The Price of Gratitude

Tidus opened the front door a crack and peered out into the district. He pushed the door open a little bit – just enough so that the mice could push their buckets and colourful helium balloons through – and unlatched the chain lock on the cage door. He flung it open and gestured for the mice to move quickly.

"Hurry up! We gotta get in position before the shadows show up… and mind the step," he whispered to them.

The mice scurried out, their buckets nearly floating away with the amount of helium balloons tied to the bucket handles. The only thing keeping them close to the ground were the bags full of marbles and beads acting like sandbags. Tidus dragged his springboard out too, flicking the latch so that it sprung into the open position. He gripped the handle of his watery sword and put his guard up. He had no idea if his juvenile tactics would work against the shadow monsters but he figured he'd probably be better than Selphie or Sora. At least he had some impressive manoeuvres. Selphie and Sora treated their toys like battleaxes. Tidus chuckled at the thought of either of them being in his shoes right now. He blinked and shook his head, gripping his sword a little tighter. Now wasn't the time to reminisce. The shadow monsters might arrive at any minute, sensing a large group of hearts straying from safety.

"Alright," Tidus commanded. "Everybody ready? Just stick to the plan and work from the bottom up."

"Right!" the mice chorused, dropping their first sandbags. The buckets rose higher and the mice dunked sponges and bathroom scrubbing brushes that they had tied to sticks into their buckets and started cleaning. The soap bubbles floated off the windows, shining colourfully like little spherical rainbows in the lights from the shop. Then when the panes had been cleaned a bungee jumper using a piece of elastic as their bungee leaped from the floating bucket with a rubber strip to scrape the soap and water away, leaving a crystal clear surface that didn't compare to the foggy, gritty view it once had.

The shop window panes were nearly finished and it would soon be time to drop the second lot of sandbags to ascend to the second floor. The myriad of bubbles still shone in the artificial light, making Tidus stop in awe. He stared at them as if lulled into a dozy trance but snapped back to reality when one of them darkened.

His eyes widened and he focused on the real world in time to see one of those helmeted shadow monsters leap for one of the buckets. Tidus dashed forward. He struck at it with his sword, sending it off its course. It crashed to the ground with a heavy clank. As if that was the cue, several more of them suddenly appeared from dark portals. They could sense which heart was the strongest and closed in on it: Tidus.

The sword was long enough to parry three attacks at once and that left one more. Tidus jumped forward and slashed down on one foe, long and even. The other four dived for him. He rolled out of the way and let them crash into each other. While they were all stuck together by their helmets, Tidus took the opportunity to try the effectiveness of one of his special moves. He rushed towards them and did a practiced double flip, slicing them with a double, circular cut. They were thrown apart. One had taken significantly more damage and its body was beginning to break. Tidus picked on that one, stabbing it mercilessly in the chest where the heart motif was. Its body dissipated into black smoke.

He turned around to the sound of clanking behind him. The four still standing lunged for him. Tidus leaped over the top of them and rolled to safety. One of them turned around quickly and charged. He batted it out of the way easily. The others followed the same mindless tactic, not following any form of coherent teamwork. Tidus could easily beat them away from him with the blade but he wasn't used to being the one who was ganged up on. He spied one that had landed furthest from the others and chose to focus his efforts on that one for a while. He dashed to it, using his speed to reinforce the power of his strike, felling the monster instantly. The three remaining foolishly charged again. Tidus kicked the first two out of the way and delivered a three strike combo to the third that finally finished it.

"Tidus! Help!" a tiny mouse voice cried from above.

Tidus looked up. Three dark portals had opened and out of them flew three monsters that looked nearly exactly the same as the helmeted soldiers but wearing heavy brown boots, goggles, brown caps with chopper blades on them, and wings. The two on the ground had already recovered and were running towards him and smaller Shadows were rising out of the pavement. Tidus beat away one of the Soldiers and stabbed in other in the head through the open visor. He pulled downwards. Its dark body broke like the ones before it that had fallen.

Ignoring the others that weren't close enough to be an immediate danger, Tidus rushed to the springboard. He jumped on it hard, pushing as much force as he could into the spring mechanism. He shot up like a bottle rocket and snagged one of the flying soldiers with the edge of his blade, diverting their attention before they could attack the mice. They flapped away from him as he descended and landed on the roof. Then they surrounded him.

Tidus backed up, trying to find more steady ground. One of them charged in for an attack. Tidus blocked it, feeling the power behind it. It was a heavy blow; much stronger than the Soldiers. He attempted to counter but it flitted out of the way. From behind one charged at him and knocked him to the roof tiles. It backed away almost immediately as though expecting a reaction. Tidus pushed himself to his feet again. He waited for one of them to charge an attack at him again and this time he ducked. He pointed his sword up and thrust it into the creature's stomach. It flapped hard to get away from the weapon but the damage had been done. It was starting to break up with flecks of darkness peeling off its body in wisps. The others didn't seem affected by this; they continued their cautious method of attack.

As one came back for another charge, Tidus parried the blow and quickly redirected his swing to slash at the monster. He strung as many hits together as he possibly could before the shadow monster managed to slip away but it was on the verge of destruction too. Behind him the remaining one which he'd turned his back on was flexing its claws, ready for another surprise attack. It didn't expect to have a sandbag dropped on its head. A bucket floating with balloons had flown above it. The mice had now crawled up to the handle and Jaq was among them.

"Everybody jump!" he commanded. He and the mice all leaped off the handle and grabbed onto one side of the bucket. They closed their eyes and held their breath as the soapy water poured over them and over the Heartless. It was hardly affected since it was wearing goggles, but having its attention turned away from Tidus gave the blond enough time and a wide opening to attack and destroy it. The mice let go of the bucket since it was now significantly lighter and was floating away uncontrollably. They landed on Tidus' head and shoulders.

"Are you guys okay?" Tidus asked the sodden rodents.

"We're fine," said a small one in a green shirt.

"What about the others?"

"We gots the windows all finished," Jaq reported, "so we're cutting the strings. Just thought we oughta make sure you're okay, though."

"You're going down?!" Tidus exclaimed, remembering the hoards of shadow creatures still on the road in front of the store. He looked over the edge to get an aim for his springboard. "Hold onto me really tight, okay? We're going to go really, really fast."

The two injured Air Soldiers spied their opponent preparing to escape and zipped in for another heavy attack. Tidus saw them both easily and jumped to avoid them. They collided into each other. Tidus held the sword's hilt with both hands and forced his body to turn for a spinning attack. He hit both of the vulnerable shadow creatures, ultimately defeating them.

They entered freefall towards the springboard. Tidus landed on his feet and jumped off it, swinging down on a small Shadow and destroying it immediately. He swatted at the one next to it. The shadow creatures were swarming in with greater numbers, appearing from portals and crawling out of the shadows. Tidus panicked. He was sure he couldn't fight this many creatures. He grabbed the steadily descending buckets by their handles as he ran back to the front door of the shop. The shadow monsters surged, trying to beat him to it. He pulled the cage doors closed and ripped open the front door. The buckets were thrown in first. Tidus leaped in after them and slammed the door, feeling his heart beating furiously against his ribcage.

Outside, a couple of Heartless, curious about the springboard, opened up a portal and abducted it to their world of darkness.

Inside, the tense atmosphere began to lift as the panicked and panting window-washers caught their breath. As the success of their mission also caught up with him, Tidus broke into a huge grin. He pumped his fist into the air a let out a loud whoop of victory.

"Anya! What was that noise?!" Odile screeched, making Tidus cringe.

"We done it!" Gus exclaimed, jumping up and down and embracing a neighbouring mouse tightly. "We helped Anya good!"

"Yeah, but look what else we done," another mouse added, pointing to the floor. Tidus' face fell when he saw the soapy water mess that had been created in the shop in his haste to get the mice back in quickly.

"Anya just cleaned that…" he muttered guiltily. He gulped down his apprehension and rolled up his sleeves. "Well, I guess I'll have to fix this myself. You guys won't need my help to do the windows inside, right? There aren't any shadow creatures in this building."

"You can count on us!" Jaq proclaimed.

"Good on ya, sports," Bartok congratulated while locking the door as a precaution. "And I'll take the inventory while you're doing that."

Tidus didn't miss the implication of that and grabbed the little white bat by the foot. "Nice try, Bartok. You have to go and help them."

The mice pushed their buckets away to start their indoors cleaning. Tidus headed around the counter to the small area behind the shop. In this small space there was bedding, food and water for the spaniel, which was curled up in its basket. It looked up as Tidus passed it heading towards a narrow stairway that led to the basement where he would be able to find a mop. It would also be an appropriate place to hide the sword until they had enough time to put it back.

It was dark downstairs. Tidus fumbled around until his hand bumped a piece of string hanging from the ceiling. He pulled it and the light came on. There were even more, larger rolls of fabric down here with extra mannequins, busts, and tape measures. To his disgust, he also noticed that there was a sagging cot in the corner with old sheets surrounded by the barest of necessities: a small, cracked mirror, a basin and washcloth, and a trunk filled with more old and ragged clothing.

In the middle of it all was a table with a contraption covered with a sheet of old linen. Curious about it, Tidus removed the linen and found a machine with a needle attached and a wheel upon which a piece of thread from the spool spun. It was a treadle machine. He found a long wooden pedal under the table connected to another wheel at the end of the machine by a sturdy but slight piece of rope. Stepping on the pedal and working it made the wheel spin and the needle move up and down. It was accompanied by the unhealthy sounds of banging and grinding. The string threaded through the needle hole uselessly. It was then that Tidus realised he'd seen a machine like this before, maybe just once. Didn't Sora's mother have something like this? This must have been the broken sewing machine that Bartok told him about.

Setting the sword down behind some large rolls of fabric and intending to find a mop, Tidus noticed a fairly large case. Forgetting the mop for a moment, he pulled the case away from the wall and opened it. It must have been weighty by itself because the thing was empty. There were little compartments lined with velvet for storage and safe keeping. Some of them were shaped like wheels and half cylinders. Suddenly Tidus had an idea. Removing the spool and thread from the sewing machine, he began to experiment with what he could and couldn't unscrew, taking the sewing machine off its desk and pulling the treadle apart bit by bit. All the parts fit perfectly into certain compartments. Delighted that he'd figured this out, Tidus put away the rest of the machine, leaving the mopping for later.

Anya trudged back down the stairs to the shop. She was exhausted already but there was still more that she was expected to do. The orders would probably take all night and she had no idea what she was going to do about the windows. With a tired sigh she decided that she might start with the windows first. Using the same bucket and rag she used for wiping the furniture upstairs, Anya walked past the orders on their busts and mannequins, paying no mind to them since she was already too daunted by her task. She opened the almost invisible doors to the display cases where their products were put on demonstration in the windows. Taking one look, she gaped. She rubbed her eyes and looked again but the window was still crystal clean. She shut the door and turned around. All of the dresses, suits, skirts, and blouses that had been ordered were somehow miraculously finished.

Unsure of what had happened she walked quickly through the door to the front of the store. The floor was clean and Tidus was heaving a case towards the door. Bartok was sitting on the counter as he normally was and all of the friendly mice that lived in the walls were standing near their mouse hole. Even more shocking was a sword with a blade of water lying across the counter that Anya was sure must have belonged to Rothbart.

"Anya, you're back," Tidus remarked. "I wasn't sure if I'd get to see you before I went. I'm really supposed to be at the hostel and I bet everyone's worried about me by now."

"Tidus, what happened?" Anya asked. "The windows… and… and the orders and… is that our sewing machine?"

"Tidus is gonna fix it for us," Bartok explained. "He works at that big, ol' Gizmo Shop across the square."

"But everything else...!"

"We did it for you," Tidus replied.

"We did the windows," Jaq said proudly.

"And we did the sewing," the female mice chimed in chorus.

"I just thought that you needed some help around here," Tidus elaborated. "And it would be too dangerous for you to clean the outside of the windows by yourself."

Anya was wide-eyed and too slack-jawed to make a real response. She pointed to the sword on the counter with a questioning but still disbelieving expression.

"Yeah, I used that to keep the shadow monsters away while the mice did the cleaning. But I don't need it anymore so you'll have to get it back to Rothbart somehow without him noticing."

Anya looked off distantly into space for a moment, thinking deeply. She smiled and took the sword off the counter, putting the hilt in Tidus' free hand. Tidus blinked and looked at her questioningly.

"It sounds like it'll be too much trouble to return it," she told him, "so why don't you just keep it? Besides, if he didn't notice you taking it, why should he even assume it's gone? And you will need it to face the monsters out in Second District."

Tidus closed his hand more securely around the hilt. "Why?" he asked softly.

It took him by surprise when she threw her arms around his shoulders and he nearly fell backwards but caught himself. "Thank-you!" she said. Tidus thought he heard a small sob. "No one's ever been so kind to me."

She let go and gazed at him with slightly teary eyes. "You take care, okay?" She patted him on the shoulder.

Tidus smiled broadly. "You bet. But you keep holding onto hope too, okay? We're not gonna be here forever."

"I hope so," Anya smiled, opening the door for him.

"I'll get this fixed for you as soon as possible," Tidus promised, lifting the case and starting to leave out the door. "See ya."

The mice farewelled in unison and Bartok waved. Tidus left the cage around the store's door and started back on his way to the Gizmo shop. He was worried by his own words. There was no known way to restore a world that had been lost to the darkness. He didn't know how he could guarantee that they wouldn't be here forever.

Oh, but he had hope. He steeled his conviction that he would one day see all of his friends again together on their island and walked forward.