Chapter 4: New Leader

Disclaimer: I do not own Kingdom Hearts.

His opponent still had that grin on his face, that sadistic grin that was incredibly freaky, especially when he was hacking away at Sora with sadistic glee and Sora was only just able to keep up. From the moment he had jumped onto the scene to save Axel, Zeven had gone after him like a man possessed with the spirit of a demon. Luckily he had found that he could use two keyblades without the use of one of his special forms that he couldn't use at that moment because he was alone except for other who he hadn't decided if they were friend or foe. Larxene had helped a bit with fighting him before he had given her a bad cut and kick that took her out of the fight, but he was able to hold up his own against his opponent, despite the abandon at which Zeven fought with.

Zeven brought both of his keyblade's down on the two that Sora had brought up to block the attack before he was forced back by another one of Zeven's random elemental attacks that forced Sora to keep his distance. Luckily Sora could see that the elemental attacks he used had a pattern, unlike his fighting style, which would throw off any person who used a sword, even Cloud with its many ups and downs. When Zeven tried to use a fire attack he countered with blizzard that at first seemed weak because of the fire but he aimed it above the attack so that the ice melted in mid air and put out the fireball as well as soaking Zeven. This only made Zeven laugh as he threw out one keyblade and caught it with a chain so that he could spin it around. The idea was that if Sora wasn't hacked by the sword because he was up close then he could be strangled with the chain or at least caught and held in submission. This was a brilliant move used by a rather psychotic individual or he at least seemed like he was insane, but Sora reasoned that since his moves were good at confusing his opponent then he was a genius. Jumping back to a tree, Sora prepared himself to spring from the tree right at the man for a quick slash like Cloud had taught him, but before he could do that he found that the tree was cut in half by the chained keyblade.

"Well you have gotten stronger, but you're still not at that level that I need you to be," said Zeven as he brought the keyblade back to his hand and threw the chain to the ground, revealing that it had been cut. "Right now I could still take you on because you haven't the strength to keep up the fluidity of your movement with my brute strength. I'd also suggest you get faster as I'm more than likely to get faster in my strikes and you were able to keep in this because you were faster than me, but you are still not in the complete understanding of the power you have. Also I'd be careful of who you choose as your allies because though they may be whole, they still have a leader and you don't know if he is in this for the greater good."

"You shouldn't judge that he is our leader," said a voice from atop the large rock that was in the middle of the bamboo grove. Sora looked up to see Saix looking down at the both of them except he too was whole, just like Axel and Larxene. "We have not chosen him as our leader, nor does he have any will to lead our Organization so we are instead caught with the dilemma of who is to be our new leader."

"You think you can fill the shoes of my little brother," asked Zeven with a bit of a smile on his face as he brought his keyblade up.

"The choice we made was neither in the one who helped us find each other nor was it one of us," replied Saix as he called one of his own claymores to his hands. "In the end we chose to stick with the wielder of the keyblade and so that is why we stand against you now, not under the orders of anyone, but ourselves. It is because of that reason that I will fight you to the death gladly since I'm finally deciding with my heart."

"Could you get any more corny than that," asked Zeven with a laugh as he started to mock the blue haired man who was threatening him with a large sword. "Just because you chose something your heart decides doesn't mean it's a good outcome, especially when you don't know what type of heart you got. For all you know this could be the bad decision, I mean you remember what your failed heart decided and look where it got you."

"It doesn't matter because right now I've decided that I will support the Organizations decision to go against you," said Saix and with that he lifted his claymore and swung it down at Zeven, who just sighed and then brought up both his hands to catch the blade before it could touch the skin on his forehead.

"You see there is a greater difference in power between you and me if you think that your attack will have any effect on me," said Zeven before he kicked Saix right in the chest sending him flying into a tree. "Come now if you wish to battle me you had better make sure that you are strong enough to take on my brother or else this will be as simple as putting out a fire in a waterfall."

Zeven brought his blade up with one hand so that the hilt of it was paired with his right shoulder and then he pushed out his blade out at Saix who only barely managed to dodge it. Calling upon his many claymores, Saix was able to set up a line of defense so that it would take Zeven a while to get to him, enough time for Saix to prepare an attack. To his surprise, Zeven kicked one of the clamores intot he other and created a domino effect that brought down Saix's line of defense and before he knew it Zeven was at his throat with his two keyblades. There was a quiet moment in the air as Zeven grinned at his prey and gave him enough time to let him know that he was screwed in every way possible, but before Zeven could take advantage of his position he sensed something coming at him from the side. He was forced to move back to avoid the point of a knife as it flew right before his face and embedded itself in the bamboo. Zeven let his gaze shift to the Savage Nymph that was holding a knife between each finger in preparation to throw them and he had an annoyed look on his face.

"Save the butter knives for fixing dinner babe, I'm interested in a blade," said Zeven before he did the unthinkable, he brought his keyblade up in a flash and cut Saix in half. "Well I suppose I'm done here for now, hope to hear good things from you soon."

A dark mist enveloped Zeven, nothing like the grey that surrounded Sora before, but an oppressive dark blue mist that Sora was not meant to follow, nor had he any intentions of doing that. With a somber and silent walk, Sora went over to where Saix was slowly dying, this time he had blood to bleed instead of fading into nothingness. Not much was known to Sora about Saix, except that he had a heart and he did count as a human being, no matter what he had said or done before. Sora also knew that Saix was not his enemy, he was Sora's ally and that made him a possibility of being a friend, perhaps even a very good friend that Sora would have been glad to know, but that chance was now ripped away from Saix, along with any plans he had for his own future. By his side were Axel and Larxene, both were friends of Saix or at least comrades and there was one golden rule about losing a comrade, you always mourned their passing, even if there was nothing else. They all came; all eight other members of Organization XIII came to see the passing of the second in command, and probably the one who would have run the show had they not chosen Sora.

"I thank you my friends and comrades, for you have all given me something very dear," said Saix before his body went limp and his eyes became cold and emotionless to everything that was around him.

"What gift did we give him, I didn't save him," asked Sora, a bit curious as to the unspoken gift that he had given and he noticed that all of them were doing something that could only be really appreciated when someone use to be irrelevant to the matters of the world. They were shedding tears for him and to someone who was once a Nobody, it was very touching and in reality, it was probably the best gift they ever got.

"Well then, what should we do," asked Axel and everyone turned to one person in the bamboo grove and Sora sighed as he made his decision.

"I'll trust you for now, Xehanort," said Sora as he turned to the one everyone was looking at and Xehanort gave a nod as he started to summon up a grey mist.

"We'll have to trail him," replied Xehanort before he started to walk into the grey mist, his hand motioning for Sora to follow.

"Looks like I'm going to have to ask Kairi to wait just a little bit longer," said Sora as he walked into the twilight of the grey must and felt it spread all over him.