As I hoped I got two chapters edited up today! ….always feel like I should be saying something important here, but I can never think of anything. ^^ lol
Chapter 3:
Once I'm to my locker, I retrieve my paper lunch sack and shut the door before walking out of the school's back entrance and down the road that runs behind the school to a field hidden from prying eyes. Not only is the field shielded, but students never seem to come here. I know Sora told me why no one ever comes here, but I don't remember the reason as I wasn't listening to what anyone was saying at the time.
Finding a stump on the outskirts of the meadow, I sit down and slowly eat my homemade lunch. Putting the last bite of my roast beef and avocado sandwich in my mouth, I hear Riku's voice coming around the last of the trees as him and a blushing Sora come into view.
Catching my eye and noticing my raised eyebrow Riku supplies "he showed me your guys' artwork."
I nod once prior to standing up and brushing the few crumbs that collected on my black and white checkered shorts off. Without saying a word, I lazily walk a ways past the middle of the field. Once I figure I'm in a good location, I turn and see that Sora and Riku have taken up fighting positions on the other side of the field and wait to see what my first move will be. They stop whatever conversation they had been having before coming into the meadow to give me their full attention.
Once I'm fully facing them, I open my hands and feel the reassuring weight of my two key blades settling into my hands. Relaxing into my fight stance, I take a deep breath while Sora and Riku each summon their own blades and take up similar stances side by side.
They really do create the perfect team. Each making up for any weaknesses or gaps in the others fighting; just like me and Axel made the perfect team…
Without giving them any warning, I charge straight towards them with my key blades running along the ground just behind and to either side of me. At the last second before I barrel into them, I quickly sling both blades in fount of me to attack both of them at once. Forcing both of them to bend their knees and arms when my blades come crashing down as I put all my weight, speed, and quite a bit of my strength behind the blow. Grunting from the strength of the impact, I flip myself up and over them disengaging our blades as I twist in mid-air and land in a defensive crouch. With my key blades up and ready I only wait a short moment before I'm blocking a strike from each. Riku made the first movement whipping his dark blade then bringing it down to echo against one of mine blocking the blow that would have otherwise hit my shoulder. Quickly I have to also block a blow from Sora aimed at my legs. When I have both blades blocked, I maneuver away before quickly changing to the offensive jumping toward them blades raised poised in my next attack only to be easily blocked by Riku while Sora stands behind him watching me for an opening.
The rest of lunch is spent in a similar fashion with the addition of Sora checking his watch every now and then to make sure we get back in time for the afternoon assembly. When the end of lunch rolls around, we are all breathing heavily with a thin layer of sweat covering our faces and the rest of our bodies as well as making a few places on our clothes damp with the substance.
Walking back to and entering the school, we follow the mass of the students heading to the gym for an assembly we're required to attend as it's the last day before the beginning of spring break. Upon entering the gym, Riku leaves us to join his class while Sora and I head for our class section keeping an eye out for Kairi and the rest of our friends.
"Sora! Roxas! Over here!" comes Selphie's voice over the babble of the gathered students.
Slowly we squeeze our way through the mass of bodies to Selphie sitting with Kairi, Naminé, and some of their friends. I have tried to make new friends, but aside from Selphie and Tidus, I haven't seem to be able to make any…well I guess that I really haven't' tried as I've kept almost exclusively to myself since I came to the world. The only reason, I'm sure, that I'm even friends with Tidus and Selphie is because they hang out so much with Sora and them.
"Sora, Roxas where were you guy's during lunch? Was Riku with you?" Kairi questions, then noticing our sweaty clothes and faces, "Why are you soaked in sweat?"
"The old field" Sora whispers into her ear, then does the same to Naminé and Selphie at their curious looks. As a school rule we students are not allowed to go anywhere out of sight of the school during lunch. This wasn't the first time I've gotten Sora and Riku to go to the old field with me, nor will it be the last I'm sure. All three understand and don't question any further as they know I often like to duel when I'm struggling to chain my emotions down or work through something.
I find fighting with our key blades soothing. It might be hard work and I bit brutal at times, but it's the most familiar thing I have anymore. Fighting is the only thing besides red and green that calms my mind and make me feel at peace…however contradictory fighting may be to that feeling.
Only when it seems as though every student in the school is in the gym, does the principle, Mrs. Harada, come leisurely walking across the gym from somewhere along the bleachers up to the single mike in the center of the gym.
The principle turns on the cordless mike and begins her speech. "Your attention please. Time to quiet down if you want to be dismisses soon." With a knowing smile she looks us over until it is practically silent. "Now as you all know we are meeting in a few hours at four pm for our yearly school camping trip. I'd like to go over the rules and activities now so I know you all have heard them."
By the time she finished explaining everything, it has already been over a half hour and so she concludes the assembly with "alright I'll see everyone at three thirty down at the docks for our four o'clock departure. Anyone late will be left behind. Don't think we'll wait for you, last year some students got left behind. You students know who you are. Don't let it happen again. This is a mandatory trip and only a parent or guardian can excuse your participation in this. Also if you're not properly packed be by the time we meet you will not be allowed to come. You all may be dismissed."
Almost instantly all the students are up and moving towards the doors starting up conversations and bringing their noisy footsteps along with them. I lead the way for my friends, easily slipping by and between people with my thin frame. I don't stop even when I notice Sora and the others are nowhere in sight. I keep pushing through the crowd knowing otherwise I'll just get pushed and shoved in their haste to get to their lockers and outside. Letting the flow of students take me along the hallway, I remove myself from them when we are just getting to my locker. Quickly I grab my pack and the materials I'll need for the minimal homework assigned by a few teachers over spring break. When I have my things and my pack zipped on my back, I slip my way past people to reach the front doors. Just outside and to the right of the entrance, is where my friends normally meet after school so I know I just need to get there and over the next few minutes they'll all manage one way or another to find me.
Winding through the last of the students, I spot Riku's silver hair and follow it until I step out of the mass of bodies and up to his side. "Hey" I greet in a voice just loud enough to be heard over the babble of other voices.
"Hey yourself blondie," he smirks "get stuck in there?"
"Something like that, they're all just as pushy as usual." I respond stepping so I'm in front of him instead of at his side and send a brief glare at the people still pushing past others to get off campus.
Snickering at me he half teases half seriously suggests "muscle up shrimp and just push them aside."
"Well sorry if we're not all as tall as you and the crowds don't just part for me because I happen to popular with the entire school." I glare (damn my height) up at him.
Just as he's opening his mouth again, probably for some smart-ass remark, an undignified squeak is emitted instead as he jumps a bit in surprise before whirling around to face a proudly smirking Sora.
My lips tweak up slightly in amusement silently observing Riku's reaction while Sora scolds him. "play nice Riku or no sugar cookies."
As Riku's face falls dramatically into a childish pout, my lips rise up higher as he turns back to look at me with a glare. Sugar cookies according to Sora are apparently kisses. I unfortunately found this out one day when I walked into Sora's room when the door was ajar without knocking. I never knock if the door isn't all the way shut so I still blame the both of them for it. To make a short story even shorter, I had heard Riku demanding that Sora give him the sugar cookies that Sora had promised him. I had been craving some sugar and cookies sounded good so I had gone over to Sora's room to see if I could swipe a few…let's just leave it that I'll never ask anyone for a sugar cookie. Ever.
"But Sora" Riku whines "Roxas started it."
Looking straight at Riku I dead pan "did not" wiping all emotion and any evidence of facial muscles in use from my face.
Riku opens and closes his mouth several times obviously trying to find some way that it wasn't him who 'started it.' Coming up with nothing, he huffs and crosses his arms turning his back on me like a toddler not getting what he wanted. After a few moments Sora rolls his eyes before taking Riku's hand in his to tug him around to face me once again. When I can see Riku's face, I see the laughter clearly in his eyes.
During the next few minutes, the rest of our friends seemingly materialized out of the body of students: Kairi, Naminé, Selphie, and Tidus. They mostly talk used to my usual silent presence until most of the school has been emptied of people. Only then do we gradually part ways as our paths divide here and there along the way to our separate homes so we can put the last few items into our bags for the weekend.
At three thirty as planned, we meet up at the docks with the rest of the school and meet up with our chosen groups once we had located our grade gathering area. Only minutes after we've gotten into our groups and the school staff seems properly satisfied with what each of us brought, they have us hand off our luggage to the few crew members on board so they could pack all of our belongings on board. At four sharp, the boat departs the harbor and heads for the island, which Sora told me that him, Riku, and Kairi used to play on as children and is also where this world's door is located.
Upon arriving at the island, the first thing we have to do is set up our tents in previously assigned locations along the beach. When the tents are up, we lay out our mats and sleeping bags with our packs next to our beds. After that, multiple groups collect firewood and began cooking dinner with the aid and direction of the staff while the rest of us got free time before the dinner was ready.
For my free time, I joined Kairi and Naminé at their request to accompany them beach combing. We found a few sea shells, sea weed, and some washed ashore wood, but nothing that really caught my interest. Though I hadn't expected there to be, I just went with them so I would have something to keep my mine occupied. Beach combing proved to be more entertaining than dinner as I was left to my thoughts while eating my portion of spaghetti, garlic bread, and a fresh greens salad. Fortunately, the time after dinner was given to us students to do what we want for the next few hours so Riku came over from his class and with some teachers permission, came and got Sora, Kairi, Naminé, and myself to go somewhere down the beach.
This somewhere Riku has in mind, Naminé and I find out to be, is where the door to the other worlds is. Riku only says our real destination after we are all well out of ear shot of everyone else and answers my unasked question of why Tidus and Selphie weren't invited to come as well.
"So it still is here?" Kairi asks.
Answering for Riku, Sora says "yeah remember that week me and Riku spent on an island last over Christmas break?"
Sora and Riku had planned a camping trip on some island for that break, but never told anyone, with the exception of their parents, what island they were going to. I didn't care, but the rest of our friends had been bugging them about it.
Realization dawned on her and Naminé's faces "so this is where you guys went. How long did it take to find the door?" Naminé questions before Kairi is able.
With a long suffering sigh Sora answers once again "almost the whole time we were here…"
That hard huh. "Did it move or something?" I question thinking how I had heard of some worlds Sora had been to had apparently changed from the time when he was trying to find both Kairi and Riku to the times when he was trying to find Riku and had to deal with Kingdom Hearts.
Nodding, Riku answers this time "yeah, this whole island used to be much, much smaller. Even as little kids we could walk around it in under an hour; now it would take us about a day to walk the shoreline. None of its old features are still here. Sure it has the same types of plants and the old ones are still here, but they've been spread out. So much has been added to this island that knowing what the old one was like is pretty much useless, but we did manage to find it."
"Why didn't you guys tell us, we could have come and helped search?" Kairi demands more than questions.
Scratching the back of his head Sora explains "well…we didn't know if it was even on this part of the world anymore or if it could only be found by key blade masters when it needed to be lock like in the other worlds…that and well we just wanted some time to ourselves. No offense to any of you or anything, but well yeah ya know…" he trails off.
Clarifying the reason why they're showing us the door and simultaneously taking the attention off Sora, Riku gets back to the point with "we thought it would be a good idea if the rest of you knew where the door to the other worlds is. Just in case anything ever happens and we aren't or can't be with you. We all have key blades so technically we should all be able to unlock or relock it if need be and use our emergency gummy to get outta here and get to Radiant Gardens or the kings castle for help."
"Remember the land marks around and leading to the door because the old path is gone and it would probably be safest if we never made a path for others to follow" Sora instructs as Riku leads the way into the forest following a path only visible to him and Sora.
"None of us ever left or came back through the door, but anyways we should know where to find it." Riku adds before pointing out clear land marks to help us all remember the way for the rest of the time. We wind our way between boulders, through tall grasses, jump across cricks, and under the low hanging branches and leaves of the towering trees. Overall, it probably takes us about twenty minutes by my estimations to reach the face of a cliff reaching just above the tallest trees in the area. Midway up the side is a bush looking just like many of the others dotting the cliff face, but according to Riku, it is hiding the entrance to the cave containing the door.
Here, Sora climbs up first making places for foot and hand holds obvious for the rest of us. When he slips past the bush seemingly into solid rock, Riku proceeds up next. The rest of us glance at each other, shrug, then I clamber up the rock being careful to not slip down. As my face becomes level with the bush, I see the small opening large enough to allow a full grown person to easily slip through, but small enough to be effectively concealed from prying eyes. When I crawl into the cave, at first I can't see, as my eyes aren't yet adjusted to the minimal lighting, causing me to almost crash into Riku as he has barely stepped away from the entrance. Squinting, I just make out the wall and ceiling; moving away from the mouth of the high cave, I side step both Riku and Sora to make room for Kairi and Naminé. Both of the boys follow my example and move aside as Naminé then Kairi reach the bush and crawl in.
Once we're all in, Sora grabs my hand telling me to grab one of the girls so he can lead us in without any of us crashing or tripping unnecessarily. Naminé was the closest to me so I grabbed her hand and she in turn takes Kairi's with Riku bringing up the rear with Kairi's other hand in his. There are a few twists and turns and some uneven places on the cave floor, but overall the cave is seemingly featureless as there is no divergent tunnels from ours before it opens after one last turn revealing the door to other worlds glowing eerily and just lighting up the open space for us to see each other's basic physical details. I'm surprised to see how clean, distinct, and modernized the door is. I've never seen one in person before or even a picture, but I had always imagined them to be old and decrepit looking considering they've supposedly been around as long as each individual world has. That and its style doesn't look remotely like any on this world nor any other I've been too. No wonder Sora, Riku, and Kairi loved this cave as kids. The door would have been absolutely amazing from a kids point of view; even now from mine and knowing what it is and its purpose, it still seems amazing.
The door stands at the end of the large cavern whose ceiling rises about a story and a half then spreads out into a very rough oval shape that stretches out about twenty feet long (from the path leading in to the door at the far end) by over ten feet wide.
I wonder aloud "do all the doors look like this or are they all different?"
"No, they're all the same" Sora answers "they're all well hidden huh?"
The others make sounds of agreement and I think its Kairi's voice that asks "how did you guys manage to find this place? It's so well hidden."
Riku snorts "probably luck. We had just wanted to see the view from the top of the cliff and as we were climbing up, Sora used the ledge the bush is on and saw that there was a hole behind it. So anyways we checked it out and here we are."
"This whole island really changed after it fell into darkness" Kairi comments reflectively "and not just this world, the others as well. It's weird how everyone who wasn't involved in the changing of the world's never noticed what happened. They don't even know their world was in darkness." Turning to Naminé and myself, she explains that "this cave used to be ground level right by the beach with just a few palm trees, some grass, and a nice cold pond in front of it. It was so easy to get to before."
"Yeah" Sora agrees. Out of all of us, he must have seen more changes and differences with how often he went to each world before and after they changed. "So I was thinking since we're all key blade masters, that the rest of you should know how to open and close the doors. Ya, know just in case anything ever happens again with the worlds. It would be a good idea for more than just me to know how to do this. It could really shorten the amount of time it would take to close the doors on all the worlds if I had some help…not that it's going to happen again, but yeah…"
"We understand Sora," Kairi says patting his back "so are you gunna teach us?"
"It's not much to teach really," he confesses, "you just got to rely on your own instincts and trust in your blade. That's all I really did to find and seal the doors. The doors always appeared to me after I had defeated the worst of the heartless and nobodies then I just infused my key blade with my power and let it flow out. I guess it feels a lot like using magic except instead of blasting the magic out you just direct the key blade at the door and let a steady stream of magic flow to it."
"That's it really?" Kairi asks. "And here I thought it was really difficult."
Smiling sheepishly, Sora adds "well yeah not really…ohh and I always imagined the doors being sealed when it was happening. I don't know if that helps or not but it doesn't hurt to visualize that too. I was always really relaxed and not trying to force anything when the doors were sealing either. So if you ever have to seal a door relax and just be calm…though that is hard sometimes right after a fight."
Sounds simple enough and I would almost call this excursion to the cave pointless, but as Sora and Riku said it is a good idea for each of us to know where the door is. Obviously we are not going to open the door then close it just to make sure each of us can do it. The doors are meant to be sealed and opening them could have dangerous effects on the world and perhaps even attract any heartless and nobodies that may be in this world.
Sora and the rest continue to talk about the key blades as we all take up places to sit against the walls of the cave around the door. For the most part I keep to myself doing little to contribute to the conversation that slowly moves to our experiences with the whole Kingdom Hearts shenanigans. Surprisingly we never really all sat down together and talked about all that happened outside of this world. Usually if we were all together there were other people around too that prevented us from talking at length. I know we've talked a bunch in fractions of our small group, but never like this where we're all together and don't have to worry about eavesdroppers.
I've talked for hours with Sora on plenty of occasions, but not so much with the others. Maybe they don't really want to ask since they know almost all of my existence before the destruction of Kingdom Hearts just about revolved around Axel. It's not like trying to hide my pain has kept my sensitivity about things that remind me of Axel a secret from them. I do try, really I do, but I still have so much control to be desired over my emotions, tears, and facial expressions. Mostly I wish I never had been separated from Sora in the first place, but then I never would have met Axel. If only Kingdom Hearts didn't give me my own heart and separated me from Sora. I've never believed in gods or the like, but if there is some higher being out there that decides peoples punishments, maybe a real life of my own in exchange for Axel death is my own punishment. It certainly feels like it. If I didn't know without a doubt that Axel would want me to live and discover all the answers to my questions as I possibly can and live a full life for the both of us, I would likely have ended my existence shortly after I became a somebody. I don't like the idea of someone taking their own life, but damn it does look so inviting when I wish I was either dead or Axel was still alive and with me. But I'll never stoop to that, not when he gave his life so I could live. It would be such a slap in the face and a betrayal to him and the memories I have of him; even more than when I left him and Organization XIII. I can never do that not to him-
"Roxas" I pick my head up from my knees and see everyone looking at me. When I sweep my eyes over their faces, Naminé speaks up looking concerned, but trying to hide it with a warm smile "we're going to head back now."
I stand and wait for the rest of them to do so without saying a word or nodding my head in acknowledgement at all. Within seconds we're all on our feet and Riku is leading the way out followed by the girls leaving Sora and me to be the last to leave.
Walking close to me and whispering so the others don't hear, "you okay?" Sora asks right by my ear.
"Yeah" I say just barely audible for even him to hear. I'm half tempted to be sarcastic or say as good as I can be without Axel, but I know it won't cheer me up and that it'll only make Sora sad. I don't get any satisfaction or ever feel better when I bring the peoples spirits around me down even though I am hurting, I don't need to bring Sora down with me. He's helped me so much already…
The time we spent in the cave must have been well over an hour judging by the displacement of the sun and the movement of the shadows among the forest. By the time we reach the edge of the forest, the sun has begun its descent below the horizon. There are a few students scattered along the beach on which we take back to the camp. Everyone is heading back to camp seeing as the sun is setting and as a rule we all have to be back amongst the teachers by the time the sun sets. We stop and help a few classmates of Riku's trying to haul their large pile of drift wood back to be used in the camp fires tonight. With each of us taking a small armful of the wood, we easily make our way the remainder of the distance. When we reach the camp the sun is more than half way down as we deposit the firewood by a campfire before checking in with the teachers to let them know we are back from 'exploring'.
Riku leaves us to join his class as the rest of us split up into pairs as we search for our tent groups. As soon as Sora and I find ours, the teachers call for grade meetings around the fires. There are four large fires, one for each grade to cluster around, roaring providing us with light as the sun finally slips all the way below the horizon. Me and Sora stay with the other two boys, Satoshi and Yamatto, from our tent and join the rest of our grade at our designated fire.
"Alright, can I have everyone's attention? Quiet please" shouts a teacher over the chattering voices of the students. Once the vocal noise is almost none existent and the teacher has everyone's attention, they proceeded to tell us our activities scheduled the next two days along with what tents were expected to do certain chores at chosen times during the day (they had given each tent group a number to make assigning the groups easier).
I know I didn't pay much attention during the assembly earlier today, but I swear they're telling us the same things all over again, just in more detail this time around. Whatever.
With the announcements complete, everyone gets ready to retire for the night, although the staff more or less has hinted that as long as we kept our voices down and don't cause any trouble we can stay up as long as we want to so long as we are all up without complaint by eight thirty the following morning.
I don't stay up for very long and probably fall asleep sometime after ten even with Sora and the other two boys taking and laughing. I used to be quite the night owl, but over the last year, with my lowered stamina and health issues, I tend to sleep much more and have a hard time keeping myself up late. I don't think I've managed to stay up later than eleven since I've become a somebody. So shortly after I was comfortably settled in my sleeping bag, I slowly drift off into a dream filled of Axel.
And as I said after the last chapter this will be the last update I'll be able to do until who knows when….I hope to be able to get to the local library sometime so we'll see how much I'll be able to update. …in the next chapter more exciting things will start to happen… 8D