Welcome Back, I still don't own anything. Thanks for sticking around. Let's continue…
They proceeded into the hotel.
"Melody, why did you welcome in this riff raff?" Zazu watched the raven, who sat hunched in a corner, with suspicion and a little haughtiness.
"If I don't give Trickster a chance how can I say that I truly am sided with the light?" said Melody. "It's a matter of principle."
"But that woman, Maleficant, she could have him watching you."
Hunter screeched and sailed off the balcony to land next to Trickster. He gave the raven a fixed look then glared over at Zazu.
"Fine take his side, he didn't destroy your world," Zazu said pointedly.
"Neither did he destroy yours, Zazu" Melody said sternly. "But Hunter did work for a man that I'm sure would have sided with the darkness if it had struck there." She paused, thinking pensively. "But I've been wondering why you can talk Zazu, but Hunter and Trickster can't." She sat down on the bed staring absentmindedly at her sward. "I wonder if it has something to do with the worlds. They didn't used to be connected, maybe they ran parallel and things like language only wore through to certain worlds." She groaned and ran a hand through her hair. "We need to get to the bottom of this Heartless thing. I guess I better go to Cid and explain why I don't have any items and need another gummyship."
Cid didn't take the news lightly. Wrecking a gummyship was not the way to get on his good side. Melody left the shop grumpily. She hated it when people were mad at her, and she didn't know what she could do about it. She gloomily thought how it looked like she and the birds were grounded until they could find somebody else who made gummyships.
She stopped in her tracks. Parked by the entrance to Traverse Town was a large gummyship with the name Highwind painted on the side. I wonder who flew that in, she thought.
Wandering back to the hotel she sought out Aerith and asked her.
"Oh, Sora's back in town, you should go meet him Melody. He's finding out all sorts of things about the worlds," she said. "And he's bringing us back a lot of Ansam's reports."
Melody thought it over and decided to take Aerith's advice.
"Do you guys want to go meet Sora?" she asked the Trickster and Zazu, Hunter was out flying. Trickster shuffled his feet and Zazu didn't answer. He was staring out the balcony, lost in thought. Melody walked over.
"Zazu, you know it might be a good idea for you to get out and stretch your wings."
"Hmm? Oh- yes, yes, of course Melody." The hornbill was distracted.
"You know, maybe in his travels this Sora kid found out where lost worlds go," suggested Melody. The hornbill stuttered.
"Well- I-I, I didn't say I wasn't going! But if there is something to be gained be going to see him, well perhaps Melody you shouldn't go alone."
Melody smiled to herself as the two of them left together. Aerith had said Sora was down visiting the wizard Merlin. She gave them directions to his house and Melody and Zazu headed toward the door with a flame on it that she had walked by a couple times. Suddenly she held up her hand to tell Zazu to quiet and stopped walking.
They were obviously Heartless, but this kind was bigger than she had encountered before. A Heartless with a balloon like head that grinned maniacally floated about the doorway peering in, and a lumbering apelike Heartless holding a shield held open the door a crack. Both were quivering like a tv antenna when it's picking up signals. It looked for all the world to Melody, like they were eavesdropping on whatever was going on inside the red door. But they themselves weren't listening, Melody realized. They were relaying what they heard to someone else.
"Maleficent," Melody growled bringing out her sword. She jumped out from behind the Heartless and took a swing at the apelike one. The Heartless swung it's shield up to redirect her sward and punched out with it's free hand. The balloon Heartless took a bite at her head. Instantly Melody understood that these were smarter than the normal brand of Heartless. Zazu flew up the pecked at the balloon Heartless, which snapped wildly at the bird. Meanwhile Melody dealt with the Heartless defending itself with it's shield. For the first time she noticed that the shield had a lifelike engraving of a dog's muzzle on it and she cried out when the muzzle suddenly snapped shut on her sword. The Defender knocked into Melody with its shoulder and whipped its shield around, throwing Melody against a wall with its speed. The sword sailed away through the air, but it did not go far before it vanished and reappeared in Melody's hand.
The Heartless paused and stood straight up. It's orblike eyes fixed on her, but it wasn't the Heartless with its wild beast sensory mind staring at Melody. She could feel its master watch her from somewhere deep in the darkness.
"You're not going to get me that easily Maleficent," said Melody and she used the wall to springboard herself into the air and to drive her sword's flower tip through the Heartless's body. For a moment the flower sprouted from the other side, then the Heartless vanished in a swirl of darkness.
Something slapped against the back of her head and Melody fell forward. The small Heartless with batlike wings and goggles that had hit her swung around for a second attack. Melody staggered to her feet when sharp claws seized her arms from behind. She struggled with the Heartless on her own, only glimpsing Zazu's blue feathers whisking outside her line of vision. The flying Heartless in front of her pulled up short and spun off, intimidated by the larger Heartless that were now materializing around the soldier the held her arms. Melody realized that it had her totally defenseless yet the creatures hadn't killed her yet. Then she saw why. A pool of blackness opened up before her and the Heartless shuffled toward it. Straining to see Zazu somewhere Melody cried out to her friend.
"Zazu!"
And was swallowed up by the darkness.
I must be in a ship. The walls were a dark swirling material that shimmered color like a black opal. It was a tight space, the walls very close to her sides but light was coming through the heart shaped window in front of her, where she could see the swirling colors of deep space. The window had two bars crossing it in an X, which Melody recognized as the emblem of the Heartless. The truth set in. She was inside one of the ship Heartless. Why she was alive and where they were taking her Melody could not fathom, so she sat there trying to summon her sword.
But doubt was setting in. If she slashed her way out of the Heartless she would plummet through space and most surely die. Although open space was breathable, the fall would be endless. Even if she failed to hit something and die on impact, hunger would set in eventually. Her only option was to stay put.
She heard the Heartless slash it's arms outside. It sounded agitated. Suddenly something blue shot past the window and Melody heard a familiar shriek. The Heartless began to swing around, knocking Melody against the walls of it's middle. She pulled herself to the window in time to see Zazu swoop under the Heartless' arm and come closer to the window.
"We've come to save you Melody," he called and then duck out of the way as a beam of energy came shooting from above. More Heartless were coming toward the birds. Trickster spiraled up from below and gave the Heartless a sharp peck. Zazu's voice called from nearby.
"As soon as they land wherever they are going, we shall aid you in your escape."
The little bird sailed past again dodging laser fire from some smaller space Heartless. He failed to avoid Melody's Heartless, clipping him with one of its arms. The hornbill teetered out of the way of more laser fire, but Melody saw a new band of Heartless coming up chasing Trickster. The two bands would trap the birds between them. Near by Hunter slashed his talons through two Heartless and five more came swarming in after him. Melody couldn't watch her friends battle to their deaths. She pulled forth her sword.
Out side the Heartless it appeared as though small flowers were blooming out of the sides and then retracting. Finally the Heartless burst apart and Melody used the force of the blast to catapult herself through the mob of Heartless. She swiped left and right sending Heartless scattering. Then she began to slow. She gave the air a few more slices and began to fall. Air streamed past her making her eyes water and her hair blow. The colors racing past her made the fall as beautiful as it was frightening. Suddenly she heard a cry from above her.
"Melody!"
The birds fell in beside her, not wanted to leave her side. Hunter flew by her head, Zazu beneath, and Trickster at her back, his wings spread wide. Almost in formation the four fell through the air of deep space.
At first Melody thought it was just a new pattern of colors in the sky. There was a glow spreading from below her, blue, like she was falling toward a huge ocean. But then she realized that a golden glow was falling down around her from above and she looked up to see that it was a glow surrounding Hunter. The blue glow spread from Zazu's wings and met with the golden glow. A metallic black trickled in from behind her and Melody saw the glows solidify. The three birds flapped slower and Melody found herself leveling out as a great ship solidified around the four of them. Her feet touched a blue cabin floor that led into a brown cockpit. Out the windows spread two black wings. Zazu and the others landed on the benches that sat below the windows and the one of the two captain chairs.
"How did-" begain the blue bird, but Melody laughed out loud.
She ran her hands over the controls of the ship that was now theirs.
"Things are connected," she said smiling. "Worlds, hearts, and now us. We were truly meant to help the worlds." She turned and hugged her three friends.