Overcoming the Darkness
Last chapter's closing line:
Then do it! If he's with me, that's all I need. …I know what I need to do.
Chapter Seven: Experimentation
Maleficent returned exactly one hour later, as promised. "Tell me now, child. What is your decision?"
Lita took a deep breath and stood tall. "I will help you, in return for the strength of Darkness and Axel's resurrection."
Maleficent smiled, "An excellent choice indeed. Follow me, my dear."
She opened a dark corridor in front of her and walked through. Lita followed without much thought. They emerged from the corridor in front of the Twilight Town train station. After musing briefly, Lita decided that they came here because there was more room.
Maleficent turned to face her. "Now then. Accept my gift, Lita."
A globe of darkness suddenly encased Lita, and for a moment she tried to fight against it. Then she realized that in order to progress, she'd have to lower her defenses and let it flow into her. She did so and forced herself not to throw her shields back up. She felt it slip through every crack in her walls and melt into the light she still held in her heart. She shuddered as it dimmed and tainted. The darkness was so wrong and so right simultaneously. Her mind couldn't decide which side to believe, the one that told her to quickly shut it out before it dyed her black, or the one that told her it was okay, let it fill her and make her stronger. Eventually, she let her mind go blank and allowed the Darkness surrounding her to do as it wished.
When she awoke some time later, she felt changed and yet the same in a manner she couldn't identify. Maleficent simply told her "experiment" before she left. "You know how to find me," she said. And Lita did. All she had to do was open a corridor and think of Maleficent and she'd travel through it to a location nearby. Of course, she needed to make sure she knew how to open a corridor first.
She held out her hand and thought of the dark passageways she'd been in before. She heard the signature "shoom" sound of a portal opening and looked up to see an open Dark Corridor in front of her. She walked through it and it closed behind her. Then she thought about the clock tower and walked forward in the darkness. Suddenly she found herself atop the tower in the same place she'd been thinking of in her mind. Well, I know how this works now. I'd better be careful not to lose focus in there or a stray thought might send me somewhere completely different from where I want to go.
She portalled herself back down to the main area and decided she needed to see how her new powers worked in combat. However, Heartless rarely came to the train station, and she didn't really want to leave the wide open space. She remembered that Maleficent could summon Heartless in a heartbeat and thought she'd try it herself. She focused and imagined Shadows forming on the ground around her and pulling themselves up into tangible creatures. She opened her eyes and there they were! Exactly as she had pictured them. They stood there rather uncertainly, having seemingly no idea why they had come there. They didn't attack her, so Lita figured it was safe to assume they considered her on their side. She summoned her Keyblade to see how they'd react to it, but gasped upon seeing it.
It was no longer the blade she knew. Instead of silver, it was entirely black. The lion heads on either end were now draconic and appeared ferocious rather than noble. And the other designs on the key had become extremely sharp and dangerous. Part of her heart cried out for her old blade, but she displayed no further reaction.
The Heartless also showed no reaction. They looked at the blade with interest, but did nothing. Lita made a quiet sound of observation and then proceeded to use them as testing dummies. She started attempting all the moves she'd seen Riku do before, and found that she could do all of the offensive ones, especially the one that was like Sliding Dash but with a powerful punch of Dark Energy attached, but she was unable to do anything defensive. She wished she could at least form the Dark Shield move that Riku used on a regular basis but that too eluded her.
Eventually she stopped trying. She'd annoyed the Heartless enough anyway. The powers of Darkness didn't do much against them. The Keyblade itself could still destroy them, but the attacks paired with dark energy didn't hurt them much. That she found very interesting, because Riku was perfectly capable of dispatching Heartless with his power. What was different about hers? Still, they were tired of getting beat on, so she sent them away.
She did feel stronger, but it bothered her that she still felt unsure if she was doing the smart thing. Was darkness really the answer?
