsh on him back there? Like, I get that the mission is important and everything but…”

“Sometimes people need to be told the ugly truth, Tommy.” The brunette interrupted him. “He has a big task on his shoulders, and if he keeps shirking it off like he did in Joaldo, then he’ll end up regretting it sooner or later.”

“Still, you could have phrased it better…” Tommy muttered to himself. If Toby did hear what his friend had to say, he didn’t respond to it.

A few minutes later, they did find themselves something that wasn’t Heartless. It appeared to be the entrance to the bunker, with four lights above the entranceway. The two remembered seeing this on the world before they crash landed.

“Should we knock?” Tommy asked as he turned to face Toby, who nodded in approval. He then proceeded to knock on the door three times before waiting for someone to answer back.

It took a while, but eventually they heard someone from behind the door coming up to it. The door then proceeded to open, but only partway. That was enough for the two to make out that the robot behind the door had white eyes, a mustache and wore a grey jacket and blue helmet with red safety goggles on top. Something else of note was that the lights on his visor also showcased forehead wrinkles above his eyes.

The robot narrowed his eyes at the two in front of him. “Don’t think I’ve seen either of you here before…” he said. “So what brings you two out here?”

“We were looking for …acquaintances of ours.” Toby explained. “We got separated from them a while ago, and in the process, we ended up unsure of their whereabouts.”

“I see… Now what do these friends of yours look like?” The robot asked. “Maybe he or my team have seen them around.”

“Well, one’s name is Molly.” Tommy began. “She has glasses and is wearing a tan shirt with black collars. The other one is Sora. He’s got some very spiky brown hair, wears these absurdly yellow shoes as well as this weird onesie and coat combo and is usually seen carrying a large key.”

The last part caused the robot to perk up. “A giant key, you say?” he muttered to himself before going again to speak to the two. “You guys wouldn’t happen to be door inspectors, would you?”

Upon hearing this, the two of them turned to look at each other. As they did, Tommy shrugged. He thought that they might as well tell him that they were. After all, why come up with an alibi on their own when they just got one plopped in front of them? “Yeah, I guess you could say we are.” he said as he turned to face the robot behind the door. “We’re just here to check-in, but we can’t begin until Sora and Molly get here.”

“Well, I haven’t seen anyone like that around yet.” admitted the mustachioed robot, before smiling. “How about you guys come inside and wait until your partners get here? I can tell the others on my team to keep an eye out and see if they come by here.” As soon as he finished saying this, the door proceeded to open fully, as a sign of the robot welcoming them in.

A sign that the two were not going to pass up on. “Thanks for the help, sir.” Toby said as he and Tommy walked through the open doorway.

“No problem!” the robot assured the two as they passed him on the way in. “It’s the least I could do.”

As the door began to close behind them, the robot turned to look at the two and asked them “Say, have either of you boys played Gin Rummy before?”

- - -

It took about 20 minutes to get there, including the times where they were forced to stop to defeat the Heartless that ambushed them and to heal up afterwards, but Sora and Molly finally made it to the Outpost that the young robot had told them about.

“Finally, we’re here…” Molly said, panting as she was out of breath from the long journey (she didn’t know that robots could even get out of breath) and relieved that it was finally over.

As she was busy catching her breath, Sora walked his way up to the bunker door and knocked. He was only able to get two in before the door began to open partway, with a robot (a different one from the one that greeted Tommy and Toby) being seen on the other side of the door looking at them.

The robot’s eyes widened immediately upon seeing the two. “Oh, you’re here!” he exclaimed, excited by the arrival of the newcomers for reasons that they didn’t understand yet. “Come in, we’ve been expecting you!”

With that, the bunker door opened fully, allowing the two to walk in. They did, looking at each other with a confused expression as they did. Perhaps the young robot from earlier had gotten here first, and let those inside know that they were coming, but that wouldn’t explain their excitement.

The room they walked into was small and barren of any objects except for a table that was placed close to the door. On the opposite side of the room was another door that led deeper into the Outpost. Six other robots were currently sitting at it playing some kind of card game, all of which turned to face them.

Four of them were new faces, but two of them weren’t. Sure, they had changed to fit their environment as well so it was a bit more difficult to recognize them, but they still had some of their recognizable features on them, enough that Sora and Molly were able to figure out who they were.

“Hey look, Sora’s here!” Tommy exclaimed.

At the moment, Sora was really happy to see that both of his colleagues were alright, even being about to rush over to the two for a hug of relief. 

But that changed once he locked eyes with Toby and Toby with him. As they did, they remembered what happened on the Highwind before it crashed; how Toby made it seem like he didn’t care for whatever happened to Sora’s friends and how annoyed Toby was with how Sora was in his eyes ignoring the mission. With those bad memories being brought back up, they stopped whatever actions they were going to do upon reuniting and instead crossed their arms and tried to ignore the other.

Molly facepalmed and sighed at the two’s actions. They seemed like they were making up with each other, only for them to split back apart at the last minute. It seems like it was going to be a while before they could be able to make up.

The two’s thoughts of animosity towards each other was moved slightly back when one of the robots, one with a mustache and red goggles came up and spoke to Sora. “So you’re this Sora I’ve heard so much about.” he said, as he stuck out his hand for the boy to shake. “The name is Khan Doorman.”

So Tommy and Toby were the ones who let them know about him. Still, that didn’t explain why everyone seemed so excited by his mere presence. “Pleasure to meet you.” Sora said, as he put his hand forward to accept Khan’s offer and began to shake.

“Same to you, too!” Khan chuckled. “It’s not everyday that I meet someone interested in doors at your age.”

The spiky-haired boy raised his eyebrow at this. He wasn’t exactly sure where the mustachioed robot had gotten that from, but decided to take that compliment anyways. After all, people could just be into doors in this world. “Uh…thanks?” he said, as he finished his handshake.

He felt a hand on his shoulder and turned to see Tommy standing next to him. “I’d better get him and Molly caught up on what happened since they got separated from us.”

Khan nodded, accepting this as Tommy brought Sora to a corner of the room where Toby and Molly already were. As soon as the four got together, Molly was the first to speak, primarily so something else didn’t happen between the two brunettes. “So what was the story that you guys gave to them?” she asked, making sure to speak softly enough that the other drones weren’t able to overhear, but loud enough for the others to hear. “Why do they think Sora’s interested in doors of all things?”

“Well, apparently, we’re now a team of door inspectors.” Toby explained, speaking similarly to how Molly had spoken. The Keyblade Wielder and Chronicler both raised their eyebrows at this, so the president continued further. “Tommy came up with that excuse.” he said as he pointed towards his companion.

“Hey, at the time, I thought that would be the only way that we would be let in!” Tommy defended as soon as the three’s eyes were now placed on him.

“Okay, then. So how’s the Highwind?” Sora asked.

“Well, it got busted in the crash.” the blonde revealed. “Sam’s pretty pissed off about it.”

“Thankfully, he was able to tell us that Gummi Blocks can heal themselves on their own, so eventually, it will be like it never got damaged in the first place.” Toby added. “But it’s going to take around 3 to 4 hours till that happens , so we’ll just have to wait here until then.”

“So what you’re saying is that we’ll be stuck here for a while.” Molly said.

“Afraid so.” answered the green-suited brunette.

“Well, while we’re here, could you and Sora at least attempt to make amends with each other?” she suggested, a hoping grin forming as she did.

“I’ll make amends with him once he stops messing around in worlds and follows his mission.” Toby stated.

“I’m not doing that if it means I have to stop looking for my friends in order to do so!” The islander said as he raised his voice slightly. Thankfully, no one else outside of the four seemed to hear him.

“I know that you two have a lot of bad blood between you.” Molly began, trying to stop the fighting before it escalated too quickly. “But for now, try to put those feelings aside. You guys won’t be able to save the universe if you both keep arguing with each other.”

Though they attempted to complain, no such thing ended up coming out of their mouths. They both wanted to help save the worlds from the Heartless. Did they really want to be the ones to doom them due to them clashing because of their differing beliefs?

“Fine, we’ll work together…” Toby began, as he turned to face Sora.

“I guess I’ll let you come along…” Sora said shortly after, as he did the same with Toby.

“… for now.” both of them finished with an aggravated undertone.

Despite the aggression present between the duo, Molly breathed a sigh of relief. At least they were making an attempt to form a truce. Hopefully, they’ll soon be back to being friends again.

As the two were agreeing to their truce, Khan must’ve sensed something from the other side, as he began to walk to the door that led further into the Outpost.

Once he got up to the door, he took out a white remote and pressed a button on it, which caused it to open. Him opening it was what ended up getting the quartet’s attention. Though it was just the four that are paying attention, as the other robots were too enamored in the game they’re playing.

Behind the door was revealed to be another young robot. She displayed eyes that were the same color as her short purple hair. She wore a black beanie as well as a black hoodie with a symbol that looked like a skull and crossbones , but with the skull replaced by the low battery symbol. She also had a choker with the symbol of a skull around her neck and purple striped leggings worn behind black boots. Strangely, she was about a head shorter than all of the robots encountered by the four so far. On her back appeared to be some kind of large futuristic gun.

She didn’t seem to expect that anyone would meet her when the door was opened, if her exclamation of “Oh, Robo-Jesus!” was to be believed.

“Uzi, what are you doing?” Khan asked the girl as he crossed his arms.

Sora and Molly turned to look at the two robots upon hearing the girl’s name as they both recognized it. This was the girl that Thad mentioned to say hi and good luck to! Though, since it seemed like Uzi was currently in the middle of something, they decided to save Thad’s message for later.

Speaking of Uzi, she was currently answering Khan’s question. “Oh, uh, I was just sneaking out to make out with the boyfriend that I definitely have?”

This only succeeded in letting a little chuckle out from the robot with goggles. “Ok, be serious with me this time.” he said after he finished laughing.

“Okay, okay, you got me…” Uzi groaned. “I need to…measure the exterior hydraulic mechanisms on Door 1, because…of a project I’m working on for school. I wanna…check on it because…I wanna be a part of the Worker Defense Force and hide behind doors like cowards while playing cards like you guys do.”

“Well, we don’t just play cards.” Khan defended as he let out another chuckle.

It was at this moment when Toby and Tommy pieced something together. During the brief time that they knew them, the members of the WDF that they saw mainly stuck to the table where they played their card games. Even though Khan told the other members of the team to look out for Sora and Molly like he promised, they barely left the table, only finding them because the two they were looking for just happened to knock on the door. For a group calling themselves the Worker Defense Force, they sure didn’t seem to do a lot of defending. That would explain why when they played, the numbers were so faded.

“Besides…” the robot with the mustache continued as he began to caress the doorway that he had opened. “When you build doors this good, there’s no need to fight.”

Shortly after, he stopped his caressing and began to search for an item on his person. That item was soon revealed to be a wrench. “Anyways, this is great news! Here; this is the wrench that I used to tighten bolts on my first door prototypes.” He also proceeded to mutter something else that the four were not able to catch a single word of before he talked clearly again. “I want you to have it!” he said before handing the tool over to the purple-haired robot.

After passing the wrench over, he turned around so he could face everyone else in the room, wrapping an arm around the girl’s shoulder as he did so. “Guys! My daughter’s into doors!”

It seemed like Khan’s door obsession wasn’t exclusive to him, as all the robots at the table began to cheer like this was meant to be some kind of momentous occasion. The quartet made sure to clap as well in order to blend in with the others, so they weren’t as enthusiastic about it.

The robot with goggles pressed another button on the remote to open the door to the outside, a large cold gust of wind to blow through in the process.

“She’s just gonna be outside whilst she examines the exterior to Door 1.” he spoke to the others before he realized something. “Hey, we also have some door inspectors with us! They can come out to help you!”

“Uh!” Sora let out. He did not expect that they would actually have to follow through on their excuse of being door inspectors at all, and it didn’t seem that the other three were either.

He was about to say something but Toby spoke first. “We’d be glad to.”

Uzi groaned at this, before muttering something about knowing that there should have been a caveat and beginning to trudge out.

Before they could follow him, Molly spoke up. “Is it okay if I stayed inside?” she asked. “It’s just that there are monsters outside, and I’m not equipped to handle them like the rest of my team.”

“Well, I don’t see why not!” The robot with the mustache responded. “In fact, we’re just about to start a new game, so you’re welcome to join us.”

“Thanks for that.” she said, before turning to face the quartet. “Make sure you let me know what you find.”

“Will do.” Tommy said, as they began to walk outside.

As the four departed, Khan couldn’t help but to shed a tear from his digital eyes, taking off his mustache to wipe it off. “They grow up so fast.” he said.

Once they walked out of the Outpost, the door closed behind them. Sora, Tommy and Toby then turned to face the door.

It didn’t seem as if Uzi really had an interest in joining the Worker’s Defense Force if some of what they managed to catch was true. But, as far as they knew, she’s still under the impression that the trio were a bunch of door inspectors so to continue with this charade, they had to act the part. The only problem was that they didn’t know what exactly that was supposed to entail.

Sora’s best guess was that he had to check to see if the door is strong enough against any outside forces, so maybe he’d have to try and hit it to see how it resists.

He took out his Keyblade and attacked the door a few times. Each time he tried to strike, it would only seem to bounce off the door without leaving a mark.

…And now he’s unsure of where to go from there. Does he use bigger attacks, like his magic spells on the door? Does he get everyone else to try to attack the door with him?

He turned to face Tommy to hopefully get an answer from him. “Any idea what I’m supposed to do now?”

“Why are you asking me?” The blonde replied.

“Cause you and Toby were the ones who told Khan that I was a door inspector in the first place.” the spiky haired boy answered.

“We didn’t come up with that!” Tommy defended. “He just asked if we were ones after we mentioned that you usually have a giant key with you. I just went with it so we didn’t have to come up with an alibi on our own.”

As the duo were talking, Toby crossed his arms and sighed. Tommy should have at least thought about what he was signing everyone up for before he went with what Khan had assumed. Though truth be told, he didn’t feel that mad towards Tommy. Yes, he’s another companion of his that didn’t think about the possible consequences of his actions, but at least those consequences weren’t as bad as the ones for Sora ignoring the mission.

Suddenly, Sora had an epiphany. Outside with the trio was also Uzi, the daughter of the guy that seemed most obsessed with doors on this planet. She herself didn’t seem to be as keen with the subject as her father, if she even did care, but maybe she might’ve overheard something that he had said that could help them figure out what to do next.

He turned around in order to ask her, only to see her running off into the woods. “Hey, wait a minute! Stop!” the boy cried out, though his cries were ignored by the girl as she went deeper into the forest of dead trees.

Since she wasn’t listening to his cries to stop, it seemed like he would have to go after her instead. As he did begin to race after her, he heard Toby calling out to him. “Sora! Where are you going!?”

“After Uzi!” Sora shouted back, not even bothering to stop his run or look back at the brunette New L’manbergian.

“But…” Toby began, only to stop as he saw that Tommy was running in the same direction as the two. “Why are you going too!?”

“Because it just so happens that that forest is full of Heartless.” the blonde responded. “Besides, what else should we do? Wait here while she could be potentially dying?”

If the brunette had any objections to the matter, he didn’t showcase it except for a sigh. After that, he readied his staff. “Alright, let’s go.” he said. After that, the two began to run into the woods as well.

Chapter Text

Sora, Tommy and Toby chased after Uzi for a while. She was a fair distance away from the trio when they began their chase, so it ended up taking a while before they could catch up to her.

When they did, it was because she had stopped due to a sudden appearance of a horde of Heartless consisting of Winterhorns, Blue Rhaspodies and Shadows. Upon encountering them, Uzi began to attack, using the wrench her father gave her to beat up any threats that got close to her.

Tommy was the first to aid her in combat, throwing his shield at a Shadow attempting to lunge at her, taking it out.

The death of the monster was what led Uzi to realize that others had arrived, turning to face them. “Geez, you couldn’t just leave me alone, could you?” she snarked, sounding not very happy to see them.

“Hey, don’t blame us for trying to help you out!” Tommy replied, uncertain as to why she was acting that way towards them.

“Please, I’m not going to run away back to the Outpost because of a few monsters.” the purple-haired girl scoffed as she went back to fighting the Heartless, attempting to knock a nearby Blue Rhapsody out of the sky.

“Who said anything about running away?” Sora asked, as the trio went to assist her in eradicating the Heartless in front of her.

That was something that Uzi wasn’t expecting to hear. For a brief few seconds, she just stood where she was and looked at them with an expression of bewilderment. Most everyone else she knew would rather run and hide like cowards if they were placed in this situation but these guys were actively choosing to be here fighting these monsters.

She managed to shake the feeling off though, before joining the fight once more.

Tommy was currently occupied with holding his shield above his head to protect himself from the icicles that a Winterhorn was raining down, Toby had casted a Thunder spell that obliterated a few Shadows and a Winterhorn and Sora just took out the Blue Rhapsody that Uzi targeted earlier.

Once the purple-haired girl rejoined the fight, the Winterhorn attacking Tommy had landed and went to ram her. She retaliated with two swipes of her wrench, the first shattering its antlers and the second doing it in.

The fight kept on going, with blows being directed from both sides, though they were mostly against the Heartless. The last of the group was a Blue Rhapsody that was taken out by a fireball produced by Toby.

After the fight was over, Uzi turned to face the trio who assisted her. “Hey, uh, thanks…” she said, in a tone much different than the one she usually had, one with a sense of genuine warmth behind it. A look of realization dawned on her face shortly after as if she remembered that she was supposed to act tough. “Can you just leave me alone now!?” she shouted as she continued her trek deeper into the woods.

Unfortunately for her, she was stopped forcibly when Toby lunged forward and grabbed onto the hood of her hoodie. “Oh no you don’t.” he stated simply.

The robot teen tried to struggle out of the president’s grasp, but to no avail. “Oh, bite me!” she cursed as she squirmed.

“Hey, look, we just want to know why you’re going deeper into the forest, that’s all.” The spiky-haired boy explained.

Despite Sora’s attempt to calm her down, Uzi kept on trying to worm her way out for a bit before giving up. She knew that if she kept refusing to answer, they'd just keep on bugging her until she told them anyway. “All right, fine! I’ll tell you!” she groaned.

Once Toby let go of her, she turned around and took off the futuristic gun that she had on her back to show to them. In this process, she had it pointed at the trio, causing them to step back in shock, weapons at the ready just in case she tries something.

“You see this sick-as-hell railgun I’ve got?” Uzi asked, a manic grin on her face.

“It’s kind of hard not to.” Tommy muttered.

“It’s not complete yet.” she continued, ignoring the blonde’s comment. “All I need to do is find the last part for this, and then those Murder Drones won’t stand a chance.”

“…Murder Drones?” Toby asked, an eyebrow arched. His two companions also had a look of confusion present on their faces.

The purple-haired girl’s grin dropped as she (thankfully) lowered her railgun. “Murder Drones.” she reiterated. “You know, the Disassembly Drones? The ones that humans sent here to get rid of us because they weren’t fans of the whole ‘robots create a society for themselves’ thing?” Once she saw that despite her explanation the three still looked like they had no idea what she was talking about, she let out another groan. “Did none of you remember my presentation?”

“We, uh, didn’t get a chance to watch it.” Sora said in an attempt to defend the three. As he was, he was busy thinking about what Uzi had said.

Previously, when they had gotten information about a world from Sam, it would usually contain all of the information necessary for them to blend in, but these Disassembly Drones seemed like something very important common knowledge, and yet they were only finding this out now. Hopefully the short explanation they got from the teen will see them through.

Thankfully, she didn’t find it necessary to look further into his answer, brushing it off with a casual “Whatever.”

“The point is,” she continued. “I just need to get that last piece. And the thing that I’m looking for just happens to be the same place where their lair is. So if you don’t mind, I’ll be on my way and you guys can stop bothering me.”

With that, she began to continue her way into the forest. She expected for the trio to make an attempt to stop her again, but no such thing happened. Instead she heard footsteps running after her. She turned her head and to her surprise, the three were following behind her!

“Seriously!?” she shouted, not stopping in her tracks as she did so. “Why are you still following me!?”

“We want to help you take out those Disassembly Drones!” Sora called back.

“Don’t you have better things to do?” Uzi questioned. “Didn’t you guys have a door to inspect?”

“Oh, right, about that…” Tommy began, rubbing his neck as he attempted to keep the pace. “That was a lie. We’re not actually door inspectors. Heck, we don’t even have any idea what that’s supposed to mean!” 

That ended up being the thing that caused the girl to stop in her tracks once more. “Why would you claim to be something like that?” she questioned as she turned to face the blonde.

“Your father asked us if we were that, and we just went along with it.” he explained with a shrug.

“So then, what is it that you guys actually do?” Uzi asked with a raised eyebrow.

“Well, we mainly just go around places and help them deal with the Heartless, those creatures we were fighting earlier.” Toby explained. “And we’re also looking for some friends of ours.”

“I’ve checked for that, and I was told that they’re not here.” Sora added, before turning to face the other brunette with a glare. “I’m sure that some people are happy about that.”

The New L’manbergian didn’t have a response to give to the boy, instead choosing to remain silent. They had made the truce back at the Outpost to stop arguing with each other, and he was planning on sticking to it no matter what. After all, he heard what Molly had said, they wouldn’t be able to do their mission if they kept arguing with each other. Giving him the silent treatment was in his best interests.

Tommy let out a little sigh at this. He was not fond of the fighting that the two were having. He personally thought that both sides had a point. Sure, he wanted to do their mission like Toby, but even he can admit that some of the stuff he said back on the Highwind was a little harsh. Thankfully, they didn’t seem to be as aggressive towards each other as they were before.

He turned back around to face Uzi, only to a look of confusion on her face. “…but, why?” He heard her say.

Was she asking about why Sora and Tommy were acting that way towards each other? Well, he saw no harm in letting her know, though he will be cutting out the details that involve other worlds. “Oh, they just got into an argument earlier,” Tommy began. “Nothing to worry about either, they just-”

Before he could continue, Uzi interrupted him. “First of all, I wasn’t talking to you, so mind your own business!” she shouted. “Second, that wasn’t what I was talking about in the first place!”

“Well, then wha-?” The blonde was about to ask, before he was interrupted once more.

“I was wondering why you guys are so set on helping me! There I said it, you happy?” she yelled before turning and crossing her arms.

This outburst was enough to take Sora’s and Toby’s attention away from each other, at least for the time being. “Why wouldn’t we want to help you?” the boy asked, confused.

“Because I’m an angsty little weirdo?” Uzi answered, as if it was the most obvious thing. “That’s why no one likes me. Heck, the reason that I’m doing this alone in the first place is because no one even wants to be near me.”

The three didn’t have an immediate response to give, leading to the area being silent. They felt some melancholy for the girl despite her rude attitude. She must’ve been really treated like shit by everyone if she’s this distrusting of others asking to help her.

Though, it was in that silence that Sora remembered something, something that could possibly cheer her up. “Well, I wouldn’t say that everyone hates you. Before we got to the Outpost, me and Molly met someone who told us to tell you ‘good luck’. I guess that must’ve been for this.”

Hearing this caused the girl’s eyebrows to raise. “Who said that?” she questioned.

“Well, we never got his name…” Sora admitted. “But I do remember what he looked like. He was wearing a sports jacket and a baseball cap.”

This description was enough for Uzi to recognize the name. Once she did, her face changed, but it was not an expression that Sora expected her to have, with it being a look of disgust. “Thad said it!? Ew, why would he do something like that?” she exclaimed.

This outburst confused the trio. Wouldn’t something like this be something that she would’ve wanted? Why was she against it? “Probably because he cares about you?” answered Tommy, an eyebrow raised.

“Well, next time you meet him, tell him I said ‘Bite me!’” she said as she once again turned her head away from the trio. Though as she did, the trio could just get a glimpse of a blush on her face.

“Why? Are you mad at him for something?” Toby questioned.

“Not mad! Just generally hormonal!” Uzi clarified before letting out a sigh. “Look, let’s just stop talking about my feelings, okay? If you guys are really so gung-ho about helping me save the world or whatever, we better do it as soon as we can.”

“She’s right.” Toby admitted. “Now c’mon, let’s go get that piece.” With that, Uzi continued her trek deeper into the forest, being followed shortly afterwards by the trio.

It was at this moment that Sora realized that the trio were never able to introduce themselves to her. Well, there’s no time like the present to do so. “By the way, I’m Sora, and those guys are Tommy and Toby.”

“Yeah yeah, good to know.” she said, seemingly not giving it a second thought. Though maybe there’s a good chance that she cared despite what she showed. In a way, she reminded Sora an awful lot of Giovanni. Maybe there was a softer exterior inside that she’s trying to hide with her rebellious teenage attitude.

As they continued to make their way through the forest, Sora couldn’t help but to think back to when they found Uzi in a fight with the Heartless. But they shouldn’t have even been after her, right? After all, the Heartless only try to steal the hearts of people. Did that mean that robots are capable of having hearts as well?

Despite this not being his first encounter with robots, this was his first time thinking about this question. He had never thought about it when he and Molly were attacked when they first landed because they could’ve attacked them due to sensing the Keyblade’s presence nearby. He never thought about it towards Scythe because he never saw Heartless attack him and just presumed that he lacked a heart.

Once the idea found its way into Sora’s mind, it lodged into his lobes and refused to budge as they continued on their path to the Disassembly Drone lair.

Eventually, they made their way out of the forest and into an area that held the remains of a city. There were of course the broken buildings that the trio were able to see when they first saw the world, but also present amongst the frozen over wreckages of buildings were discarded construction vehicles and crashed cars, some of them still containing the skeletons of former humans!

It was truly an unnerving sight to behold. Even Uzi, despite the bravado she possessed earlier, seemed to be creeped out as they walked. Tommy and Toby were unnerved the most out of the quartet, with the destroyed remnants of the human society that once lived there being an unintentional reminder to them about what happened to their original home.

Their time staring at the wrecked city as they walked was interrupted when a crunch sound was heard as Sora’s foot came down. A crunch that sounded disturbingly different from the crunches heard as they walked across the snow. Upon hearing this, the four had stopped in their tracks..

The spiky-haired boy took a deep breath in, as he braced himself to look down, praying that what he stepped on was not what he thought it was.

Once he looked down, he saw that he was wrong in his guess, at least in part. He didn’t crush the bones of a discarded skeleton beneath his feet, instead, his foot ended up on the visor of a robot’s corpse, merely cracked by the impact. The only thing displayed on the glass was a red triangle with an exclamation mark in the middle and a good chunk of the body was covered in the snow beneath, leaving only the head and one of its hands peaking out. Upon seeing the body, Sora stepped back in alarm, making sure he wasn’t accidentally stepping on another section of the corpse in the process.

The boy’s brief plight ended up attracting the attention of the other members of his group for an equally brief moment. When their attention wavered from the boy, Uzi realized something. “Welp, here we are.” she said after a sigh, drawing the attention of the three to look to where she was looking.

They ended up seeing one of the spires that were dotted around the city when they had their first glimpse of the world. From there, they were not able to tell what exactly the tall hills were made out of, but now that answer was more clear.

It was a tower made of robot corpses.

“This…is where they live?” Tommy questioned, disturbed by the grisly sight of the Corpse Spire in front of him, as were Toby and Sora.

“Yep.” Uzi put simply. Though she tried her best to hide it from the others, those attentive enough could hear from her tone of voice that she was nervous about going into the spire as well. “Welp, we better head in. The sooner we get what I’m looking for from their corpse house, the better.”

With that, she trekked her way into the spire, with the other three going in shortly afterward.

Once inside the Corpse Spire, they found that the area within was littered with machinery. Thankfully, for the most part, none of the machinery originated from any more dead robots, instead more resembling junk. A patch of moonlight was able to make its way from towards the top of the spire, shining onto its center. There stood a strange looking vehicle. It was shaped like an escape pod, but had four giant spider-like legs.

“Make sure to keep an eye out.” Uzi reminded the others as they stepped in. “Not only should be somewhere around here, but the Murder Drones could be coming back any second now.”

“Right”. Sora said, as he, Tommy and Toby nodded their heads. “So, this piece you’re looking for, what does it look like?”

“Well, it’s cylindrical in shape.” the purple-haired teen began. “It has a green glow that should make it stand out.”

It took a few minutes of searching, but eventually the item they were searching for was found. Uzi herself was the one who found it, having noticed it at the base of her feet.

As soon as she picked up, the beam of moonlight that had made its way into the lair had vanished for a brief moment. Uzi was able to notice this, eyes widening as she realized what this meant. “Oh crap!” she whisper-yelled, before turning to face the other three, which were thankfully nearby. “Guys, hide!” she called out to them.

They were able to hear her and ran after her as she went and hid behind a large piece of machinery that was thankfully big enough for the four of them to hide behind. From where they hid, they heard something, presumably a Disassembly Drone land, but couldn’t see where without the risk of peeking their head past their cover.

As they were behind cover, Sora spotted a shard of glass close to where he was located. He grabbed it, thinking that he could use this to see what was happening.

Looking into the reflection of the shard, he saw what a Disassembly Drone looked like as it was stationed on the strange pod. It seemed to closely resemble the other robots encountered on Copper Nine though there were a few differences. Most notable was the tail sticking out from it and the mechanical wings on its back. Its tail was a long black wire, with a needle and a tube of glowing yellow liquid attached. It had silver hair that was covered by a black pilot’s hat. Besides that, the only clothes worn by it was a black short-sleeved fur coat and a yellow armband attached to its left sleeve.

Speaking of its left arm, it put it up, revealing a severed robot head in its grasp. Black liquid that Sora had to keep reminding himself was oil and not blood was leaking out from its stump, and though he was unable to see exactly what was happening due to the robot’s back being turned, it seemed from the sounds he heard that the drone was drinking the oil leaking out.

As soon as the oil stopped its passage from the head, the Disassembly Drone crushed it in its hands with relative ease, not destroying it completely but just leaving it as a crushed mess. Said mess was discarded with as much care as a human would with an empty soda can.

Upon seeing such a monstrous display, Sora put the shard and put a hand to his mouth, trying not to vomit from what he witnessed. Yes, he had witnessed death before on his journey. There was that poor man in Traverse Town as well as some of the teams back in Joaldo Island. But those had been due to their hearts being stolen by the Heartless, so they didn’t end up leaving anything behind. He had thought that the lack of body was more unnerving than if there was a corpse, but this was the moment that proved him wrong.

After he managed to compose himself, he went and, despite his intuition warning him otherwise, he went to go and sneak in another look. Once he did, his eyes widened as they realized that the image had changed somewhat.

The Disassembly Drone was now facing the directions where the four were positioned, revealing to the boy what its face looked like. Like its body, it was similar to that of a regular Copper Nine robot with a few differences. On its hair and under the pilot’s hat was a black band that had 5 yellow glowing circles on it. The visor showcased a yellow X on it instead of the eyes that the robots typically had. Its mouth was a wide sharp-toothed grin.

But what the robot looked like was not the big issue at the moment. What was the issue was that it was looking at where they were.

Like it knew they were there.

“…Guys, it knows we’re here.” Sora warned the others as he turned to face them. As soon as he had finished talking, the Disassembly Drone had launched itself into the air, not towards the four yet, but straight up.

As it began its flight, the four moved away from their hiding place and took their weapons out. Once Uzi took her railgun off of her back, she threw the piece she needed in the air and took off a cover piece from the railgun. She then caught the falling piece in her hand and inserted it where the cover piece used to be. Judging by how a similar green glow appeared on the weapon after this, the piece could’ve been a power source or something of the like.

The Disassembly Drone took this opportunity to land, and it did, right in front of Uzi. The resulting force from the landing pushed the girl backwards in the air and caused her to drop her railgun, leading it to end up laying next to where they had been hiding.

Despite getting flung by the force of the landing, the purple-haired teen managed to get herself to land safely, backflipping while in mid-air so that she could land straight on her feet. A few seconds later, she fully realized what she actually did and looked at herself impressed. “Whoa. And they said that pirating all that anime was useless.” she said to herself.

Unfortunately, the short period of time that she was imagining was time enough for the Disassembly Drone to launch towards her, its hands changing from looking normal to being sharp knife-like claws as it did. However, before anything could happen to her, something else caught its attention, something that caused it to leap away from her.

That something turned out to be a fireball, one launched from Sora’s Keyblade. “Hey, leave her alone!” he shouted at it, to which he was snarled at by the drone in the process.

Uzi took a few seconds to stare at the boy who saved her, before snapping back to reality. She shouldn’t dwell on the fact that he saved her, at least, she shouldn’t right now. That she could unpack once they’ve defeated the Disassembly Drone.

Something that would be much more difficult now, due to the railgun being dropped. Though if the trio’s attacks were enough to drive the feral drone back, they should be able to keep it occupied long enough for her to get it back. “You guys keep that thing distracted, okay!?” She shouted at the others as she began to go for the gun.

The feral drone took this opportunity to launch itself in an attempt to attack her again. Once again, this attack was prevented, this time it was from getting hit by Tommy’s shield getting thrown at it. It hit the Disassembly Drone hard, but didn’t seem to cause any visible damage to it.

The attack caused the shield to bounce off the drone, leaving it in the snow instead of rebounding back to the blonde’s hand as was usually the case. Now that he was defenseless, the drone took the opportunity to rush towards him in an attempt to attack.

This time, no one was able to stop it before it could damage someone, as its claws began to slice into Tommy, oil beginning to leak from his wounds.

It thankfully didn’t cause too fatal or deep a wound thanks to the intervention of Toby, who ran over and shot another fireball at it, causing it to stop its assault on the blonde and flee. The damage the blonde suffered was enough to cause him to pass out, though.

As it fled, the Disassembly Drone decided to choose a different target, this time its victim was Uzi. As it flew to the girl, Toby casted some more fire spells at it in an attempt to drive it away from her, but it merely weaved through the attacks as it continued its path towards her.

He eventually stopped casting fireballs for a few reasons. One, he saw no point in shooting them if the drone would just keep dodging them. Two, he wanted to make sure that he had enough magic left in him to heal up Tommy.

Though staying where he was and saving up his magic did mean that he won’t be able to assist Uzi. Neither could Tommy, due to his current condition. Thankfully, Sora was still available to help her.

“Sora! Try to stop that thing!” he yelled at the Keyblade Wielder, though there was no need as the boy was already on the way to help the robot girl.

He wasn’t able to get to her before the drone did, unfortunately, with it stopping her in her tracks by landing in front of her. As it did, it whipped out its syringe tail and thrust it at the girl’s face. She put her hands in front of her face in an attempt to protect herself from getting her face pierced, an attempt that succeeded, though at the cost of the tail stabbing through one of her hands instead.

With its tail firmly stuck within the hand that was stabbed, the drone leapt up in the air, forcing the teenage girl to be dragged along as its tail moved with it. It didn’t go that high or that far before it landed on the ground again. Once it touched down, it spun around, whipping its tail and by extension the girl with it. 

It was at this point where her hand and its tail began to get unstuck. When it became fully unstuck, Uzi was flung off, tumbling on the snowy ground until she slammed into a nearby piece of machinery.

Despite this, she seemed less concerned about any damage that she might have sustained in her tumble and was more freaked out about the hand that was pierced. She seemed to have good reason to, as when she looked, a hole began to form as the metal around the area was beginning to melt!

She knew exactly why this happened, having some knowledge on Disassembly Drones. The glowing yellow liquid in the tube attached to the tail? That was nanite acid, which was a corrosive material that the drones unleash on Worker Drones like herself from the sharp tips of their tails. Thankfully, the hole managed to stop its spread, but that still didn’t stop the purple-haired girl from freaking out.

It was then that she had spotted something out of the corner of the eye. She turned her head to look at the item of notice and saw that it was her railgun just a few feet away from her. If only the Disassembly Drone would leave her alone for a few seconds.

Unfortunately, it didn’t seem like she would get that leisure, as the drone once more made a lunge towards her. But before it could get a chance to give her body more wounds, it was hit in the back by Sora’s Keyblade.

The Disassembly Drone made its decision to get rid of the spiky-haired boy first before it finished with Uzi. It turned around and tried to swipe at the boy with its claws, only for him to block it with his weapon, putting him in yet another situation where he had to resort to pushing against his opponent’s attacks with his Keyblade.

As he was pushing, he hoped that he would be able to distract this thing for long enough that Uzi would be able to reobtain her railgun. So far, all of their attacks did nothing against this thing while the same could not be said for the Disassembly Drone’s strikes. If she really was that confident that the railgun could defeat it, then it must really pack a punch.

While the boy continued to push against the drone’s claws, it began to ready its other weapon, its tail, for an attack on him. He saw this, but couldn’t do anything to stop it as he knew if he tried to block it, there would be a good chance that its claws would tear into him while he was distracted. So it seemed that he would just end up damaged by it one way or another until…

“Hey, moron!” Uzi’s voice caused the drone to stop his tussle with the Keyblade Wielder and turn his head towards the voice. When he did, he saw that the girl was still on the ground where she was thrown, though she had now reacquired her railgun and was currently pointing it at the drone. “Bite me.” she said as she activated her weapon.

Sora took this opportunity to run out of the way of what he believed the range of the weapon to be, not wanting to get swept up in the attack. Thankfully, the Disassembly Drone made no move to stop him from escaping, as it was distracted by the purple-haired girl.

Perhaps in an attempt to stop her before the gun fired, the drone morphed one of its own arms into a gun-like appendage. Unfortunately for it, it didn’t have time to do anything else before the railgun went off. The gun began to showcase a green glow before it felt like the entire world went dark, leaving the only things visible to be the lights that all the robots in the room had.

Then it fired its laser, which ended up being an absurdly large and blinding beam that also shattered the machinery nearby! It was a miracle that no one got hurt by the laser except for the Disassembly Drones. Even the corpse walls remained unaffected.

Despite the impressive display of the laser, the only part of the drone that got damaged was its head that had gotten completely blown off, leaving blue sparks to dance from where it used to be. The body was still standing, at least for a few moments before it collapsed onto the floor with a thud.

The only sounds in the Spire besides the blowing of the snowy winds was the heavy panting coming from the purple-haired teen. “Holy hell!” she gasped, eyes widened as she was looking at the body of the Disassembly Drone that she took out. The look of shock on her face didn’t last long as it was quickly replaced by a manic grin. “Suck on that, Dad! We handled ourselves just fine!” she exclaimed.

As Uzi was ranting on how she was successfully going against her dad like a rebellious teenager would, Tommy had finally woken up fully healed after getting knocked out. At the same time, Sora was too busy staring at the body of the Disassembly Drone. In his journey across the stars to other worlds, he never had to resort to killing anything, besides the Heartless. And that wasn’t something that he was against. The concept of death had never been something that he was comfortable with, especially since his father had died when he was young, something he didn’t like to talk about.

He was about to look away from the body and think about something else when he noticed a few things about it. Firstly, a strange warbling noise was heard. Secondly, the dancing sparks were getting weaker as a mass began to grow on the stump. And thirdly, the body had started to move, and was currently trying to get itself up.

Everyone else’s attention became focused on the drone once it managed to stand back up. As it did, said mass had finally turned into a recognizable shape - one that was the drone’s head. Once it was fully formed, a few differences from what it looked like previously were noticed. 

First, one of the five bulbs on its head was red instead of yellow. Second, the visor no longer displayed the X but instead a red message that read “ERROR Optic Sensors: Offline”. Said message was paired with the noise of a beeping alarm.

Had they had the time, the four would’ve been questioning how the robot was able to regenerate its own head like that. But this was not the time to be concerned about that. They already had a tough time beating it before and even then they were only able to affect it with Uzi’s railgun, who knows how difficult the fight will be the second time around.

Sora was the first to act, as he rushed over to the Disassembly Drone. Sure, the Keyblade might not have had any effect on it prior, but he wasn’t thinking about that at the moment. Instead, he was worrying about getting in that first hit in order to gain some kind of advantage against it.

Though he was successful in landing the hit on it, said hit did fail to cause any damage to it, just like the other hits landed did. 

It did, however, cause a reaction to the drone. It managed to have snapped it out of the message that was on, revealing yellow eyes that were similar to those that the other Worker Drones had, in contrast to the massive X that it had before. As the eyes were revealed, the alarm had ceased making noise.

Its head turned to face where Sora was. In reaction to the movement, the Keyblade Wielder braced himself, as did the other three, preparing themselves for what seemed to be the beginning of round 2 of an already grueling-

“Did you just hit me with that giant key?”

Sora blinked. It took him and the others a while to register the fact that the voice came from the Disassembly Drone. They were not expecting such a friendly toned voice from a creature that was as vicious as it was when they fought. Hell, none of them even knew that it was even capable of speech! He could only raise one of his eyebrows in confusion and let out a “What?” in response.

“Yeah, sorry - It’s just that my, uh, head kinda hurts…” The drone continued with a friendly smile, as he rubbed the back of his head with his right arm, turning himself slightly as he did so. As he did, it noticed Tommy and Toby before looking around and spotting Uzi as well. “Oh, it seems you have friends here! That’s cool.”

He paused as an epiphany formed in his head. “Wait a minute! Are you guys new to our squad?” he asked before he frowned and narrowed his eyes. “Though I thought J would’ve let me know about this many people joining…” He shifted his vision to focus on each of the four with suspicion, eyes glitching as he did so.

At this point, Uzi seemed to have caught onto something about the drone, something that the other three didn’t understand yet. Still, it didn’t prevent her from being as tense as the others were. After all, there was always the possibility that the Disassembly Drone would ambush them when they’d least expected it.

Said tension was quickly dispersed as the Disassembly Drone went back to his cheery smile. “I’m sure that it just slipped her mind.” He rationalized, before he turned in a direction where he was facing all members of the quartet and saluted them. “I’m Serial Designation N! Nice to meet you.” he greeted.

“I’m kind of the team leader of this squad.” N boasted before he held up his hand next to his mouth. “That’s not true. Everyone tells me that I’m useless and terrible.” he whispered before he realized what he was saying. “Wait, I-I’m not supposed to tell you that part! Biscuits.”

He sighed before he continued. “Welp, honesty is the best policy. I also can’t seem to remember the past three hours of my life, but I’m sure that’ll sort itself out!” he said before giving out a little chuckle.

Despite how friendly N was being, Sora and the others were still cautious. At this point they were able to piece together some reason as to why the drone was acting completely differently from how he did at first. All of them figured that because he must’ve somehow lost his memory due to him losing and regaining his head, in the process making him forget his encounter with them.

However, Sora had a piece of the puzzle that the other two lacked, as the two didn’t have a chance to see N’s error message. His optic sensors were down, and one of the five lights on his head were red. Maybe those bulbs were where his eyes actually were, instead of the ones on the visor. Maybe his optic sensors being down caused him to think that the quartet were fellow Disassembly Drones.

His thoughts were interrupted when Uzi spoke up. “Un-huh. I, uh, I mean, we have to…go.” She then proceeded to make her way out of the Corpse Spire while she still could, but stopped as she held her hand in pain, hissing through her teeth as she did so. Despite the fact that the hole had stopped getting bigger, it still hurt like a motherfucker.

At this point, the two New L’manbergians had gotten up from where they were before and were now close to where Sora and Uzi were. From where they now stood, they could get a glimpse of the teenaged girl’s damaged hand. “Are you alright? What happened to your hand?” the blonde asked, having not been able to see the result due to being knocked out at the time.

“She must’ve accidentally stuck herself with her tail.” N noted. “Trust me, I know how painful that must feel. But you could always just pop it in your mouth. Our saliva can neutralize the nanites. Good thing too, cause otherwise I’d be constantly disassembling myself.”

“And by ‘our saliva’, you mean like…” Sora began, hoping this would shine a light on if his hypothesis was right.

“Disassembly Drones? Yep.” N finished, confirming the boy’s thoughts.

“...Would you excuse us for a bit?” The brunette in the green suit asked, as he walked in between the two teens and the Disassembly Drone. “The four of us just want to have a little private conversation, that’s all.”

“Oh, of course!” The drone obliged, as he stepped back until a good distance away from the four. “Take all the time you need.”

Once N was far enough, the first one of the quartet to talk was Toby. “Ok, what should we do?” he asked. “We could heal Uzi on our own, but using methods that Disassembly Drone doesn't do to heal will definitely make us suspicious to him and as far as I know, none of us have healing spit.”

“Well, we can try getting him to heal her for us.” Sora suggested. “He seems like a nice enough guy to accept the offer.”

“Maybe we can also get him to do it inside that landing pod in the process.” Uzi suggested.

Tommy turned to face her after hearing that. “Is there a reason why you’re interested in doing that?”

“I just want to check it out.” the girl answered. “I have some suspicions about it and I just want to make sure I’m right about it.”

Seeing no harm in her investing something like that, the others shrugged at this. “Well…I guess I don’t see why not.” Toby admitted. 

“Hey, N!” Uzi called out to the Disassembly Drone, ending the period of privacy that the four had. “Could you be the one who heals me up? Preferably in the landing pod over there.” she added as she pointed over to the spider-legged vehicle.

“Oh, sure! I love doing anything!” N said. Thankfully, he didn’t seem to wonder why she wanted him to do it or why it had to take place inside the pod of all things. Instead, he merely made his way towards the vehicle, leaving the quartet to stare at each other for a bit, surprised that their plan worked out so easily before following afterwards.

- - -

The time that was spent in the Landing Pod with N healing up Uzi’s hand was probably the most uncomfortable moments that the five have ever had. Well, maybe it wasn’t for N, but for the other four it definitely felt like it. 

The landing pod itself was rather small, big enough to fit in the five, but about the size of an elevator. In fact, most of the uncomfortable nature originated from the Landing Pod’s small interior. There were large glass screens and a control panel under them as well as two chairs, ones that were taken by the non-world travelers, forcing the others to stand. It didn’t seem to be in the best of shape, as the glass screens were all cracked and there was the rare time where some orange sparks would fly out from a random location.

Eventually, that moment was thankfully now over with as N spat out her hand, now clean of its hole, but dripping with an absurd amount of saliva, with a “Bleh!” 

“Well, I never thought I would be the one to heal someone else, but, hey, I’m always open to new things, I guess.” he admitted.

Meanwhile, the purple-haired girl stared at her newly-healed hand in disgust before looking at the other four in the pod. “None of us are going to share a word of this with anyone, got it?” she threatened.

“Wasn’t planning on it.” Sora answered nearly immediately, when at the same time N said “Consider it repressed.”

“Uh, you mentioned other members of your squad?” Uzi asked the Disassembly Drone, wanting to quickly change the subject. “Are they coming back soon?”

“Oh yeah, two others.” N answered as he briefly put up two fingers, as if to help get the idea across. “Uh, they’re out hunting for a bit, but you guys are going to love them.”

“First there’s V. We usually both hunt together all the time, so there’s a lot of mutual respect there. I, uh, secretly have a crush on her… But you can’t tell her, okay?!” he added on in a bit of a panic. He stopped for a bit, only continuing shortly afterwards when the four seemed like they weren’t going to tell her. “Uh, then, there’s J - our leader! …J’s awesome.”

From what the drone had said, his companions J and V seemed like nice guys, just like him. But the four were able to pick up that things were not like they were told. They remembered how earlier N had accidentally let slip that the others had called him useless and terrible, and here it seemed like he was having a hard time coming up with anything nice to say about J.

Before any of them could push him on this any further, N spoke up once more. “Hey, let me give you guys the tour, you know besides the corpse…wall thingies outside.” He turned to face the desk and began pressing the buttons on there at seemingly random. “Here are the buttons!”

“This isn’t just a landing pod.” Uzi pointed out before the Disassembly Drone could continue further, her hunch about the pod turning out to be correct. “This is a spaceship, this thing could get us off-planet!”

“It’s more of a one-use missile. They never really taught us how to land.” The silver-haired drone admitted.

“Wait, you want to get off-world?” Sora questioned.

“Yeah, why’d you ask?” Uzi asked as she turned in her chair to face the spiky-haired boy, a twinge of hostility in her voice. “Think it’s weird or something?”

“No. Not at all.” Sora responded, a nostalgic smile on his face as he remembered the times that he, Riku and Kairi used to plan on visiting other worlds before their islands were destroyed. “I used to feel the same way.”

“Used to?” the purple-haired girl asked, an eyebrow raised.

“I-I mean, I still do!” he quickly responded as he caught his slip-up.

Thankfully for him, she didn’t want to dwell on it, instead turning back in her chair to face the drone in the pilot’s outfit. “We-uh-the Worker Drones, we could work with them to fix it up instead of all the murder!” she finished with an accusatory finger point at N, causing the drone to jump back in his seat.

“Speaking of which…” Toby spoke up. “Could you remind us why we are doing it again?”

“Well, other than ingesting their - SWEET” N’s voice briefly went deeper and more terrifying, with the crazed smile and X on his visor from when he acted more feral towards them appearing as well before he went to normal. “- oil to avoid overheating and dying? I guess I just want to be useful. I was given this job, and I always wanna try my best.”

“Doesn’t seem to me like that’s getting you a lot of respect.” Uzi said, standing up in her chair as she did so. “You really think that the company isn’t going to dispose of you and the others once all the workers are dead?”

Despite her sudden hostility towards him, N didn’t seem threatened by what Uzi was insinuating. “Oh, my! You sure are rebellious. It’s kind of exciting.” He put his hand close to his face to fan himself off before he realized what he was saying and began to correct himself. “U-Uh, but it’s not as fun as, uh, following the rules, right guys?” he asked as he faced the other three.

He wasn’t able to get an answer out of the three before a metallic thumping and banging could be heard from outside of the pod. He looked up at where the noise was and smiled. “Hey, they’re back!” he said as he recognized the sound and what it meant. He went back to face the others, only to find that they were no longer in the pod with him.

“Idiot! Get out here!” he heard the muffled voice of J call out to him.

When he exited, he saw his boss was now standing on the ground, arms crossed. She had some similarities with N, those being the tail, silver hair and band with 5 yellow eyes on top, but she also had some major differences in her form. Her legs were mostly black ended in points. Her hair was short with two massive pigtails, one on each side and wore a black suit.

At the same time, a third drone crawled in through the hole where the moonlight was shining from, cackling as she did so. V had a lot in common with J in terms of appearance, with a lack of head equipment and legs with black painted on up to her thighs that ended at points instead of at feet. Her silver hair was in the style of a bob and wore a black crop coat.

“Yo, I saw a small group of workers out there that I kind of wanna practice making balloon animals with.” V noted as she flew down from where she crawled from. She had the X and sadistic smile on her face before they switched back to regular. “What happened here?”

“Synergistic liability here must have tripped and knocked himself offline.” J informed, her tone of voice implying that she was disappointed but expected herself to feel that way. She then promptly slapped N across the face hard enough for his visor to display in red text “SYSTEM REBOOT” with a yield sign above it. As it did, all of his lights briefly turned off and back on and when they did, they turned on all yellow.

He quickly went back to showing his eyes again, but as he did, he received an influx of memories, both from after and before he got his amnesia. After the few hours were wiped from his mind, he encountered four new figures, one of which might’ve hit him with a giant key. He couldn’t actually make out what they were, but assumed that they must’ve been a fellow group of Disassembly Drones.

This influx told him that he was wrong. It showed him memories of him and the newly-identified Worker Drones. One with spiky brown hair staring at him in confusion holding a giant key. One in purple hair being the one ranting about how the company wouldn’t hesitate to get rid of them once they complete their mission. Him slicing into a drone with blond hair. And finally, the purple-haired one saying “Bite me” before blasting him with the weapon that ended up blowing his head off in the first place.

After realizing this, he simply let out an “Oh.” He knew how much trouble he was. Those four Worker Drones that V mentioned must’ve been the same ones that he thought were fellow Disassembly Drones. The ones that he let get away. If his companions found out how he royally screwed up, he was dead.

He turned to face the exit on the ground and was able to see the footprints of the four as they must’ve hightailed it out of there. But before he left, he knew he had to come up with some excuse as to why he’s leaving. “You know, I-I-I left an e-extremely dangerous weapo-uh, an excuse o-outside.” he claimed before he ran out of the Spire on foot.

Yes, he was more than willing to admit that the excuse was definitely rushed and bad, but he was panicking so hard at the moment. Hopefully, it would be enough so they wouldn’t suspect anything.

Unfortunately, it wasn’t.

None of the two made an attempt to stop him as he ran out, but stared at him with narrowed eyes. J turned to face V to make sure she was feeling the same as she was. When she did, she saw that the bob-haired drone had replaced one of her hands for an orange and purple flag that read “LITERALLY SO INSANELY SUSPICIOUS”.

If someone else were to have seen that, they would’ve questioned why she would even have a flag that read that. However, J was not one of those people. After all, questioning that would be to question JCJenson, questioning JCJenson was disobeying JCJenson and she will never be one to disobey her company.

And if the reason for this strange behavior N was suddenly exhibiting to disobeying JCJenson, then she sure as bandwidth was going to make sure that that traitor suffered for it.

Chapter Text

The quartet ran out of the Corpse Spire as fast as their legs could carry them and refused to look back. They had already had trouble with defeating N, who knew how much trouble that they would have if they fought the others? Yes, they could always use Uzi’s railgun as it was the only thing that seemed to damage them, but any damage done could easily just be reversed by their ability to regenerate.

Thankfully, they did have a destination where they would be safe from the Disassembly Drones. “We gotta get back to the Outpost.” Uzi informed the others as they ran. “They never managed to get through the doors before, so we can just wait it out in there before we regroup and try to finish those Murder Drones once and for all!”

The other three were more concerned about their safety at the moment than trying to fight the drones again. Though they knew that they could be hurt and killed, they had no idea if they could be kept down. If they were going to fight them again, they would need to know how to keep them dead first.

As they were close to the forest, groups of Search Ghosts, Blue Rhapsodies and Shadows materialized to face off against the group. The quartet, however, made an attempt to ignore them and keep moving on. After all, they wanted to make sure that there ends up being a lot of distance between them and the Disassembly Drones.

But while they weren’t fighting against the Heartless, something else did, as they heard the sounds of them getting defeated from a short distance behind them. They didn’t look back at what was responsible, but they all had a gut feeling that it was one of the Disassembly Drones that did it. Knowing that this meant that one was closing in behind them, the quartet did their best to run faster.

Eventually, they finally exited the forest and found themselves outside of the Outpost. Sora, Tommy and Toby began to run up to the door in order to knock on to alert the others inside, but Uzi held out to tell them to stop. Instead, she pulled out a black thin square-shaped object with writing on a white lined section of it reading “DOOR MASTER KEY” and pressed it against a panel that was next to the door, which caused it to open.

When they came inside the small room, they found that barely anything had changed. Most of the other Worker Drones were still sitting at the table playing card games, only now Molly was sitting amongst them. The only other major difference was that Khan was no longer present there.

There was a small amount of commotion amongst the card players when they entered, due to the gust of wind blowing in from the opening door disrupting where the cards and stuff had been placed. The only reaction that the four gave to acknowledge this was Uzi yelling “Bite me!” at them.

Most of the Worker Drones ended up ignoring the four, going back to put the cards back to where they once were. The only one who actually ended up paying them any mind was Molly. She figured that they might’ve gone on some sort of adventure when they had exited the Outpost, that was usually what would happen when the trio would arrive at a new world, she’s come to learn.

But this was different. When she watched the trio from footage broadcasted by the nanocameras, no matter what happened to them, they were always able to put on a brave face for whatever they were fighting against. But now, they were terrified. She could deduce this through how Uzi was mashing a black object against the door panel quickly while muttering “Close it, close it!” and that the other three were staring outside intently as they were looking for something. They must be trying to escape from something. They never acted like this for the Heartless, so this must be from something natural to this world. “Is everything alright?” she asked them.

As she did, finally the panel accepted the key, the door closing as the Disassembly Drone that was chasing the four was diving towards it. Sora, Tommy and Toby stepped back from where they were, but didn’t go for an attack yet, thinking that the door would close before it could reach them. And that ended up being true…for the most part.

Before the door could close all the way, the drone reached its clawed hands in the gap between and gripped onto the closing door tightly, to the point where the places where its fingers were. Metal creaked as it began to pry the Outpost doors fully open.

The trio were the first to react, running up to the door and hitting its hands, hoping that they would let go of the door and lose its progress. Alas, their efforts were in vain, as just like the other times where they attacked a Disassembly Drone with their weapons, it didn’t seem to affect it in any way. The others didn’t move in to help with Uzi and the other WDF members just staring as they were frozen in fear. Molly, on the other hand, got up from her seat and began to get away. She had enough experience back on her world that if something managed to break through into where it shouldn’t, the best course of action is to get out of there before it could do anything to her.

It was now at the point where the doors were opened wide enough that the drone’s eyes could now be seen, briefly showing the “X” before shifting back to normal. “Hey there, fellas! Good to see you again.” It spoke, identifying it to the four as N. “Wait, no.” he tsked as he remembered why he came here in the first place. “I’m gonna have to murder everyone. Gotta put a rain check on that reunion, sorry!”

With that, he wormed his stinger tail in through the gap that the doors gave, and used it to stab not any of the drones inside, but instead the master key out of the purple-haired girl’s hands. The attention of the quartet shifted from N to the master key, eyes widening in horror as they realized that the now stabbed-through keycard had slammed against the panel once more.

The tail snaked away, its work done, as not only was the door keeping its owner separated from the Worker Drones was now open, but every other door in the Outpost was now opening, giving N even more access to the Outpost.

It was at this moment where all the Worker Drone in the room began to book it, fleeing deeper into the building. Despite them running away from him, N didn’t bother to chase after them again, at least at first. Instead, he extended his hand towards the drones, as it shifted into a gun-like form.

Before he was given the chance to fire at them, a small group of Winterhorns began to materialize behind him. They ignored him and went past him, instead being the ones to go after the drones.

The Heartless managed to catch up to the fleeing drones and before any of them could react to the creatures’ presence, one of the WDF members was stabbed in the body by a Winterhorn’s ice antlers. However, no liquids were shed from his wounds, instead the body just went limp before vanishing into a dark purple haze, leaving behind a heart-shaped gem that floated up to the sky before fading away.

Sora turned around just in time to see the heart fade away. Yet again, he wasn’t able to save someone before their heart was stolen. At least this time, he now had definitive proof that these robots do indeed have hearts in them, though he really wished that he would’ve found out some other way.

At this point, he stopped running and turned around, ready to fight the Heartless. He knew that doing this would increase the risk of him getting attacked by N but he didn’t care. At this moment, he didn’t want anyone else to suffer that fate again, not on his watch!

This change in actions did not go unnoticed by his peers. Tommy and Toby noticed that Sora had turned back and then looked at each other. Guess they weren’t running away after all. The blonde let out a shrug and the brunette gave a sigh before they followed the spiky-haired boy into battle. 

Molly also realized this, but continued on running with the other WDF Members. After all, she was never built for combat, and she figured that Sora and the others could handle it on their own.

Uzi noticed that the three were turning around as well, but didn’t join in, at least not yet. Her hesitation came from N potentially chasing after them and her railgun. If she were to turn back now, she knew that she would run the risk of having to fight N again and that the only weapon that was capable of damaging them was her weapon.

However, her railgun may be extremely powerful, but it came with a caveat. Every time it was fired, it would have to recharge for 30 minutes before it could be fired off again. Just in case the murderous drone did decide to jump them whilst fighting the Heartless, she wanted to make sure she would be able to damage him back.

When she checked it, she saw red text displayed on a pop-up that read: “RECHARGING” with a timer counting down on it. Thankfully, the time left on the clock wasn’t that substantial, it would be ready for use in three seconds…

…Two seconds…

…One second…

Once the timer hit zero, it disappeared with the text turning green and now saying “READY”. As soon as it did, she stopped in her tracks and turned around to join the trio, leaving Molly and the other WDF members as the only ones escaping.

The battle between the quartet and the Winterhorns was a short one. The only part of the fight worth mentioning was that it was more difficult to move around and dodge attacks due to the environment being smaller than the ones in previous fights. Despite this, the quartet managed to finish the fight unscathed.

After the fight was over, the four looked around. Even though they were distracted with defeating the Heartless, they still haven’t been assaulted by N. This could’ve meant that he would be going after them now, but that didn’t seem to be the case. In fact, when they looked, they worryingly couldn’t find the Disassembly Drone at all. The four kept on searching, weapons at the ready for whenever he planned to strike them. Their search was interrupted when they heard a familiar voice coming from behind them.

“You gotta admit, that door has some pretty nice hydraulics, huh?” They had flinched upon hearing the voice, but turned around to see Khan walking up to them after turning a corner. Even though they were greeted by a friendly face, that wasn’t enough to put them off edge. Him mentioning the door reminded the world-traveling trio of the excuse that they had given him earlier and how they were supposed to have been outside checking on the Outpost’s main door. He probably wouldn’t be happy to learn that they ditched looking at it to fight the Disassembly Drones, or that in the process of escaping from one of them, ended up opening all of the doors, letting them and the Heartless in.

“Uh, Mr. Doorman…” Sora began to speak, before being interrupted.

“Please kid, call me Khan.” the mustachioed robot chuckled, seemingly still not aware of the open doors yet. “By the way, probably not related or anything, but as I was walking here, I came across some of the other WDF members running away in a hurry.” he explained as he pointed his thumb back towards where he came from. “You guys wouldn’t know what that was about, right?”

Upon hearing this, the spiky-haired boy let out a guilty chuckle. He felt that he might as well inform the door-obsessed robot what happened, he was bound to find out eventually. Hopefully Sora would be able to tell him in a way that could let him down easily. “Yeah, about that-”

However, before he could explain what happened, the problem made itself clear to Khan as N flew down from above, his landing once again forcing those nearby to fly backwards. The drone must’ve hid himself on the ceiling while the four were busy with fighting the Heartless.

Though they were pushed back by N touching down, the four were very quick to pick themselves back up, weapons at the ready. “I’m going to make sure that you stay dead this time.” Uzi threatened the Disassembly Drone, pointing her railgun at him.

The silver-haired drone gave a sad chuckle to the threat and turned to face the quartet. As he did, they saw that his right eye looked normal, while the left was replaced with an X. “I’m sorry,” he said, a sad look in his normal eye. “I really enjoyed the time that we spent together, but I can’t have you shooting V with that thing.”

“And we can’t just leave you and your friends alone so you can murder innocent drones, either.” Tommy snapped back.

At this point, Khan was just picking himself back up, which didn’t go unnoticed by the purple-haired girl. “Dad, get down. I can take care of this.” she told him, not wanting him to be caught in the blast range.

Despite what the intention of what she said was, the door-obsessed robot didn’t calm down nor did he move from where he was. Instead, he stood there frozen as he stared at the scene that was unfolding in front of him. “You led a Murder Drone here?!” he cried out in fear. “What have you done?”

Uzi’s eyes widened. Yes, before she knew that she had screwed up massively, but it was at this moment that she really understood how badly. All she wanted to do was to put a stop to the Disassembly Drone’s contact murder spree against her kind. Instead, she made the situation a lot worse by accidentally letting them into the one safe haven they had from them.

She did her best to try and regain her rebellious persona, but cracks were beginning to form in her facade. “Now is so not the time for this!” she argued. “I know I messed up - but I’m just about to fix it. Just move out of the way!”

As she was distracted talking to her father, N took this opportunity to lunge at her. Before any damage could befall her, Sora shot another Fire spell at the drone. He remembered hearing the silver-haired robot mention that they have to prevent themselves from over-heating by drinking oil, which would explain why he made sure to dodge the fireballs during their first fight. Maybe if he could overheat him, it could end up being the thing that makes him stay down for good.

This time, the drone was not able to dodge the attacks, partially due to the more smaller environment from when they previously fought. Instead, he used his wings to cover himself, making them take the brunt of the spell.

After he defended himself, he grabbed onto Uzi’s railgun, and before she could pull the trigger against him, he yanked out of her hands and tossed it aside, where it slid to the feet of Khan.

Then he proceeded to grab onto the girl’s hand and threw her towards Sora and the others, knocking them down before they could attack him again.

Uzi attempted to get back up on her feet, but was forced back down on the ground when N rushed over and thrust one of his wings onto her, stabbing through her shoulder and Toby’s hand, which was underneath. This action not only caused the President to cry out in pain, but also forced the teenaged girl to cough up a good amount of oil. A yield sign flashed on her left eye as she did so. To make sure that the other two wouldn’t think of trying to fight back, he shifted his hands into their gun form and put it so that their barrels touched the heads of the two.

Despite being pinned down, Uzi was able to get her head up at a point where she could see her father, just standing there in fear of what was happening in front of him and her gun at his feet. “D-dad!” she called out to him, her voice somewhat strained from her injury. “Just p-point and shoot! Trust me!”

She had hoped in the bottom of her heart that in this moment, one where his own daughter was in danger, that Khan would stop being cowardly and actually take initiative against the Disassembly Drone. After all, he wasn’t able to reach her mother before her untimely demise via Disassembly Drone, so there was no way Khan was going to let that happen while he’s able to do something.

And at first, it seemed like that would end up being the case. There were moments when his eyes would dart to the weapon at his feet briefly before going back to staring at the scene in front of him in fear. Sora, Tommy and Toby did their best to encourage him into using the gun, letting him know that his daughter’s claim can be trusted as they saw for themselves what the railgun was capable of.

But in the moment, fear had contaminated his servos, his cowardice overtaking him. He began to step back from the situation, the desperation in his daughter’s eyes amping up as he did so. “…Dad?” she called out in a last ditch attempt at convincing him away from what he was planning on doing.

He did end up stopping in his tracks, but not because he decided to stop what he was doing. He pulled out the remote in his pocket and a door closed, separating him from them.

Something must’ve been pressed on the other side, because the lights flickered off before turning back on but with a red color shining instead of the typical white. Judging by this and the fact that an alarm could now be heard, this was likely some kind of panic mode being turned on.

The desperation in Uzi’s eyes changed to hopelessness as her body slumped back down on the ground. The Excalibur trio couldn’t blame her. Though someone could justify what had transpired as Khan being too afraid to think properly, he still ended up abandoning his daughter when she needed him the most. Even N, who could’ve at any moment chosen to end their lives at any moment, couldn’t help but pity her.

He managed to snap out of it after hearing something. “Woah, N.” a voice said, a voice that he recognized as belonging to one of his fellow Disassembly Drones. He turned his head to see that both J and V had arrived at the scene, crawling in on the ceiling above before flying onto the floor. “Am I dreaming, or did you do something not useless for once?” J continued, impressed as she and V walked towards their comrade.

“I’ve been trying to get past these doors for months. Nice work, N.” V added.

He awkwardly smiled back at her, just happy that the robot he had a crush on was talking to her. He would’ve waved as well, but he didn’t, as that would entail taking his gun hands off of Sora or Tommy, who he knew would’ve taken the opportunity to fight back against him. He did retract his wing from Uzi’s body, with her weight being what kept Toby pinned down. However, his happiness was short-lived as he realized something. “Wait…you…me…name…remember?” he couldn’t help but stutter.

The others ignored his ramblings as V walked up to the door chuckling. “They really thought that they could just put up another door to block us out. Little do they know we have this.” She lifted up her hand to reveal that she held the master key that N had pierced and Uzi dropped earlier, though now had a hole through it where it had been stabbed. “Not in its best shape, but it should get us through this last door.”

With that, she slammed it against a nearby panel, crushing it in the process. However, this still had the desired effect, as the door opened itself up. “Lowest body count eats a missile!” the bob-haired drone called out before she deployed her wings and flew down the hallway, cackling as she did so.

J, on the other hand, didn’t follow V just yet, instead walking up to N. “Way to go, stud.” she complimented, patting the drone on the back as she did so (hard enough that he let out a small “Ow” when she did). “The company’s gonna love this. With this colony wiped, we’ll make our quota for sure.”

“You know what that means.” she added, smiling as a sing-songy tone was briefly made evident in her voice. She reached into her pocket and pulled out…a pen with the logo of JCJenson printed on it. “Branded pens!”

Apparently, though Sora, Tommy and Toby couldn’t explain why, this was something of value here, if the “Ooooh” of admiration N let out at the sight of it as it was clicked by his boss was to go by. However, this seemed like something exclusive to the Disassembly Drones, as if they turned to face Uzi, they would see that her expression changed from that hopeless look to one of incredulousness. They were rewarded for killing her kind, with gifts like that!?

“I can see you got your hands full at the moment, so I’ll leave your reward here for once you’ve taken them off the table.” J noted, as she tossed the pen to where it could roll up to N’s feet before going to head off in the direction V went.

N took a look at the pen as it stopped moving. As he stared at it, the Disassembly Drone felt that something was off. He did what he was supposed to do, was now seen as useful by his peers and got rewarded for his efforts, and yet, he didn’t feel fulfilled with what he was doing. It might’ve been due to the extended time that he had with the quartet prior, or what just happened between Khan and Uzi, but he couldn’t help but feel bad for the drones he was supposed to kill.

He then remembered what Uzi had said to him back at the Spire, that there was a chance that JCJenson wouldn’t hesitate to get rid of them once they had succeeded in clearing Copper Nine of all the Worker Drones. He hadn’t given it much thought then, as he dismissed it for being too rebellious for his tastes. But now…well, he at least wanted to know what they were supposed to do after they’ve completed their mission.

J was still nearby thankfully, and since she was his boss, she seemed like the right person to ask about this. “Uh, you know, not that I can’t wait to keep murdering all these Worker Drones…” he began as he turned to face her. “But just outta curiosity, do we actually, uh… know what the company plans to do with us afterwards?”

That question definitely succeeded in getting the pig-tailed drone’s attention, as she stopped in her tracks as she turned to face N. “Excuse me?” she questioned sternly, as she put hands on hips and squinted her digital eyes.

“Ok, so, I may have encountered a group of Workers earlier and one of them might have suggested that they could fix up our landing pod to, uh, escape the planet and stuff. Which - whoa, hey, it’s against the rules and all…” The drone in the pilot’s cap began to explain, making sure to make it obvious that he’s asking this out of curiosity and not because of some ill intent he had. “But it is kind of making me question why our pods are only one-way in the first place, cause you know I get the feeling that because of what we’re doing that the company doesn’t actually love robots, and, like, we’re robots as well…”

“Questioning the company, are you, buddy?” his boss asked, interrupting N’s ramblings, as she walked over to him. Despite her seeming upset at what he had to say earlier, she was now approaching him with a smile replacing the scowl she had earlier. “You just gave me the excuse I needed to do something I wanted to do for a long time.”

Suddenly, she thrusted something into N’s body with a thud, causing him to grunt as his visor glitched into a yield sign. He looked down to see the object that was pushed into him, one that had a similar appearance to a black flash drive. Said device was removed shortly after to reveal that it planted a hexagonal chip onto his body with a screen that read “INSTALLING VIRUS”.

“Worker Drones are corrupted, N. That’s why the company sent us.” J explained as she walked away from the now-infected robot as he fell onto his knees, leaving the quartet that he had held down by him unguarded. “I hate to see you corrupted as well.”

The quartet knew that what the company-obsessed robot said was utter bullshit, but N, whose visor was now covered by a red screen either didn’t realize it or was too nice to fight back against her claims. “Th-th-thanks, J-J-J. Alw-w-ways looking out for m-m-me.” he complemented, his voice now a slurred and glitch version of what it once was as he collapsed onto the ground face up. “You’re aw-w-wesome.”

His boss merely scoffed before she unfolded her wings and flew off to the direction her ally had gone. It was at this point that Sora, Tommy, Toby and Uzi began to pick themselves back up. Though Sora went to try and get a hit in, J had left before such a thing could happen.

As they were getting back up, Toby took the last remaining pieces of his Elixir and gave himself a piece before he handed the rest over to Uzi. She was uncertain about it at first, but eventually gave it a try after seeing that his hand was now wound free because of it. Once she did, the gash in her shoulder repaired itself and before long, it was like it was never there at all.

Now that she was fully healed, she went and picked up her railgun on the floor. “Let’s go! Who knows what kind of carnage J and V are causing!” Sora shouted at the others as she did so. Sure they didn’t know how to stop them still, but they could at the very least attempt to stop them from causing a lot of harm.

They were about to leave the room when they heard N’s voice calling out to them. “A-a-ah, biscu-cu-cuits…” the drone cursed, his voice still glitchy. “S-s-sorry abou-ou-out that. If it wa-a-asn’t for me, you wouldn’t-n’t-n’tve had that awkward mom-om-oment with your dad.”

Uzi turned around and gave a little sigh at that. “Please, me and him weren’t that close anyway.” she attempted to deny, but the slight cracks in her voice suggested otherwise.

N could sense this as well, and attempted to direct the conversation to something else in order to take her mind off of it. Fortunately, he knew just what to say. “Hey, do you think-nk-nk that-at-at you could help-lp-lp get this off of me?” he suggested. “It’s kinda killing-ing-ing me.”

He was successful, but not in the way he would’ve liked. “Seriously?” she questioned as she turned the drone laying on the ground. “Why would you think that we would do something like that?”

“...Becau-au-ause we’re frie-ie-iends?” The awkward shrug in the infected drone’s voice was still audible despite how much it was distorted at this point.

“Really? And was that before or after you attempted to mince us?” Tommy asked, crossing his arms with a suspicious look on his face.

“Well, technic-ic-ically it was after-er-er the first time but befor-or-ore the sec-ec-econd…” he stopped as he realized the hole he was digging for himself. “I should prob-ob-obably stop talking now-ow-ow.”

“Well, maybe we could…” Sora spoke up before being interrupted by Uzi.

“Excuse us for a sec.” she said to the infected drone, before putting the four of them into a huddle. “Don’t tell me you’re actually thinking of helping him out after what he did.” she chided the Keyblade Wielder.

“I know he did terrible things, but leaving him to die like this just feels wrong.” he admitted. “Maybe if we can remove the chip from him, he could help us fight J and V.”

“You really think he’d be so willing to turn against his own kind?” she asked.

“Well, J was the one who put that chip on him, and from what I could tell, V had probably been pretending to not know who he was for a long time. Those would be good enough for me to want some kind of revenge on them.” The spiky-haired brunette stated.

“Are you sure about that?” Uzi asked. “He keeps trying to find the good in them, and he even thanked J for putting that chip on him, for crying out loud!”

“He did, but he was beginning to question why he was here before that.” Sora pointed out.

“You mean when he asked the questions in a way that his boss wouldn’t get mad at him for it?” she countered. “That has to be the lamest heel-face turn that I have ever seen. There’s no way that we’re helping him.”

“Actually, I don’t think it would be a bad idea if we did.” Toby admitted. “If he helps us, he could provide us with an advantage.”

“Really? And why’s that?” she asked skeptically, an eyebrow raised.

“Well, being a Disassembly Drone, he’s at least got to know a more permanent solution to beating them.” he explained.

“...Guess you do have a point.” the purple-haired girl admitted with a groan after a silent moment of contemplation. “Okay, here’s the deal, N.” she said to the infected drone as she broke the huddle. “Somehow, we decided that maybe we shouldn’t exactly be leaving you for dead. We’ll remove that chip for you - but on one condition. You have to help us beat the other Disassembly Drones.”

N gave out a little laugh in response. “Sur-ur-ure, I lo-o-ove doing anything-ing-ing.” Despite his enthusiasm in his distorted voice and the thumbs-up he gave, a message popped up on his visor claiming “I’M LITERALLY ABOUT TO DIE”. Though that could be talking about how badly the virus has been affecting him.

She pulled out her wrench and put its jaws against the virus chip and attempted to yank it off. It took a few attempts but eventually she was successful in prying it off of him. Once she did, the red screen disappeared, his visor now showing his regular yellow eyes.

“Hey, thanks for that.” N complimented the rebellious girl as he got himself back off the ground, his voice back to normal as well.

“Nuh-uh, no bonding thing. You were responsible for killing a lot of my people.” Uzi reminded him.

“That’s super fair.” the Disassembly Drone admitted, scratching his neck as he did so.

“C’mon, we still have to deal with the other two!” said Tommy to the others, and with that, the quintet ran in the direction that J and V had flown off to.

You would think that due to the time difference between V and then J leaving and the five chasing afterwards that it would be difficult figuring out where the two Disassembly Drones went. But as it turns out, this was not the case. They were able to figure out where they went in a morbid way, as the two murderous machines left a trail of Worker Drones corpses in their wake.

As they followed the grisly trail, Sora did his best to try not to look at any of them directly. He also tried not to think about them, but he couldn’t distract himself from the depravity of the situation he’s in. It was bad enough that Disassembly Drones were committing these murders with glee, but then there was the fact that they were sent here by JCJenson because they weren’t happy that the bots on Copper Nine had made their own society after the humans there were wiped out. The robots were just minding their own business, they didn’t deserve this!

He tried to focus his thoughts towards a more positive direction. Out of the three Disassembly Drones that had been sent here on their murderous mission, they were able to get one of them on their side. Now they just have to figure out how to deal with the other two.

Speaking of which…

“Hey, N?” he asked the silver-haired drone. “We know that Uzi’s railgun seems to be the only weapon we have that can damage you guys, but you can just as easily heal from whatever you can take. Is there any permanent way to stop you guys?”

The drone in the pilot’s cap looked hesitant to reveal how to kill them at first, either because he was worried that the group would eventually use that information against him, or because despite everything they did to him, he didn’t want his fellow Disassembly Drones to die. But eventually, he decided to reveal the information anyway.

“Well, there is one way that we can die.” N told the group as he pointed to the spot where J had inserted the virus chip into him. “You’ll have to destroy our Hearts. They’re the only part of us that we can’t regenerate and it’s also essentially kind of our brains.”

“Aim for the Hearts, got it.” Uzi replied.

After a few more minutes of following the trail of robot corpses, fighting some spawning Heartless along the way, they eventually found themselves entering the area where J and V were located. It seemed that they had to tear their way in to get there in the first place, judging by how the door they entered was ripped open like the wrapping on a Christmas present.

As they got to the doorway, they got there just in time to see V manically grinning as she was holding a familiar-looking young Worker Drone in her hands. Thad must have gotten attacked by at least her or J before this as a thankfully non-fatal amount of oil was dripping from him. Meanwhile, the pigtailed drone was watching the scene close by, hands on her hips. Though they couldn’t see it, it was probably likely that she had a smug grin on her face.

“Put him down!” Sora shouted as the others got their weapons ready. All except for N, who chose to politely wave at his two former allies. This didn’t go unnoticed by the four as they briefly glanced over to him. The one who gave him the most attention was Uzi, who elbowed him to stop.

“Oh, right!” N said, as he remembered that the two were no longer his allies before clearing his throat. “J, you were kind of mean to me at times, and I wish you weren’t. V, you’ve pretended that you didn’t know who I was for our entire time together, and gotta be honest, that’s kinda hurtful. Just a bit of constructive criticism.”

He turned to face the purple-haired girl next to him. “Was that better than last time?” he asked.

It took a few for her to realize what he was talking about until she remembered that she had criticized N switching sides earlier and how she mentioned that it was the lamest heel-face turn in history. Was he trying to make up for that? She decided that she might as well give him an honest assessment. “Eh, I’ve seen worse.”

N seemed to appreciate that small victory, pumping his hand down in satisfaction.

“Noted, traitor.” J scoffed, as V discarded the boy she held in her hands by tossing him aside as she began to put her focus towards the five. “Seems like you’ve become as much of an obstacle as the Heartless. Thankfully, I can deal with you the same way - with some good ol’ rightsizing!”

“Wait, did she just…” Toby muttered to himself, noticing something off about what the pig-tailed drone had said.

This, however, was a moment that the others weren’t focusing on currently. Instead, Uzi got the five into a small huddle. “Okay, here’s the plan. Me and Sora will take care of J, the rest of you try to take out V. Sound good?”

“Actually, is it okay if I help you guys fight J instead?” N asked. He was hesitant to fight V for a few reasons. First of which was that despite how terribly she’s treated him in the past, he still has the remnants of a crush on her. Second was that V was the most murderous drone out of the three, which also made her the most dangerous one to fight.

“Nope, good luck!” she exclaimed as she grabbed an object from her hoodie pocket and threw it at J, managing to hit her square on the middle bulb above her head despite the large distance between them. Despite said distance and that the attack was causing J to freak out as the fluid from the shattered bulb raining down on her, the others were able to barely make out what the weapon Uzi used was - a pen.

Specifically, it was the JCJenson branded pen that was gifted to N earlier.

As the work-obsessed drone was busy flailing about from the attack, the purple-haired girl grabbed Sora by the hand, dragging him off with her as she ran towards J. Meanwhile, V shifted her hands into swords as she began to launch herself in the opposite direction, not to counteract Uzi and Sora, but instead so she could go and tear up the others. Tommy and Toby seemed ready to fight her. N, on the other hand, was not, eyes widening in fear as he saw the cackling drone flying towards him.

Uzi eventually stopped when she was a good distance away from both N, Tommy and Toby as well as J and turned to face Sora. “You go keep her distracted while I find an opening.” she said. Sora nodded his head and began to run towards the still-freaking out Disassembly Drone.

At this point, the broken bulb atop of J’s begun to repair itself, the fluid no longer leaking for her head. Despite it still repairing itself, she still wasn’t able to see, but she could sense the movements of Sora and Uzi coming towards her, though just the general direction that they were in.

She shifted one of her hands into its gun form, and began to unload its chip aimlessly in the direction that the two were hoping that her fire would hit them. Sora attempted to block the oncoming bullets with his Keyblade, but he was still struck by a few in thankfully non-fatal areas on his torso, tiny bits of oil leaking out. Uzi was also caught in the crossfire, a few bullets scraping her, but she was mainly knocked off-balance by the attack rather than seriously injured.

As soon as she was done firing, the work-obsessed drone used her free hand to pull out the pen, allowing the bulb to fully heal. She attempted to crush the object that caused her pain, only to fail to do so. “Damn the well made quality assured durability of JCJenson products!” she cursed under her breath. This managed to keep her distracted for long enough to allow Sora to rush in and attack her with a flurry of hits.

Uzi would’ve joined in with Sora in his attack, but before she could, noticed and ducked a laser beam shot at her from V.

“Hey! You still have to deal with us first!” Tommy yelled as he charged into V, his shield out in front of him as he knocked into her side.

The bob-haired drone seemed to have listened to his advice, changing focus on her attacks to the two New L’manbergians and N. She blasted another laser in Toby’s direction, which the brunette was able to Dodge Roll away from and N, who had been thrown against a nearby wall by the murderous robot earlier in the fight, ducked out of its way too.

“Some assistance would be appreciated!” Toby called out as he shot a fireball at the enemy Disassembly Drone, managing to hit her in the back which she retaliated in turn with another laser shot.

“O-Oh yeah, right! Will be doing…that.” N said, still very nervous. However, he still made an attempt to try and steel himself in the moment. He pointed his hand, transformed into a laser cannon similar to the one V currently had out, aimed it at her and attempted to fire…

…only to be embarrassed that the only thing to come out of it was a small series of digital pink hearts, which faded away after a short while. 

Despite the brief appearance of the hearts, it managed to catch the attention of his two current allies. “DUDE, GIVE IT UP, SHE’S CLEARLY NOT INTO YOU!” An incredulous Tommy yelled at him.

“SORRY, I’M STILL TRYING TO GET OVER THAT!” he yelled back in embarrassment.

As he did, the bob-haired drone pulled out a new weapon in her arsenal - a rocket launcher - and shot one that landed next to her formal ally. He managed to fly away from it just as it was about to explode. V chased after him in the air, leaving the other two to try and give him some assistance from the ground.

Meanwhile, J and Sora were still fighting with each other, clashing claws against Keyblade. While not showing this on the outside, the work-obsessed drone was nervous. She knew that she and V were outnumbered but luckily, she knew how she would be able to even the battlefield in her favor.

She dashed back from one of the Keyblade Wielder’s attacks, getting some distance between the two. Once she did, she began to cackle as her hand shifted into what appeared to be a three pronged claw, electricity beginning to dance around it. Sora ran towards her in an attempt to stop whatever she was planning on doing as she raised her pronged hand in the air.

However, he was too late to do so, as J fired off her weapon, letting out an EMP blast that covered the entire room. As soon as the blast touched the drones, they froze in place, their visor briefly showing a flickering yield sign before shutting off completely as their bodies went limp and collapsed onto the floor. However, the blast was only designed to target Worker Drones, so J, N and V were the only ones unaffected by the blast.

N was unaware of this fact at first, being too occupied with the current conflict he was having with V as they flew across the sky, their blades clashing against each other occasionally. It was during a moment where they were standing still in the air, both of their blades pushing against each other that he noticed the lack of support he was now getting from Tommy and Toby.

He looked down to see the bodies of his Worker Drone allies collapsed on the floor. Though it seemed that both of those helping him were fine for the time being, the same however could not be said for the two that went to fight J. He saw her kicking the body of Sora off to the side, saving him for later as she went over to where Uzi lied, claws out.

“Uzi!” he called out in peril, as if his voice would somehow be able to arouse the girl from her unconsciousness, but to no avail. It seemed that he would have to be the one to save her, but that would be a difficult task right now due to him being currently in the middle of fighting V, and struggling at that.

He tried thinking of solutions that could quickly get him out of the pickle he was in, but only managed to come up with one, and it was an embarrassing one at that. He ultimately decided to do it anyway, as he needed to do something soon if he was going to save Uzi. Plus her opinion of him was already seemingly low, so he saw no harm in having it lowered further.

“I’m so, so sorry about this.” he apologized to her in advance. “Have fun repressing this.” And after taking a deep breath…

…proceeded to lick one of her blades.

“Eww! What the hell?” V yelled out in disgust and rightfully so as well. But as she did, she made the mistake of pushing her sword hands away from N, allowing him to free freely without being stabbed for his troubles.

However, instead of going after Uzi, he flew straight up into the air and before V had the chance to follow, he flew back down, foot out, and used it to kick the bob-haired drone straight into the ground.

As this was happening, the Worker Drones were beginning to stir once more. Uzi’s first act after reawakening groggily into consciousness was to reach for the gun that she had when she fell, only for it to be kicked off to the side by J. 

“My, you seem to be quite the rebellious little asset.” she spoke pridefully. “You must’ve been the one who brainwashed N against us and the company. Impressive feat for a barely sentient toaster like yourself to achieve.” As she was continuing to talk, text briefly replaced her eyes that read “PLAYING:// Monologue.mp3”. “You know, I have had my fair share of prey fighting back before, but the spirits you and your allies seem to give are just so-”

CRUNCH!

“-painful?” She stopped her monologue to look down at the mysterious sound and found that while she had been preoccupied with that, Uzi had grabbed onto her tail and shoved it straight into her leg, the nanites already flowing through.  

“Gah! Fourth-quarter profits! Mother of company leadership retreats!” she shouted as she hopped on her non-injured foot in pain, spouting corporate lingo as if they were swears. Eventually, she hopped against a piece of rubble that came from the explosion of V’s missile, causing her to trip and fall to the ground.

Shortly after, Uzi got up and stood over her, railgun pointed right at her to sway her away from finding a way to fight back. “I swear to Robo-god, if you say one more buzzword, I’ll do it.” she growled.

Despite the threat given to her, J merely scoffed. “You really expect me to be scared of that?” she boasted. “None of the other members of your tiger team could even give us a dent if they wanted to, so why…”

Her boasting was prematurely stopped by the rebellious girl making good on her promise, pulling the trigger and firing straight into her body. 

Once the blinding green light of the blast faded, her corpse was revealed. Her bottom half and her arms below the elbow managed to get out of the situation unscathed, but as for the rest of her, it was completely annihilated, a smoking stain replaced where it once was. Thankfully, that included the area N pointed to as to where the core was, so she won’t be bothering the Worker Drones again.

Satisfied with the outcome, Uzi grinned and spat on the stain, as a way of saying ‘Good riddance’.

As the other drones were getting back up on their feet, they heard the sounds of cheering. Looking around, they could see other Worker Drones poking their heads out from behind the containers that were scattered around the room. Some of them even came out from their hiding spots to applaud the victors of the battle. They must’ve hidden themselves there before the five had gotten there.

But Uzi still seemed to be somewhat affected by the EMP blast from earlier, as the yield sign briefly showed on her visor and some sparks danced around her as she began to fall over. Fortunately, before she hit the ground, she was picked up by N and placed atop of his shoulders. Next to him was V, her tail also her own undoing, except this time it had her tied up as if by rope. This handiwork was presumably done by the male Disassembly Drone while Uzi finished off J.

“Holy hell, you guys. That was insane!” The five heard as they began to rejoin each other. They turned to see Thad, still slightly bleeding oil and being propped up by what the others assumed was a fellow student. “And you too, uh…” he added as he noticed N next to them, justifiably a bit uncomfortable with him.

“Oh, the name’s N. Don’t worry, I’m one of the rebellious good guys now.” he said in an attempt to make himself sound cool, even going so far as to do the motions of finger guns and his visor briefly showing sunglasses in place of his eyes.

It was at this moment that Uzi noticed a familiar figure in the crowd - her father, Khan. He stepped out towards the front and was about to say something, but stopped when an object was thrown at the bottom of his feet. He looked down and saw that it was the wrench that he had given her earlier.

“Ok, I’ll admit, I made a mistake and ended up getting a lot of people killed because of it.” Uzi began. “But even then, just leaving me for dead back there- that was going too far.” She was getting very emotional here, to the point of even letting a sniffle out. However, she slapped herself as if to remind her of the edgy persona that she was meant to maintain.

Throughout all of his daughter’s speech, Khan hadn’t even attempted to speak up in order to defend himself. He knew that what he did was pretty shitty, and that Uzi was in the right for calling him out.

“I know what you’re going to say, and I’ll save you the trouble. I’m banishing myself from the colony. Can’t get anybody killed if I stay far away from them” Uzi declared solemnly. “Let’s go, guys.”

N was the first of the group to walk out, carrying Uzi with him on his shoulders as well as grabbing the captured V by her head and dragging her behind him. Sora, Tommy and Toby followed shortly afterwards, with Molly stepping out from the crowd to join them.

Khan watched as the four he believed were door inspectors left to go follow his daughter. “You’re leaving too?” he asked.

Out of the four, Tommy was the only one who stopped and turned to acknowledge the mustachioed robot. “Yeah. We want to make sure that she’s alright after what happened. It’s what any good person would’ve done.”  

Khan looked down upon hearing this, recognizing how the last part of the blonde’s sentence was targeted towards him. He would’ve also asked them what their thoughts were on his doors, but ultimately decided that now would not be that great of a time.

The seven followed the trail of bodies once more, though this time it was used to find their way out of the Outpost. As soon as they got outside of it, Sora was starting to feel some kind of pain from the bullet wounds he had obtained earlier. It was also then that he remembered that Uzi was also a victim of getting hit with bullets and still hadn’t gotten healed from it yet as did he.

Then an idea hit him. He remembered seeing Toby cast a healing spell before, maybe he could do the same. “Hey, Uzi. Could you get down for a sec?” he asked the rebellious drone. She obliged and got down from the Disassembly Drone’s shoulders.

Once she got to him, he hoisted his Keyblade up to the air, tip at the top, and tried to imagine a healing sensation. Soon, the two were enveloped in a green light, two rotating balls of light orbiting above them. Once they vanished, he looked over himself to find that where he once bled a bit of oil was now covered up, as if those spots had never been pierced by bullets at all. “Looks like I’m all patched up now.” he said.

“‘Patched up’?” Uzi repeated as she stared in confusion. “What was that?”

“Healing magic,” he explained. “I hadn’t done anything like that before, and I wanted to see if I could heal my -”

“Wait.” the purple-haired drone interrupted. “That…was magic?” Judging by her tone of voice when asking that question, her mind was blown.

“You’re just realizing this now? I know that you saw us cast at least a few fire spells.” Sora pointed out.

“I didn’t think you were using literal magic! I thought that your weapons were some sort of advanced weaponry.” she argued.

“You didn’t consider it real after you fought shadowy monsters?” Toby asked.

“To be fair, I thought that they were some form of hellish mutated life that this planet had created.” Uzi justified.

The journey back to the Corpse Spire was pretty uneventful, aside from the attempts V had made and failed at trying to escape. There weren’t even any Heartless attacks to mention. Once they got to their destination, N took the captured drone and went to place her in the landing pod, where he mentioned that there were objects there that could keep her locked up there, where she couldn’t be of harm to anyone.

As the five were waiting outside of the pod, Tommy had noticed something when looking around. Hidden next to some rubbish was a familiar looking small crystal. In fact, it looked exactly like the mysterious Gummi crystal they were given back on Joaldo Island! He went to pick it up when he thought of something. They were to check this over with someone in Traverse Town to see what it was, but Uzi here seemed to be a tech wiz, maybe she too was in some way aware of Gummi materials and could identify it.

“Hey, Uzi. Do you recognize this? I found it amongst the rubble.” he called to her as he held the crystal in the air for her to see.

The young drone walked over to the blonde to get a closer look at the object he held in his hands. “Yeah, I’ll be honest, I have no idea what the heck that thing is.” she admitted once she got close enough to Tommy to clearly see what he held.

“Well, it was worth a shot.” Tommy said, as he put the strange crystal in his pocket.

As he did, N stepped out of the Landing Pod, V no longer in tow. “So are you guys going to stay with us as well?” he asked. “If you are, I think that we’ll have to make room for you. The only place that we would have for you to sleep in right now is the Pod, and that can’t really fit the five of you.”

“Thanks, but I think we’ll be on our way now.” Toby said. “There’s probably still other places out there that need to be saved from the Heartless.”

“Do you guys really just go to different places just to help them out with the Heartless?” Uzi asked as she turned to face the world-travelers.

“Well, yeah, it’s the right thing to do, isn’t it?” Sora answered.

“Geez, you really are the virtuous types, huh?” Uzi snarked.

“Yeah, we are. Wasn’t that why you wanted to stop the Disassembly Drones in the first place, to save the world?” The spiky-haired kid asked in confusion.

“Yeah, but that wasn’t because I have high morals like you do. It was just that everybody back at the Outpost would rather be cowards than deal with them, and I just wanted to beat them so I could rub it in their faces.” she said, before she looked off to the side. “And look how that turned out.” she regretted to herself in a whisper.

It was then that another source of light had made themselves known to the seven. One that felt a lot more different than the moonlight that had shown in. They turned to see where the source came from and they saw that on one of the walls of the Corpse Spire’s interior was a bright light in the shape of a keyhole, just like the one found in the Sweet Jazz City Museum.

The Keyblade materialized in Sora’s hand, and pointed itself towards the keyhole just like last time, though now the movement was more natural and less like the weapon was jerking the boy around. It fired a beam towards it and once it hit, a click was heard before it vanished, as if it was never there at all.

“...So, what was the point of that?” Uzi questioned, after looking around and seeing that to her knowledge, nothing seemed to be different after Sora locked that weird Keyhole thing.

“I’m not so certain of that myself.” The spiky-haired brunette admitted. “But I think it’s meant to be something good.” It had to be. In all the words they had visited, these keyholes had only appeared twice and each were after they beat a major source of darkness in that world; Mera in Sweet Jazz City and J here.

“Are there any other magic stuff you have to do before you head out?” N checked.

“I don’t think so, but there is something I want to ask that hopefully you know the answer to.” Toby said. “Back before we fought J and V, J, she mentioned the Heartless by name.”

“Of course she would, that’s what they’re called.” the drone in the pilot’s cap said, not understanding why Toby would be confused by this.

“I know, but here’s the thing. The Heartless aren’t something that people just know about.” the New L’manbergian explained. “Usually, people don’t even know what they are unless someone who already knows tells them. But from what I know, me, Sora, Tommy, Molly and Uzi were the only ones in the nearby area that knew of them and I don’t remember any of us mentioning their name to you, V or J so someone else must’ve told you about them. Who was it?”

Upon hearing this, Sora, Tommy and Molly looked at each other with a concerned look dotting the three’s faces. Toby was right, the inhabitants of the other worlds they had visited didn’t know what the Heartless were, with the three having to be the ones to explain it in the end. The only world where that wasn’t the case was in Traverse Town, where they were the ones being told about them by Scythe and his friends. That leaves the question, why would someone tell J about the Heartless?

“Well, we first met the Heartless about a couple of months ago, they were just lurking around our usual hunting spots at the time.” N began. “Once we reconvened back here that day, there was someone else waiting there - a woman we’d never seen before.”

“Wait - a Worker Drone went out of the Outpost, into your corpse house and told you about the Heartless?” asked Uzi for clarification. All of the Worker Drones that she knew of - besides Sora, Tommy and Toby - were cowardly and would’ve rather stayed behind her father’s doors then willingly face the Disassembly Drones, so one of them willingly coming over on what was seemingly her own terms was strange to her.

“That’s the strange thing though, she wasn’t a drone of any kind!” he continued. “She was human, or at least she looked like one. Wasn’t wearing any protective gear or anything!”

That tidbit was what really got the five Worker Drone’s attentions. “But I thought humans weren’t able to survive in this kind of environment.” Molly pointed out.

“She might’ve had something to protect her against the atmosphere, but judging by the pale skin, purple veins, and heavy breathing she displayed, I think it might not’ve been that good for her.” N said.

“What did she mention about the Heartless?” The robot in the green suit asked, trying to get back on topic.

“Oh right! Well, she told us that she would be able to grant us the power to control them for our own purposes, but only if we, or rather specifically J, agreed to join her.” The drone in the pilot cap explained. “J ended up refusing the offer, because she’s so dedicated to JCJenson that she didn’t want any assets or help from what she deemed to be a third party organization. The woman ended up leaving after that, but the Heartless stayed. They always seemed to spawn in areas that we went to on our hunts.”

“Maybe they went after you for refusing to join her.” Molly contemplated. She knew from what Sora had told her that the Heartless usually went after those who had darkness in their hearts, and a trio of robots with murderous intent would have a lot of darkness in their hearts. It could explain why she never saw any of them within the Outpost until it became open for the Disassembly Drones as well.

“This woman, did she at least give you her name or anything about her identity?” Toby asked.

“Yeah, she did in fact.” N answered, before stopping to think. “What did she call herself again? I know for a fact that it was something witchy… Oh right, Salem! She said her name was Salem. Why, have you guys heard of her before?”

“No, this is our first time hearing of her.” Sora admitted, hands behind his head. Though now that he was thinking about it, maybe Scythe and the others would know about her, given that they were also the ones who told them about the Heartless as well as a little bit about the Keyblade.

“Well, that’s all we have to ask, so I guess we’ll be on our way.” Toby said.

“Oh, okay then. Bye!” N said, waving enthusiastically as the four began to leave the Corpse Spire. Uzi also gave a goodbye wave, though it was much more subdued than the one her partner gave.

Sora made sure to give one last look at them before leaving, feeling a sense of melancholy. Yes, they had succeeded in beating the Disassembly Drones, but now Uzi was banished, forced to live outside of the home she once knew. It kind of reminded him of what happened to him when Destiny Islands were destroyed.

At least she seemed to be somewhat happy in the situation she was in. Hopefully, she would be able to take care of herself out here.

“So do you guys remember where the ship crashed? Maybe it’s ready now.” Molly asked, making sure that she and the others were a good distance away from the spire before she did so.

“I think I do.” Tommy admitted, before pointing somewhere towards his left in front of him. “I believe it was somewhere over there.”

“Yeah, that seems about right.” Toby added, as he and Tommy set off in the direction where the blonde had pointed at.

Sora and Molly followed the two New L’mambergians for a while, hoping that the two really remembered where their ship had crashed and they wouldn’t end up lost. Their fears seemed to be proven true when the two stopped while the Highwind was nowhere in sight.

“But it was supposed to be here…” Tommy muttered as both he and Toby looked around in disbelief at where the Gummi Ship should’ve been.

“Are you sure you didn’t crash somewhere else?” inquired Sora.

“No, it was here…” The brunette in the green suit argued as he pointed to areas on the snowy ground where something big had touched down. “See? That is proof that it was here.”

As the blonde looked at where Toby was pointing, he noticed that something was present where the ship once was. “Hey, that’s the thing that teleports us to the Highwind!” he pointed out.

The other three looked at the spot that Tommy was referring to and saw that there was indeed one of the green beacons present. The ones that usually appear while the Highwind was off-world.

“Wait, does that mean he took off already!?” asked Tommy as he realized what the appearance of the green spot meant. If the ship had already taken off, then that must’ve meant that it had fully healed itself by this point, but couldn’t Sam have waited for them to get here before he left?

“It’s unlikely that he would have left without us.” Toby reassured his companion. “He’s probably just waiting for us and didn’t want to be stuck here more than necessary. If he left us, then there wouldn’t be a beacon waiting here.” 

“Well, let’s get going.” Molly said. “Sam probably has gotten lonely, especially since he doesn’t have me to talk to.”

“Wait, you two talk with each other?” Sora asked the chronicler, one digital eyebrow raised.

“Of course. I need something to pass the time while you guys have your adventures in other worlds.” she explained, before cheekily adding “What, did you think I just sit around and watch what you guys do?”

And with that, the group stepped onto the beacon, and once again were whisked from a world without witness.

- - -

“What drew the Heartless to that world?” That was the question a majority of the people in the dark room on another world had, the pale man just happened to ask it first. Usually, the Heartless were sent to a world for two reasons; to find the World’s Keyhole or anything else, or because one of the Council members resided there. But none of them came from Copper Nine, nor did it seem that they were looking for anything there as they were just roaming and taking hearts. Someone in that world must’ve drawn them in without realizing it with their darkness.

The vampiric woman shrugged. “Dunno. Though I’d say that the robot in the pigtails lured them there.” As she said this, the image projected on the Seer changed from showing Sora, Tommy, Toby and Molly to the corpse of Serial Designation J, still lying there on the ground. “Her pride and obsession to please her company would’ve made the perfect bait.”

“Now, I wouldn’t be so certain that that is the case.” Niklaus chuckled. “It is true that the Heartless go after hearts with darkness in them, but they can obey hearts of those with strong darkness - that’s why Salem can control them. If they were diverted there by the robot, she must’ve had a darkness stronger than her. If that were true, then she would’ve easily wiped the floor with them. There must’ve been something else lurking there that drew them in instead.”

The egg in the fez scoffed. “Well, it’s not like any of that matters now, the Keyhole of that world has already been sealed. Personally, I’m glad that she refused to join us. She would’ve been nothing but dead weight anyway.”

“But that still leaves the problem of another Keyhole out of our grasp.” the woman with her hair in a bun pointed out. “Sure, he’s only made a little progress against us so far, but if we don’t do something to push back, then he’ll eventually overtake us in no time.”

“Worry not,” Salem spoke. “He doesn’t know this yet, but we have an edge against him. After all, we have one of his friends here.”

“Of course, the boy - Riku, I believe his name was.” Niklaus added.

“I believe that Riku can be a valuable asset to us,” Salem continued. “All we need to do is turn him against his friend.” A smile began to creep up her face. “And I know just how to do it.”

Chapter Text

STORY:

COPPER NINE

Sora and Toby fought over disagreements on how they should handle going to other worlds, in the process causing the Highwind to crash into Copper Nine. The ship’s inhabitants ended up getting separated, with me and Sora in one group and Tommy and Toby in another. I was thankful that I quickly grabbed an A.T.L.A.S. device before we crashed, because Copper Nine had an environment toxic to humans, with the device turning us into robots in order to survive. We both ended up meeting each other again at Outpost 3, where we also encountered Uzi Doorman.

Uzi was building a weapon to deal with the Disassembly Drones sent to destroy her people and needed one last piece before it was complete, which happened to be located in the lair of the murderous drones. Sora, Tommy, and Toby followed her to the lair, a spire of corpses, while I remained at the Outpost. While recovering the piece, they encountered N, a member of the Disassembly Drones and tricked him into thinking that they were also Disassembly Drones before making their getaway.

They made their way back to the Outpost, but was unfortunately followed by N and his colleagues, the manic V and the corporate obsessed J, and accidently let them into the Outpost. N was betrayed by J and V for questioning orders and ended up joining Uzi's side. Together, they were able to kill J and capture V. However, despite this victory, Uzi had to be banished from the Outpost due to her actions causing several deaths. With no place left to go, Uzi and the others went back to the Corpse Spire. There, Sora found another mysterious Keyhole and an unusual gummi block.

CHARACTER ENTRIES:

Uzi Doorman

A young Worker Drone who is for all things rebellious. Sick at how her people would rather hide than fight the danger threatening them, she made her own weapon in order to combat against them herself. Her actions unfortunately were at the expense of the lives of several Worker Drones, so she banished herself to make sure she wouldn't hurt anyone else at the Outpost.

She challenged the status quo in "MURDER DRONES - Episode 1: PILOT" (GLITCH - 2021)

Serial Designation N

One of the three Disassembly Drones designed to destroy the robot settlement on Copper Nine. Out of the three, he is the most friendly and polite out of them. He was willing to put up with the abuse that his companions had given him out of kindness, but Uzi and Sora managed to convince him to stand up against them.

He was ready to do anything in "MURDER DRONES - Episode 1: PILOT" (GLITCH - 2021)

Thad

First KHY Appearance: Y-1 Chapter 14: A Winter Wasteland (Chapter 14 Overall)

One of Uzi’s classmates. A fan of all things sporty, he’s the only one of his peers willing to hang out and support her.

He took the lead in “MURDER DRONES - Episode 1: PILOT” (GLITCH - 2021)

Khan Doorman

First KHY Appearance: Y-1 Chapter 14: A Winter Wasteland (Chapter 14 Overall)

Uzi’s father and leader of the Worker Defense Force. Despite being the leader of such a force, he would rather hide behind the doors he obsesses over rather than take an offensive action.

He guarded the doors in “MURDER DRONES - Episode 1: PILOT” (GLITCH - 2021)

Serial Designation J

First KHY Appearance: Y-1 Chapter 15: Murder Drones (Chapter 15 Overall)

The leader of the three Disassembly Drones. She is obsessed with her work, to the point of unending loyalty for the company she works for and even sprinkling in some corporate lingo in what she says. She uses her leadership as an excuse to lord over those below her, something that eventually led to her demise.

She worked her way on screen in “MURDER DRONES - Episode 1: PILOT” (GLITCH - 2021)

Serial Designation V

First KHY Appearance: Y-1 Chapter 15: Murder Drones (Chapter 15 Overall)

The most murderous out of the three Disassembly Drones. N had a crush on her, something of which she dealt with by pretending to not know who he was. She ended up being detained by the same drone she tried to ignore.

She slashed her way on screen in “MURDER DRONES - Episode 1: PILOT” (GLITCH - 2021)

HEARTLESS:

Search Ghost

First KHY Appearance: Y-1 Chapter 14: A Winter Wasteland (Chapter 14 Overall)

Heartless that take the appearances of ghosts. They roam in dark areas and emit light from their eye to target their enemies. They can warp from one place to another.

They scoped the area in “Kingdom Hearts” (Disney - 2002)

Winterhorn

First KHY Appearance: Y-1 Chapter 14: A Winter Wasteland (Chapter 14 Overall)

A buck that chucks ice as it leaps and bounds. Fire magic will blast those frosty antlers clean off, making the fight against them a lot easier. Just don’t cast Blizzard at them afterwards, or they will regrow them back.

They dashed through the snow in “Kingdom Hearts III” (Disney - 2019)