The Key That the Jailer Threw Away
Greeting fellow fan-fic writers. This is elcid009 starting work on my new full length story and glad to be back writing. I got hired onto a second catering company for the holidays and they assured me that they were booked through December. So it looks like I'll have plenty of work from now on. I HATE being broke during the holidays so now that I'm in a good mood I feel the time has begun to start work on my new story. Kingdom Hearts crossover with Darkwing Duck.
Prologue
Roxas marched into the gathering hall as usual. He knew he had another mission to do and without hesitation marched straight towards Saix. He was starting to feel a little at home here in the Organization at last. Though he often wondered about the lost members; what had happened at Castle Oblivion? Why had so many members suddenly died? And what was Axel's part in all this. Axel still refused to answer any questions he had about the events surrounding Castle Oblivion no matter how many times Roxas asked.
"Ah good to see you Roxas," came Saix' mellow voice, "You and Xion will be on a mission together today, do you understand?"
"Yes sir," came Roxas's reply
"We're sending you two to investigate a new world," continued Saix, "we weren't originally even going to try this world but decided to send you two and see if it was worth exploring. Don't forget to conduct a through investigation."
"We'll do our best," said Xion, as she entered the room.
Roxas stretched out his hand and opened a portal and both he and Xion stepped through.
The world they emerged into was unlike any they had ever seen. It took Roxas a moment to realize that he was standing upon a massive suspension bridge. The bridge lead into a massive downtown looking area. The city looked alive and busy and its sight was enticing to the two young teens. It also seemed as though it was nighttime
"Wow," exclaimed Xion, "This place looks great, I've never been to a place like this before."
"Yeah I know," said Roxas, "This world looks different from all the other ones we've been to."
"I guess we better get going," said Xion, "we've got a big city to cover."
"Hey why don't we split up?" suggested Roxas, "we can cover more ground that way. We'll meet back here at the bridge when we're done."
With that the two went their separate ways to explore the great city.
Roxas saw many remarkable things as he explored the city, but one of the most remarkable had to be a large greenhouse the happened upon. The greenhouse was exceptionally big and seemed to house a number of interesting and unknown plants inside it. Cautiously he stepped inside to have a better look around.
"Oh my beauteous flowers," said a voice, "You're the only ones who understand me,"
Roxas peaked out from behind some bushes, and almost didn't believe his eyes. He was looking at what looked like a large walking plant. It was light green and had a beak for a mouth and roots for feet; its head was topped off with purple plant like bushes. The thing was pacing back and forth in front of a table with several potions talking to what looked like potted flowers.
"Ever since I turned into a walking plant I've been lonely," said the thing, "I've tried to fill my life with other things but nothing seems to work. Sigh my heart aches for a companion."
Roxas continued to watch the thing in earnest still not exactly sure what it was. The plant-like thing continued to talk to itself.
"I once tried growing my own bride, but that didn't work out so much. But you know what they say back to the drawing board. No reason I can't try again and this time get it right. Right Spike?"
Roxas turned his head to see another strange creature enter the greenhouse; this one looked like a giant kind of Venus-fly trap. It was also standing on roots and had mop of red leaves for hair. But it seemed in character to act more like a dog.
"The only thing is I'll need a large amount of electricity to make this work properly, and my last battle with that dratted Darkwing Duck damaged my generator. It will take a long time to fix, if only there was a way to fix it faster. What do you think Spike?"
The creature that looked like a Venus-fly trap began sniffing the air and suddenly began growling. Then in a sudden move it pointed straight towards the area where Roxas was hiding and jumped into the bushes. In the next instant there was a small struggle and Roxas was ejected from his hiding place and landed at the feet of the green plant thing.
"What have we here?" asked the plant thing, "looks like an intruder to me."
Roxas quickly stood up on his feet and drew out his key-blade. "Who are you?" he demanded
"My name is Bushroot," said the plant thing, "but it hardly matters since it will be the last thing you hear, get 'em Spike!"
[As always all fights will be detailed in the Appendix section; this one however is a bit special since it would take place in the game "358/2 Days" so think of the fighting style as that]
The creature began attacking as it tried to bite Roxas with its huge jaws. Roxas did his best to counter these attacks and landed blow after blow on the creature. The key-blade strikes continued as did the sounds of snarling bites. Finally it seemed as though the creature had bitten too deep and inflicted a grave wound upon Roxas. But this also had the effect of pushing him into his Limit territory. Summoning all of his inner strength Roxas activated his Limit attack. Roxas began to glow white as he felt the strength gather inside him. His blows were now twice as powerful and twice as faster than Spike could hope to dodge. It looked as though he was finally able to turn the tide on Spike defeating him.
"My Spike!" cried Bushroot, "what have you done? I'll get you for this!"
Roxas would have normally stayed and fought but he was too weak after his battle with Spike, so instead he ran back. He figured he had best leave this world even if his investigation wasn't complete. He was running for a long time before he returned to the bridge and saw that Xion was there too. It appeared as though she also was running from something.
"Roxas!" she declared, "Thank-goodness you're here, we've got to go!"
"What happened?" asked Roxas
"No time to explain," she replied seizing his hand, "let's just say I was seen by someone and now they're after me. I didn't get a chance to finish the investigation. What happened to you?"
"Same thing," said Roxas, "we'd better head for the portal and get out of here!"
Finally they found the bridge and on it was the portal they'd used to get here. It was just as well for Bushroot was still chasing Roxas. As they headed for the portal Roxas caught a glimpse of the person who was chasing Xion.
He looked a little bit like a dog, though he was standing upright. He was wearing the strangest uniform that Roxas had ever seen with a pattern of yellow and blue. Also on his person were a bunch of unusual devices. It looked like he was wearing a battery on his back and a large electrical plug on his head.
"Stop you girl," shouted the other stranger in a somewhat raspy voice, "I'll get you."
Roxas and Xion had just reached the portal in time and quickly disappeared inside leaving a very confused pair of pursuers.
"Megavolt, is that you?" asked Bushroot, finally identifying the other by name.
"Yeah it's me," he replied, "I was over at the power plant sucking up energy when I noticed that girl in black spying on me."
"The boy with the orange hair was spying on me," said Bushroot, "but I don't know who he was? Did you recognize the girl?"
"No I didn't," said Megavolt, "but there was something off about them. I can't explain it but I feel that they weren't from around here."
"They both looked kind of young, and they were both dressed in the same clothes," observed Bushroot, "I don't know who they were but we should definitely keep an eye for them in the future. By the way did you say you were sucking up power?"
"Oh yeah I was," said Megavolt, "you know me I like to be fully charged, what were you up to?"
Bushroot paused for a few seconds before answering, "You know why don't you come back to my place and we can talk some more."
"So both of you managed to be seen and were chased out of that world were you?" came Saix's voice. His voice was still soft but there was no mistaking the anger that was in it.
"It's not like we planned for that to happen," said Roxas in defense, "things just kind of got out of control."
"You are not supposed to be seen and you are not supposed to interfere with things in the worlds," snapped Saix, "please tell me that your exploration was at least fruitful. Did you fully explore the place?"
"We-we-we didn't get a chance to study everything since we were interrupted," stammered Xion, "but if you give us another chance—"
"Silence!" interrupted Saix, "I see that even a simple exploration mission is too difficult for you two, and Roxas I expected more from you."
"Chill out dude," came a voice from across the room, "So they bungled a mission, who cares? It's not like that world was even that important anyway. We've got enough things going on in other worlds that we can afford to lose one."
"As always your opinion is appreciated, Xigbar," replied Saix with a touch of sarcasm. "The point," he continued, "is not whether or not that world is usable to us, but what kind of world is it and more importantly were there heartless in it?"
"Well now that you mention it" began Roxas, "there were no heartless in that world."
Saix now turned to face Roxas and was staring very deeply into his eyes. "You're sure about that?" he asked with concern.
"Yeah Roxas is right," chimed in Xion, "I didn't see any heartless there either. We were both around in that world long enough to know that there were no heartless. So there's really no point in going back there and I guess maybe us getting caught wasn't such a bad thing after all."
Saix considered this news for awhile making Roxas and Xion more worried about their possible fate. Finally he spoke, "if that is the case then perhaps loosing that world is not so big a loss. Still your actions were very foolish and could have had serious ramifications if we had to go back to that world."
"Why don't I look after them for awhile?" volunteered Axel who quickly got up from the couch. "I'm sure these two meant well but maybe they need just a little more seasoning before you take them out of the oven."
"I will report your actions to the Superior," concluded Saix, "You can take the next day off and do whatever you like while we figure out how to proceed from here. Though it is looking very likely that we will have no further contact with that world understand?"
Roxas and Xion both nodded their understanding.
"Very well get out of here then," barked Saix, and Xion, Roxas, and Axel quickly left the room.
Axel, Roxas, and Xion had taken to their usual spot on the clock-tower to eat their ice cream. It had been a rough day but the fact that they were together here had finally allowed them to relax and unwind.
"Boy you two were almost in big trouble there," said Axel, "I thought Saix was gonna march you straight to Xemnas and make you beg for forgiveness."
"This day sure was a bit touch and go," remarked Roxas, "I don't know what happened but I guess I was off my game today."
"Well you weren't the only one," laughed Axel, "what's your excuse Xion?"
Xion didn't respond, instead she just half-heartedly licked her ice cream and just kept starring down at her feet.
"What's wrong Xion?" asked Axel somewhat more concerned
:"I-I-I lied to them," she admitted
"What do you mean?" asked Roxas, "what did you lie about?"
"When Saix asked me about the heartless I told him there were none but that wasn't true," confessed Xion, "I saw some."
"What?" stammered Roxas, "where? Because I wasn't lying when I said I didn't see any. I actually didn't."
"That man with the weird suit," began Xion, "the one that had the plug on his head he was controlling them, I saw it. When I was spying on him he was draining power out of a power plant and began laughing manically. Then suddenly the heartless started appearing next to him. They looked like some kind of electric heartless. Even that guy seemed surprised at their appearance. I was so surprised I gasped and he heard me, that's what caused him to start chasing me."
"It sounds to me," said Axel, "that this was likely the first time heartless had been introduced in that world. Somehow that guy had given into his heart's desire for evil and it was that desire that summoned the heartless to him. You said he looked confused, I'll bet that was his first time ever seeing them, he probably doesn't even know how to control the things."
"I wasn't lying when I said I saw no heartless," said Roxas, "I did see this weird plant like thing that talked to itself it said something about being lonely and had a weird sort of pet. I guess the pet was able to find me. That's why I got chased. But all the time looking around his place I saw no heartless."
"Don't worry about it," said Axel, "Now that the Organization's decided not to go back to that world I doubt they ever would. It's like Xigbar said, we've got other more important things to worry about."
"That's too bad," replied Roxas, "I would have liked to explore that world a bit more, but if we don't have to worry about it then I guess it's for the better."
"Yeah," agreed Xion, "maybe someday if we get another vacation we can go back to that world and just hang out. By the way Roxas, do you remember what that world was called?"
"Oh yeah," said Roxas, "Saix told me this morning….I think it was called…..Saint Canard."