Disclaimer: I do not own Kingdom Hearts.
A/N: Okay, so this is Chapter 1. The real story starts from here.
Chapt 1: War
The normally empty battleground was filled with people. The army of brightly armored people faced an army of pale creatures, led by people in black cloaks, whose faces were hidden by the hoods over their heads.
Amongst the brightly armored soldiers, two boys, with blond and brown hair sticking out in every direction, were talking to each other in low tones, heads bent in conspiracy.
"Roxas! Sora!" The twins straightened and looked to the front at the sound of their names. Their combat teacher, Leon, was looking at them with frustration. The twins were the best fighters in his class. However, they barely paid attention in class unless it involved whacking others. "Stop talking for once in your lives won't you? This is a war, not one of our out-of-classroom lessons."
Leon sighed and closed his eyes as the boys shut their mouths obediently but passed mischievous looks between themselves. He hoped they wouldn't get themselves killed during their first battle. They were only sixteen for goodness sake. The same went for the rest of the class he was teaching. They were all here, amongst the troops, wide-eyed and nervous.
Except for the twins. They were acting as if they did this everyday.
Please God, thought Leon, looking heavenward, or whoever is up there. Don't let this bunch of feckless twerps- I mean, er… Young warriors die during their first battle.
Looking back at the twins after his silent prayer, he saw that they were casually summoning their weapons.
Roxas held two beautifully made keyblades, Oathkeeper and Oblivion. Beside him, Sora was holding a keyblade of his own, every bit as beautiful as Roxas's.
Oblivious to the thoughts of his teacher, Roxas looked around to spot familiar faces in the surroundings.
He picked out the nervous faces of their classmates amongst the troops.
In the Fighters section, Hayner was standing behind a soldier who towered over him by head and shoulders, making him look smaller than ever.
Moving on to the Archers, where the majority of the girls were, he caught sight of Kairi and Olette chatting nervously amongst them. Their weapons were nowhere in sight and they look painfully young amongst the hard faced woman around them.
Thinking of girls, he let his gaze wander over to the Mages section. The slim form of Namine stood out amongst the bent forms of the old wizards and witches in the first row. She was the magic prodigy of their class, their Professor Donald had always said. But wasn't she a bit too young to be in the front line?
He let out a soft sigh and spaced out, as he got lost in his thoughts. Who was he to think of such things? After all, he and Sora were in the third row of the Fighters.
Ready to get injured or killed on the battlefield at the age of sixteen.
Although he always put on a cold and indifferent front, it hurt him to know that his class was already going out for war at such a young age. It wasn't fair. They deserved to do what normal sixteen year olds do.
Enjoy the last years of their childhood before going out to the battlefield after proudly graduating from their fighting school.
But instead, here they were, young, half-trained, and ready to suffer injuries or possibly death in the battleground.
A gentle nudge to his side interrupted his thoughts and he looked to his side to stare into soft blue eyes. A gentle smile graced Sora's lips as he looked sadly at Roxas.
"I know what you're thinking." Sora whispered, barely moving his lips as he looked straight in front of him and shifted slightly closer to his twin to whisper in his ear. "Life isn't fair. Just think of it this way: We're doing this for the sake of our kingdom, for the sake of protecting our people, to usher them into a better life. You might have thought that our friends were scared of going into battle, but look again." He tilted his head slightly in the direction of Hayner.
Roxas turned his head to look at him. Although he was hidden in the shadow of the large man in front of him, a look of determination was etched into his features as he gripped his weapon steadily in a pose their teacher taught them.
He looked back at Sora, who merely gave the slightest of shrugs before glancing at the Archers section. Roxas followed his gaze and caught sight of Kairi and Olette.
With their bows in hand, both girls had stopped talking and had adopted a stern look on their faces to match the looks of the woman around them. They blended into the section of archers perfectly.
Without looking back at Sora,he turned his head to look at Namine in the Mages section.
Inspecting her face now, he could have sworn he saw a near evil smirk pass her face as little sparks of lightning danced around her body. He shivered. If he was standing close to her now, he knew that he would have sensed an evil aura being emitted from here.
Tearing his gaze off her, he looked back at his twin next to him. Sora had a straight face on but the corners his mouth was turned up slightly as he murmured softly to Roxas.
"I told you so. They're more than ready. Have more faith in our classmates." Sora moved away from Roxas, back to his original position. "If they're anything like you, they were born ready. We're not called the class of terror for nothing."
Roxas smiled to himself as the sound of a horn echoed through the battleground.
The war has begun.
forget-me-not
Holding off an attack from above he used his other keyblade to slice through the middle of the Nobody's body, completely severing it into half.
Panting heavily, Roxas wiped his sweat-covered face with a sleeve, frowning at the long cut in his side. Blood trickled slowly out of the wound, dripping onto the dusty battleground. Although the cut was shallow, he had lost quite an amount of blood from that wound and he was feeling a bit dizzy from the blood loss.
The fighting had to stop soon or he would probably faint on the spot and get trampled to death by others. What a way for his first battle to end.
He surveyed his surroundings wearily; showers of arrows were raining down on them, but the only things that got hit by arrows were the enemies. Magic flashed above and around him, striking out large numbers of Nobodies. The unmoving bodies of the Nobodies littered the battlefield, but there were still a large number of moving ones, attacking the Fighters around them.
A flash of brown caught his eye as he spotted his brother slashing at a group of Nobodies a few meters away. Despite his friendly appearance, Sora was not a force to be reckoned with in battle. He would probably destroy the entire group of Nobodies without help.
As he was about to turn away, he saw Sora slump forward and fall to the ground, unconscious. A black-cloaked figure picked him up, slung him over his shoulder and began walking away.
Roxas felt himself go cold as he watched the entire scene, frozen to the spot. Then an explosion of anger, hate and murderous rage seeped into his blood as the initial shock melted away. No way were they going to take his brother away just like that. Over his dead and lifeless body.
Spurred by his feelings, he ran towards the unconscious Sora and his mysterious kidnapper, cutting down anything in his path with a slash of his keyblades. His surroundings faded away as he focused on the figure in front of him.
A few paces behind them, Roxas leapt into the air, meaning to bring down his keyblades on the unprotected shoulder of his enemy. At the corner of his eye, he caught sight of a fireball speeding towards him and growled angrily. He couldn't dodge it in mid-air so he had to block it.
Holding a keyblade to his side, he looked back under him and his eyes widened in shock as he realized that his target had disappeared from under his keyblade and was facing him a few steps in front of him. He could almost see the smirk directed at him under that dark hood.
A familiar clanging of metal against metal rang out from beside him as the fireball collided into his weapon. That wasn't an ordinary fireball; he could see the spinning metal under the fire. The impact of the attack sent him sprawling face down into the ground.
Spitting out dirt in rage, he pushed himself off the ground and wildly looked around for his attacker. He didn't notice the dark figure behind him until an efficient blow to the side of his neck sent him back onto the ground, pain clouding his mind as he blacked out.
- Phantom Kira