Hello! Welcome to the first chapter!—the one before it was only the prologue to this story. Please review when you are done reading.

Chapter 1 – Close Encounters

Sitara sighed for what seemed like the twelfth time that day. Most of the classes so far had been extremely boring and the fact that there was going to be a fire drill in 7th period of that day barely even perked my interest. Well, at least her friend Kari was going to be with her when it happens. That was something to look forward to.

Sitara was walking towards her class while pushing through the crowds when she felt a strange sensation nearby. It was the feeling of something dangerous was close by, but when I twisted around to glance around me, there was nothing but the teenagers pushing around me, hurrying to their classes, or just hanging around in the halls. Sitara turned back to continue on, but the sense of foreboding remained.


"Hey Riku," Sora asked when they were inside the Gummi Ship. "Why do you think that the King wanted us to come back to Disney Castle?"

"No idea." Riku replied as he was checking out the instruments in the ship as it flew away from their home world, Destiny Islands. "It's possible that there is some kind of danger that he wants our help to take care of."

"Hmm…" Sora thought about this as he crossed his arms and lowered his head with eyes closed. Suddenly, a red light above the two started flashing erratically as a loud buzzing filled the ship. Sora's eyes popped open instantly as he looked around in confusion. "What's going on?" He immediately started to push buttons to see what was wrong. Unfortunately though, he didn't remember what each button did and ended up making the situation worse. When the fire extinguisher had activated and started spraying the entire place, Sora became flustered and exclaimed, "Darn it, if only Donald and Goofy were here…"

Riku, who was luckily out of the whole scenario that was taking place, smirked as he went past Sora and pressed a simple metal switch that was conspicuously right above Sora's head. The only thing that remained was the constant buzzing and the flashing light that started it all. "Donald and Goofy are with the King still. This ship was left behind for us if the occasion should ever arrive that we needed to go somewhere by ourselves." Riku reminded Sora nonchalantly. Then he added with a grin, "You're still such a total sap." He chuckled as Sora playfully punched him in the arm at that remark.

"Oh yeah?" Sora taunted. Then the grin was wiped from his face as the both of them felt the Gummi Ship tremble violently. They looked out the dome window just to find an extremely large wormhole bearing down at the ship.

Riku's eyes narrowed at the sight as he growled, "I sense a strong darkness forming within there…" He glanced back at Sora. "We need to check it out now."

"What about-"

Riku silenced Sora with just one look. "It's too late to pull out from the force anyways, so we might as well go with the flow." He added silently.


The class went by slowly as Sitara patiently waited with Kari for the signal for the drill. She was sitting in the computer lab and doing a Digital Graphics project for her class. She paused to take a quick break and stretched out her arms, as well as look around the room. The room itself seemed large, especially when there were dozens of computers arranged on desks by long and neat rows. Sitara's computer rested in the way back of the room, while her friend's computer.

Sitara felt the roof of her mouth with her tongue. The tongue stuck as if it was glued there. It was obvious that she needed to get a drink of water badly. She sighed as she stood up and grabbed the pass for going into the hallways, just to get a drink.

When I was about a foot away from the door, the power suddenly blinked off. Half of the class cheered for having a reason to not do their work, as the other half ( Kari was one of these people) was either in shock for losing all their hard earned work or starting to freak out at the sudden change of environment. The teacher himself was trying to restore order to the classroom, but was failing miserably.

Sitara glanced around as she realized that it wasn't just the power failure that made the room dark as night – but the halls outside the room were dark as well. Aren't there usually some emergency lights that go on around this time? She wondered to herself absent-mindedly as she stared at the few teachers and students rushing past the classroom.

Then a loud voice rang out over all the commotion. "Hey, what are the computers doing?"

This apparently caught our classroom's attention considering how deathly quiet it got in that moment. Sitara turned and gawked at the sight. The computers were flickering on and off crazily with considerable speed. She edged closer to a computer that had no student sitting in front of it and she saw as the computer turned on again, some familiar pictures and words, Such as 'Lea' and 'Axel'.

Hmm, that sounds awfully… familiar… Sitara thought to herself as the computer went through some more data as it blinked on and off again. Without warning, the computers stopped on a strange symbol and stayed on. Sitara was thinking how familiar it seemed as well, when suddenly there was a sound that caught my attention: the sound of air whooshing ominously. At that moment, the lights flickered back on just to reveal twelve new, yet oddly familiar, hooded forms scattered in the room.

At first, nothing happened as it stayed silent for a few minutes. Then, a new definition of pandemonium broke out: People screaming incoherent things, everyone scrambling in every direction just to get away, and a few foolhardy teens started picking up the chairs in the room and started throwing them at the figures. Smartly thinking, Sitara grabbed Kari and managed to open the door silently from behind her and sidled out of the room with her friend before anyone else could have noticed that they left. She stepped back a few steps from the door, and when no one stopped her, she ran away with Kari as fast as she could.

That symbol definitely means something. Sitara thought to herself determinedly as she rushed into a nearby girl's restroom. She paused with Kari at the sinks to try to catch their breaths. Then it hit her like a tidal wave. That symbol was familiar. Three pointed sides at the top with a connected upside-down heart at the bottom. And the name 'Axel' was definitely familiar…

Sitara just hoped that she was completely wrong about this.


The twelve forms stood there observing the commotion in the room when one of the forms spoke. "How are we even alive now? And why are we here?"

Another one shook his covered head. "Calm down No. IV. I'm sure we'll figure out soon enough."

The students and the teacher finally had the sense to exit the room through the door, and before long, the room was empty of them. The figures muttered amongst themselves silently as they slowly absorbed the scenery around them.

Then, one of the figures stepped forward and addressed another that was standing in the very back of the room. "Superior, I smelled a couple of people a few minutes ago that both had an unusual power."

Everyone in the group turned to the figure with some slight interest. The person addressed replied slowly in a deep voice. "Oh? And what would that be No. VI?"

The said figure put a hand near the mouth of the hood as he thought about it. "I'm not exactly sure, but I have a feeling that it would be quite essential to us for the restoration of Kingdom Hearts." There was increased chattering at this comment.

"Very well then…" The one mentioned as Superior said. "Bring this person you speak of back here."

The others muttered in agreement. Black portals appeared one by one as the cloaked figures disappeared into them. When the last portal faded, everyone was gone, save the leader.

"And so it begins again… Sora." He spoke quietly to no one.


"What is this place? It's huge!" Sora exclaimed as he gawked at the scenery below the ship that appeared after they entered the black wormhole. It was a world that he, nor Riku, never seen before. It was larger than the worlds they been to. And also, for some reason, seemed more… complete than the other worlds.

As the ship flew into the atmosphere, Riku felt hesitant. "I don't know but this feeling of darkness is getting more familiar to me…" Riku paused. Why is it familiar to me? He thought uneasily. He glanced at the world below and pointed at a place. "It's coming from over there."

"Alright then." Sora stated as he grabbed the handle and twisted the ship towards that direction. He had started at a cruising pace but when he glanced behind himself, he increased the speed sharply.

"What are you doing Sora?" Riku managed to shout out to his friend. "We're going to crash at this rate!"

"We got company!" Sora yelled back.

Riku's eyes widened as he twisted around in his chair and saw two large fast flying objects closing in on the ship fast. They looked similar to the Gummi ship, but for the simple grey color and sleekness of them. They split off from each other and went on either side of the ship as they came in closer. When they were level with the ship, Riku could see the figure inside one of them. The figure looked like it had a round helmet on the head, a pair of big and thick goggles over the eyes, and a large mask over the mouth that had a thick tube hanging from it. It seemed that the figure was trying to indicate something, but Riku couldn't make it out.

"We need to get away from them, Sora." Riku said as he spun back into his chair the right way and faced ahead. "I don't know what they want, but we can't stick around and find out what."

"Ok then, hold on tight!" Sora dipped the nose of the ship down sharply. The two similar shapes obviously did not expect this turn of events when they shot past where the Gummi ship had been a few seconds ago. But then they turned around in the distance and four small objects hurdled from the two and at the Gummi ship that was still flying down towards the world.

"I didn't know they had heat-seeking missiles here." Sora said as he turned his head to watch the missiles curve towards the ship and zoomed even closer.

"We don't know a lot of things about this world." Riku retorted as he reached over and yanked the controls from Sora's grip. "But that doesn't mean that we have to find out the hard way." He moved the control handles around a bit and the Gummi ship obediently turned and twisted around the moving missiles and headed towards the two larger objects that were zipping towards the ship at an incredible rate. The ship dove right above the two and the missiles that were following the ship found two different sources of heat and headed straight at the two.

The resulting action caused the ship to shake considerably hard. "Well, that takes care of that. Riku said, dryly amused.

"Yeah, at least those people that were inside those strange machines came out alright." Sora replied as he looked back and saw a couple pieces of fabric flew out from the falling forms; they ballooned outwards and slowed their descent to the distant ground.

The two friends watched for a minute more before Riku said quietly, "Let's go before more of those things show up." Sora nodded in agreement, then took back the flying controls and resumed their course.


"This is so not happening to us." Sitara groaned as she snuck a peek at a couple of those dark forms that went right past her hiding place that was in a different bathroom. It has been at least 15 minutes since the incident and already the halls were in utter chaos. She ducked back into the bathroom when one of the cloaked people happened to turned in her direction. "This is so stupid. We can't hide in this bathroom forever! They will surely figure out that much!"

Kari had been silent since the incident, but now she spoke up. "Sitara, you need to be quieter or you'll get us both caught."

Sitara was barely even aware of the fact that she started yelling out loud, until she heard Kari speak. But the damage was already done. A voice called out from beyond the door, "Who's in there?"

Kari's mouth twisted into a small smile. "See what I mean?"

Sitara clamped her mouth tightly with her hands and silently cursed herself for making so much noise in the first place. Luckily, Kari was the only person in the bathroom with her as she quickly locked the door. Her eyes flew all over the place hoping for a way out, but the only thing she found was a loose vent over one of the stalls. She knew that even if she did attempt to try it, she would just get caught first considering that the person was right at the door, banging on it loudly.

Sitara bit her lip as she knew her time was running out and she needed to do something quickly. A plan was forming in the back of her head as her eyes rested on the sinks that were nearby and a metal pole that was laying on the ground for some strange reason. Sitara started grinning a little.

"Hey Kari, I need you to help me with something." Se said as she thought, it just might work…


"Who's in there I say?" The cloaked person shouted as he tried to force his way in through the door. The door was locked, however.

"Are you crazy No. IV? Can you not see the sign on the front of the door?" Screeched the cloaked female who was with him. As far as she was concerned, it was the ultimate sin for a guy to break into a girl's bathroom. She pushed the other person out of the way and placed herself in front of the door as she said, "Let me take care of this you idiot. Do not interfere." She created a portal to the inside of the restroom and stepped through it. When she reached the other side however, the place was pooling with water. "What the heck happened here?" she said out loud to herself as she looked around. She suddenly heard something behind her, but as she tried to turn around, she slipped and blacked out when her head hit the ground.


Sitara blinked as what happened slowly sank in. The metal bar that she was holding slowly lowered to the ground, but still was within grasp. "Well…" She said hesitantly as she prodded the figure's side. It looked like she was out cold. "That was simple." Kari came out from the stall nearest to Sitara. Her plan was to knock out the first person that came in through the door with the pole, but that changed when the person actually used a portal instead. The result: Kari made the merest sound and the girl slipped and hit her head.

Sitara glanced towards the door. "W really should be going now." She muttered quietly. The watery mess (that she and Kari created by overflowing the sinks) was only meant to slow down the people that came after them. She hoisted herself on top of the stall's wall, took off the vent's cover, and lifted herself into the gaping hole. Then she helped up Kari to the vent. She made sure to bring up the metal pole (to have some defense with) and the vent cover. As Sitara finished placing the cover back over the spot, she saw that another black portal had opened up and another figure appeared. The person appeared to have noticed the fallen girl, for Sitara heard him mutter as she crawled away, "You wanted to do things your way and this is how you end up."

Moving around in the vents quietly was not as easy as some movies made it out to be. Plenty of dust and dry webs hung all over the place, making it almost impossible to breathe in without sneezing. Several times she and Kari had past dead/alive bugs and mice and even bones and droppings. It was almost as unsanitary as the sewer that Sitara imagined to herself at times.

They both ran into many crossroads while they shuffled around in the vents, but she managed so far as to not run into dead ends. However, their luck of that ran out when Sitara (in the lead) found herself facing a metal wall. She sighed as she looked through the vent that was below the wall. Sitara knew that if she went back, she would risk getting them both lost. But then she realized that the room she was over was the now empty attendance office, which was fortunately nearest to the front doors.

She was about to have a little celebration for the stroke of luck, when a voice crashed it. "I still don't understand. Why are we looking for this person?"

"Because she may be essential to our plans Axel, even if you are a traitor."

"That isn't a good enough answer, Saïx!"

Saïx… Axel…Suddenly Sitara realized that she was right in thinking that she knew who these cloaked people were: Organization XIII.

Suddenly, there was a rumbling noise in the air, and the school started to literally shake in it's own foundation.