Chapter Three: The Dream You're Seeing
"Hey! Hey, you okay?"
Shiloh groaned, her head lolling to the side. "Five more minutes, Lionel—WHOA!"
Something warm and wet ran from the girl's jaw to her temple. Shiloh's body shot up, moving the owner of the tongue away from her.
"Whoa, calm down, boy! You can't just keep going around licking unconscious people," a voice ordered, but was only replied with an excited bark that rung harshly in Shiloh's eardrums. The squeak of someone's shoes approached and she felt a presence crouch beside her. "... Are you alright? You're bleeding..."
Shiloh groaned, only then noticing the dull throbbing at the back of her head when the boy pointed it out. She reached up to rub her forehead, but found that was a big mistake. Stinging pain shot through her tender fingertips. She raised both of her hands, feeling the nerves tingle and vibrate. She supposed that she had scrapped them when she was clawing the the pavement in the parking garage, but she didn't think they were so deep... Thoughts of what had happened at the apartment complex made her suck in a sharp breath.
"Your hands got hurt, too?" The boy inquired, breaking Shiloh from her reverie. "There's gotta be a doctor here...wherever here is..."
Shiloh couldn't concentrate on the boy's voice booming in her ears. Everything around her seemed too loud; her own heart beat seemed to have doubled and pounded at her head. She delicately rubbed her palms on her forehead and went to get up from the cold floor.
"Oh, let me help you!" The boy offered, quickly moving to hold her arm up.
As soon as she was standing, Shiloh shook off the boy's hand without saying a word. He stepped back, but she was acutely aware of his hands hovering by her. She grunted and swatted his hands away. She didn't need some complete stranger to be coddling her; she could have stood up just fine on her own. Who the hell was this guy anyway?
Shiloh opened her mouth to voice her thoughts but was interrupted by something pushing against the back of her legs. The boy stepped closer. "What's that you got in your mouth, boy?"
Hey, it's that dog! Shiloh realized, remembering the slick feeling of the wide tongue running along her face. Euuughh...
"Is that...a stick or rod or something?"
That got Shiloh's attention. "Hey, dog, hand that over for a sec," she crouched down to the canine's level and yanked her cane from its slobbery maw. Relieved that she didn't need to go looking for it, she thanked the dog with a pat on the head and stood up.
"Is that stick yours?" The boy inquired.
Shiloh frowned. "It's not a stick, and yes, it is mine."
"Then what..." he trailed off, a gasp of realization escaping his mouth. "Oh! You're—!"
"Shiloh," she cut him off.
"...Oh, I'm Sora!" The air disrupted a bit as something darted toward her. Instinctively, she jumped back. She noticed the object stayed stationary in front of her. The boy chuckled nervously and the object moved away. "Oh, right...sorry."
Shiloh's brows furrowed. Was that...his hand?
The girl sighed and shook her head slowly. "Whatever."
She walked passed the boy, following the sounds of distant chatter and movement. She ran the back of her hand along the brick wall until she reached the end of the entrance to the alleyway she had apparently been in.
Shiloh's mouth stretched into a tight line. She couldn't tell if the area she was in was small or not. The talking, walking, and overall activity of the area was so loud in her ears, but they sounded so far away. Her heart seemed to not only beat louder, but completely erratic. She put a hand to her chest and took deep breaths, trying to control her wayward heart...but noticed that her heartbeat was actually relatively steady under her palm.
"What...?" she muttered, confused.
With her index and middle finger, she checked her pulse right under her jaw. Sure enough, her heart was pumpin' and thumpin' as stable as it should be, though it did quicken a bit under her panicked confusion. If her own heartbeat was fine, then what was pulsating throughout her body? She shut her eyes tight and took a moment to get her bearings. She needed to focus on one thing at a time, and her main priority right then was to find out just where the hell she was.
Her hand clenched tightly around one end of her cane. She lifted the other side and gently tapped it against the stone floor under her feet. The second she did so, however, she nearly fell over in a panic. There, before her were..things. No words could have accurately described what she was experiencing, for she herself had never experienced anything like this before. It was as if she were hyper-aware of every little thing around her. Echoes and sounds bounced off of every single solid object in the area and returned to penetrate her ears. The ground beneath her bare feet vibrated and pulsed with every movement and twitch from everyone in the area, she even felt the footsteps of the boy from before approach her from behind.
In the midst of her mental breakdown, she was temporarily distracted by a pulsation moving toward them. High heels clacked against the stone, the obnoxious smell of floral perfume violating Shiloh's nose. Shiloh groaned and rubbed her eyes. She really wasn't in the mood to socialize at the moment.
"Hey, kiddies," a provocative voice called, "first time in Traverse Town?"
The pulse moved closer, apparently belonging to the talking woman. The pulse-vibration-woman-thing went right up to Sora. "Care for this nice lady to show you around?"
Sora's shoes skidded a bit when he jumped back. "Th-Th-That's okay!"
The woman laughed. "No, no. No need to hold back with me..." she then made a surprised sound. "Oh, I see...your girlfriend's already showing you around, huh?"
At that point, Shiloh thought it best to just ignore the two and just push herself into her own mind.
What the hell is going on, she wondered. With everything that had happened and had been happening back-to-back, her nerves were overloading. It took every last bit of her concentration to not collapse right then and there and scream her lungs out.
One minute she was snug as a bitter bug in her bed, the next she was being charioted across the entire apartment building via her brother, with monsters chasing after them. Then Lionel disappeared (Shiloh refused to believe otherwise) and the last thing she remembered was her crying like a baby while being propelled into the damn sky. Then she woke up in some alley with some guy and some dog in some place she'd never been in. Not only that, but her senses were going haywire and she was way too perceptive of every little thing around her. She was pretty sure that she was picking up on other people's heart beats at that moment. She didn't know what the hell was going on, where the hell her brother war, where she was, or what sort of demon powers she's gained in her unconscious state, but she did know she didn't like any of it not one. Effing. Bit.
"AAAHHH!"
Shiloh was broken from her thoughts by a shrill cry. It was the woman from before! The woman's screams shook Shiloh at her very core. What the hell's going on now?!
A hard thump landed right at her feet and she had to quickly jump back. Hesitantly, Shiloh lifted a foot and poked the fallen lump at her feet. She gasped and jumped further back when her big toe came in contact with a mass of hair. Is...Is that the woman? What's she doin' on the floor...?
Before Shiloh could try to help the woman up, she noticed something. The woman's once slow and lax pulse no longer was attached to the body that lay before her. Instead, the beating heart was suspended in the air by some clanking being beside that had no pulse of its own. The beating echoed throughout the area and pounded against the girl's ears. Her eyes strained when she turned her head toward where the source of the pulsation was and had to turn away. That second, there was a wave of what sounded like glass shattering...and the beating stopped.
"She's vanishing...?" Sora gasped under his breath.
"What...?" Shiloh didn't have time to question him. The all-too familiar skittering sounds of the creatures from the parking garage surrounded her and Sora.
"What is this?!" shouted the boy, bumping his back against hers.
Shiloh stood, shocked by the presence of the very things that took her brother. The clanking creature that shattered the woman's heart from before also joined in the hoard, with others like it. The girl grit her teeth and clenched her fists tightly around one end of her cane, holding it like a bat.
"These things attacked me and my brother..." she hissed vehemently. All the dissonance from the creatures did nothing to alleviate her migraine, and the attendance of the very things that took her brother did nothing to quell her rage.
Just as she took a step toward the clamoring hoard, Sora grabbed her wrist and pulled her into a sprint. "These things were on my island, too!"
They continued to run, Sora having to tighten his grip on Shiloh when she struggled against him. He slowed down just enough to open a pair of doors. The cool, ventilated air hit Shiloh's face as Sora pushed her into some sort of building. The doors immediately slammed behind her, the thud of Sora's body weight holding them closed reaching her ears.
Shiloh growled under her breath and turned on her heels. Just who the hell did this guy think he was, pulling her around like some rag-doll?! More importantly, why the hell did he force her to run away?! She had some goddamn business with those monsters outside and she was damn well going to stomp right back outside to show those bastards just what happens when you mess with Shiloh's family.
The girl walked forward to shove the boy aside, fully intent on giving those monsters outside a piece of her damn mind, but stopped when someone cleared their throat.
"Welcome to..." they said before immediately scoffing. "...Feh. From your get-up, I'm guessin' neither of ya are customers. And if you ain't buyin' nothin' I suggest you both get out!"
"Gladly!" Shiloh shouted, all the more willing to go out and take on her revenge and to not deal with some old man with an attitude.
"No, wait, you can't go—!" Sora protested, wrestling Shiloh's grip of the door handles.
"Hell yes I can, so let go—!"
The teens were interrupted by two sharp bangs from the other side of the door. The pair froze for a second and would have continued their struggle, but were again interrupted when the old man huffed behind them. "Hittin' the streets, are they? Damn those Heartless..."
The man rustled with something on the far end of the room while Shiloh and Sora resumed their struggle for the door. " Move it," the man demanded simply, shoving the two teens out of the way of the entrance.
Shiloh heard the doors start to open and bolted upright, about to sprint right out the building. Of course, she would have done so if it weren't for somebody holding her arm behind her. "Let go of me dammit!"
"You can't go out there!"
"LET GO—!"
"QUIT FRICKIN' OBSTRUCTING MY BUSINESS!"
Shiloh and Sora stopped struggling against each other to instead stand in abstract horror. A roaring fire shot out of whatever the hell the old man was holding, warming Shiloh's face considerably and most likely doing worse to anything that was outside. The fire let out one last roar and crackled before completely dying out. Shiloh noticed the clanking and skittering creatures were gone, much to her own disappointment. The old man humphed triumphantly and closed the doors.
"Now then... Haven't seen either of you kids before," the man mentioned casually, as if he didn't just incinerate a hoard of monsters just outside his door. "Where ya from?"
"I ain't a kid! It's Sora!" the boy was quick to correct, bolting upright and releasing Shiloh's arms from his vise grip.
The man let out a hearty laugh and set down his fire-breathing contraption with a loud clank. "Hoho! Nice to meet you too, Sora and..."
Shiloh couldn't tell if her face was still warm from the fire or if the old man was staring at her. From the silence, she guessed it was the latter. She hunched her shoulders and turned away. She'd rather not give out her name to another stranger, having already done so with Sora. She didn't want to make a habit out of it. But, he did just save them...
She sighed and muttered, "...Shiloh."
"Well, Shiloh and Sora," the man started, twirling whatever he had in his mouth. "Those Heartless things you saw just now are monsters that eat out the hearts of people. Used to be that you didn't see them wanderin' about First District much, but..." he explained, then muttered, "... I s'pose they found themselves somethin' good to eat..."
"Understatement of the century, old man," Shiloh murmured grimly.
"Speakin' of somethin' to eat! You were about to jump right into that hoard of Heartless, weren't ya?!" the man slammed a big hand on a counter. "Just what the hell were ya thinkin' doin' a damn fool thing like that?!"
It took a moment to register that the scolding was directed at her. "Hey, you said to leave if we weren't buyin' anything!"
"I didn't know what was out there, you did!" the man shot back. "What the hell was goin' through that head of yers?!"
"I—! You—! They—!" Shiloh stammered, frustrated. Of course then she realized what she intended to do was stupid, but... "They took my—!"
"They took a lot of things from a lot of people," the man interjected. "This whole damn town is proof of that! That doesn't mean you go runnin' around pickin' fights like a goddamn fool!"
The girl said nothing and turned away. The air was tense and quiet. Sora stepped toward the old man, breaking the brief silence.
"... Say, gramps," he started, "is this another world?"
Shiloh's ears twitched. Another world...?
Sora continued, unaware of the girl's shock and confusion. "I was on my island and...when I woke up I was here, in this city... I don't know where any of my friends went... Riku... Kairi..."
Shiloh bit her lip. She got what the old man was saying. She wasn't the only one that had just lost a home recently: Sora did too, and she was sure that woman from before also suffered the same fate. And yet, despite probably having gone through that same, horrifying experience, it was Sora that was sensible enough to run away while Shiloh tried to pick a fight. Goddamn, she was stupid.
She pulled herself from her depressing train of thought just when the man was explaining the town they were in.
"...This here'd be the city they call Traverse Town, home to all those who've lost their homes," he sniffed gruffly. "I figure if both of yer friends are still tickin', they're gonna be somewhere around here... Go look for them, why don'tcha?"
Could... Could Lionel actually be here...?
"Hey, velho," Shiloh called out, stepping forward a bit.
"I don't know what you just said but I have the feelin' I wouldn't like it if I knew."
"Whatever," she dismissed his remark. "Have you seen my brother, Lionel? He's like thiiis tall" – she stretched her arm over her head – "and he's, like, stupidly buff and stuff."
"Sorry, kid. Haven't seen anyone like that," he answered, much to the girl's dismay.
Dammit...hopefully he just hasn't shown up around here yet or something...
"Here!" the man said, which was followed by something bashing against her head.
"Ow!" she and Sora yelped, each holding some sort of fuzzy sphere.
"Eat that. Get yer health back up," the old man told them. "... Although they're just left overs..."
Shiloh pretended to not hear that last part. She held the fruit (?) in her hand uncertainly. She felt a bruise on one side and could swear that it was already partly bitten into. With a brow raised and shrugged shoulders, she cautiously took a bite. She was surprised that the thing didn't taste like much of anything, yet it was pretty juicy. The texture reminded her vaguely of a very, very small watermelon, but the skin bit into like a peach. With another shrug, the girl decided it wasn't half bad and proceeded to devour the fruit-thing. As she continued to eat, she felt a shiver run down her spine and a small wave of relief wash from her head to her toes. When she finished the entire thing, the cuts on her fingers, the scrapes on the bottom of her feet, and the gash at the back of her head had healed to a certain degree.
"If either of you find yourselves in any trouble, you can come back for help anytime," the old man declared after a moment, letting them eat what he had given them.
Sora sniffed, feeling touched by the man's concern. "...Gramps..."
"Call me 'gramps', or whatever the hell you called me before, and I'll beat you both silly," he said simply. "It's Cid."
Shiloh and Sora snickered. This old guy wasn't half bad. Shiloh didn't know about going to him when she was "in any trouble", since she just wasn't one to ask for help (or admit that she needed help), but she wouldn't mind bothering him when she found it inconvenient for him.
With a small laugh, she and Sora headed for the doors. "Thanks, gramps!" They chorused.
"IT'S CID!"
The teens laughed and slammed the doors behind them, just in case the old man decided to aim his flame thrower towards them at that point.
The cold night air hit Shiloh's face gently. It seemed that her senses finally calmed down and everything seemed so barren and silent, a nice change of pace from the last time she was outside. The pair walked slowly, not entirely sure where they were going. Hell, now that she thought about it, she didn't even know why she was still hanging around this Sora guy.
Probably because I'd be a disaster waiting to happen if I were alone, she reasoned. Besides, what the hell was she going to do on her own? She had no idea where anything was in the place, and after what happened before, frankly, she didn't want to use her cane again. Whatever the hell that whole...experience was with all that noise, vibrating, and pulsing it was something she never wanted to go through ever again.
Paying too much to much attention to her thoughts, she bumped into Sora's back. "Hey, what's the holdup?"
She soon found out the answer to her question without him having to say anything. The stamps of heavy boots approached them slowly. Instinctively, the pair backed away, only to have the other person continue toward them unbidden. Shiloh's brows furrowed. Who the hell was this?
Who ever it was, they didn't give her a good feeling.
"They know you're here. No matter where you run, they'll always be able to seek you out," the man before them said calmly. "They'll find you so long as you bear that keyblade!"
Translations:
Velho: "old man" (if that wasn't obvious enough)
