"What do you see?" Jazz shouted up at Danny. He almost didn't hear her because he could see quite a bit.
The sky was an angry violet with rapid strings of cloud funneling into the dark vortex that was blocking the sun. Streaks of lightning would shoot from the violently churning darkness that seemed to give off a purplish light and was surrounded by a reddish orange haze. The entire horizon was a deep red, almost like the sky was bleeding. Creeping in from all directions were spikes of void that shattered the land, which crumbled under the encroaching border of darkness. Beyond that dark edge was only space, the kind of space that, if one were to slip and fall from the edge, that person would fall forever until the darkness reached him. A howling wind rose from the void, pulled by the force of the vortex.
On the earth that still remained were an army of shadows, many of them small, but there were other, stronger ones stalking the streets as well. They attacked the few remaining defenseless people, ripping and tearing at them until they vanished into clouds of darkness, releasing a point of crystalline light that the shadows would leap on and then withdraw from, revealing yet another shadow.
In the near distance, by the school that still existed, was evidence of fighting. Beams of energy were being shot into the air and there were flashed of light. Debris would occasionally be cast up, or even a little shadow.
"Danny!" Jazz shouted from below, catching Danny's attention.
"Someone's fighting by the school!" Everyone ran towards the school, blasting little shadows out of the way as they went.
They reached the school grounds to see people fighting in the street out front. They were surrounded by the shadow creatures, but holding them back for the time being.
Danny, who was flying above and saw them first, shouted down, "They're still alive!"
Everyone picked up the pace a bit more and blasted shadows more rapidly as they fought to join the other group, which consisted of Danny's parents, Valerie, Mr. Lancer, Qwan, Tucker's parents, and Paulina. Everyone had one of the Fentons' weapons and were shooting the shadows.
"Sam, Tucker, Jazz! You're alive!" They were greeted enthusiastically though there was no real break in the fighting. When Phantom landed to join them, they also greeted him happily. "Phantom, you're here, too! Do you know what these things are?"
"They're shadows! A door was opened in the Ghost Zone that shouldn't have been and now the darkness is eating everything, here and there! Even the portal is closing!"
"Ghost boy!!!! You're here to save us!" Paulina leapt on Danny, who promptly shoved he back off and told her to keep shooting.
Maddie shifted around the circle until she stood by Phantom. "Phantom, have you seen my son? We came here looking for him, but he's not here, and we're worried the shadows already got to him."
Danny opened his mouth to respond but there was a sudden earthquake and a huge chunk of land fell away behind the school, taking the building with it and leaving a clear view of the absence of land beyond. Debris was being pulled up into the vortex at a faster rate, only feeding it as it grew larger.
"No!" Danny shouted in horror as he saw that Amity Park was disappearing. The others even froze momentarily, for they hadn't known that the world was disappearing as well as being besieged by shadows.
The creatures took advantage of the pause and suddenly swelled in a wave, overtaking the defenders' circle. There were three flashes of light as new weapons suddenly appeared in the hands of Sam and Tucker and Danny used an energy wave to blast all the shadows back.
"Where did those come from?" Qwan commented as Sam leapt forward in a melee attack with her long staff and Tucker shoved back more shadows with his tall shield. The two new weapons were stunningly effective, but that didn't really matter when all the shadows were converging on the group.
Danny glanced at Sam and Tucker, associating the new weapons with the ones from the dream and wondering briefly why he didn't have one as well. Then he knocked out three shadows with a single blast and the earth shook violently once more. A massive crack split the street behind the group and the chunk of land they were on started to rapidly fall apart. Shadows overwhelmed the unbalanced group, scoring hits on Qwan, Lancer, Paulina, and the Foleys. Valerie and Danny's parents, the only trained fighters, survived as the bodies of their fallen comrades disappeared. Danny got to see up close what the crystalline light was that had appeared last time. It was a heart. Their hearts, Danny realized with a sudden shock. 'The shadows are stealing people's hearts!' Danny grabbed Sam, Tucker, and Jack while Valerie grabbed Maddie and everyone flew to the roof of the Ops center, Valerie with her sled.
From the roof they had a horrifyingly good view of the crumbling world. Danny zoomed down to the basement and saw that the portal to the Ghost Zone was almost completely black, with just a small ball of green about the size of his fist. He returned to the roof.
"The Ghost Zone is gone, too."
"Oh, Jack," Maddie cried, "we'll never see Danny again."
"But mom--!" Another terrible crack cut off Danny as he was about to console his mother and the building shook, causing the roof to tilt more than it already did.
"What did you say, Phantom?"
Shadows were climbing up the walls of the Fenton home and they reached the roof just then, tackling Maddie and Valerie who were both near the edge but looking at Phantom.
"MOM!!!" Danny screamed as she fell, her body disappearing and revealing another heart which the shadows eagerly tackled.
"Maddie!" Jack howled as he leapt at them, but his efforts were futile and the shadows took his heart as well.
Though Danny didn't fully notice, a strange weapon appeared in his hand, the same one that had appeared on the stained glass floor of the dream. He leapt at the shadows that had taken his parents and Valerie, causing several to burst and disappear.
The vortex suddenly seemed to get louder, sensing that the destruction of the world was almost complete, and the wind strengthened until in threatened to remove the remaining three from the roof. They all came together and gripped each other tightly as they looked up at the sky.
"The darkness won't separate us this time!"
Then they were lifted from the roof as Danny summoned a shield around them to fend of the darkness so they wouldn't be separated like last time. The vortex swallowed them and the trio blacked out. The last thing each one remembered was gripping each other tightly, hoping against hope that they would stay together and that they wouldn't be destroyed like everything else.
The light of Danny's ghost shield and the small pinhole in the portal winked out simultaneously.
Sora shook the rolled paper from the bottle and opened it eagerly, curious at what King Mickey could have sent him. The joy on everyone's faces soon faded, however, when the impact of the message hit them.
"The dark pathways between worlds are open again."
"But we locked them shut," Riku protested.
"Someone else powerful opened them again and the 'dual world' has already been consumed by darkness."
"No! That's horrible! Why would someone do that?" Kairi was alarmed. Though she'd been unconscious for most of that episode, Sora had told her of the problems the doors to darkness had caused and the risk to Kingdom Hearts.
"We need to see the king about this right away. The door must be shut before the darkness spreads again."
"I agree," Riku said. "Another wave of heartless on the worlds would be bad. There may even be more nobodies."
Sora, Riku, and Kairi all looked up to the sky as if they could see the star of the 'dual world' wink out.