Chapter 7: Deep Cover

Disclaimer: I do not own Kingdom Hearts or the characters of said video game.


"Does anyone know what just happened back there because I'm a bit confused," asked Sora as he looked around the gummi ship cockpit only to see that most of them were as confused as he was, but the less excitable members of the crew were all thinking in a corner, which almost looked like a meeting of mercenaries. "Will the 'uses few words group' please come over here and tell us what you guys are thinking of right now." Sora announced, waving a hand. The muttering stopped, all members of the small group turning their attention to Sora.

"What we were thinking was that the resurgence of Shan Yu and the resurrection of Scar are both related," replied Cloud as he started to type on the computer of the ship to bring up the images of the two and other images that had been taken from the gumi ship of a man with a white mullet and wearing a white coat over black clothes. "This man has always been where we are and it seems like he is targeting you for some strange reason, but it could be revenge since he was once a heartless until he managed to make himself back to what he was. Some of the people who have seen him say that he has the power to bring back those who serve darkness and is the reason for Maleficient's reappearance. We also have two others that you can see in the picture, one of them is a notorious mercenary who goes out to the highest bidder, but he used to be head of the guard squad in Hollow Bastion before it got turned into what it was when we were kids, well all those from Hollow Bastion. We all generally believe him to have been in league with the heartless or that he was paid to keep the gate open that he was supposed to guard."

The pictures went into a mug shot of the notorious, yet to be named mercenary, much to the annoyance of Sora who had been waiting to see the man they had been talking about. The man they saw was a bit of a looker with short blonde hair and a bit of unshaved fuzz under his chin that made him look a little laid back. The most distinguishing feature were his left eye and his lack of a right eye, the former being a very glowing red and the other being covered by a black eye patch that made him look sort of like a pirate. The black leather jacket with a black shirt and topped with black pants and boots said a dangerous man, which, Sora was certain of, he was. The next few pictures were of the mercenary performing missions with a rather sharp katana and saber that were cutting through things from other people, heartless, nobodies, and knights.

"He seems to have a lot of skill for a man who hasn't succeeded once," remarked Sora as he looked at Cloud and Leon and noticed that both of them had solemn looks as if lamenting for something.

"Sora, do you know where I got this scar came from," said Leon as he pointed to the scar across his face and Sora only nodded no. "The man who trained us both to fight was that man; I even hate to say his name right now."

"Bandit, Ban for short," piped up Yuffie as she also stared solemnly. The kunoichi was leaning back comfortably in her chair, hand on her chin as she appeared to think about something intently.

"He gave Leon that scar and he gave me a scar on my back," said Cloud before he pointed at the eye patch in the picture. "We both fought him and I gave him this while Leon cut him good on his back, but he still survived it enough to beat us and leave the world we were currently on. This was our second fight, the first one was a clear victory for him on Hollow Bastion, but he placed us on a transport out of Hollow Bastion with everyone else. I still don't know why he saved me."


At that moment, the infamous Ban was looking at the remnants of his gummi ship before starting to shoot of at the sky with a blind rage while his apprentice was wiping away the writing on the board and then started writing "stop" on the board with large red letters. After a few clips, ban threw the gun into the horizon and pulled out a gummi block that started to reshape the ship back to what it was before. He hated using these because if one person knew he had it they would be asking to borrow it and it would never end. The thing had been his for three easy payments of $19.95, but the fourth payment was a complicated one that was made in Wampon where the mail man was shot to death, the envelope wouldn't seal, and the stamp was in the wrong denomination.

Neko was watching the fascinating block go to work to remake the ship and couldn't wait until he gave her the spare gummi ship with her own repair block. The two had met on the streets of traverse town when ban was coming to check on his former students whom he claimed treated him like he was a father, but Neko could see a bit of pain in his eye as he said this and it slowly became clear to her how he lost his eye. It was Ban who had taught her how to use her own summoning powers to summon up dragons to fight with her and it was him who forged the Dagon sword, which held the summoning stone that belonged to her first summons and still held some of the power. Ban himself had discovered his affinity for ice to create two swords of ice in his hands, a power that had submerged itself until she showed up. It was only a bit of her own potential and he soon found that she could have as much potential in power as the keyblade wielder.

"You don't have to use that anymore, you can talk normally now," said Ban as he got on the ship and got into the pilot's seat of the gummi ship and then plotted a course. "We might have to accomplish some of his next task just to stay on his good side. We don't want to blow our cover."

"But we don't want to run into your old students as well," said Neko as she took the gunner's seat and found that there a certain look on his face of inner torment after she had said those words and realized that the reason he was so torn up over that was because he was being blamed for something. She lowered her head, an upset look on her face as she watched Ban quietly.

"What do you mean by that," asked Ban defensively before he felt her tapping on his eye patch.

"Where exactly did you get this, Ban," asked Neko as she took her hand off of the eye patch and sat back down in her seat to wait for him to answer her with the truth.

"As you may have guessed by now, my relationship with my former students is less than stellar," said Ban calmly as he didn't bother to turn back and look at her, he just looked on into the infinity of space. "It all roots from my original failure to prevent the destruction of Hollow Bastion or the takeover I should say, since it wasn't really destroyed, just overrun by heartless. For right now I can't tell you why I failed because it would hurt so much to say it, but the point is I failed and they lost everything because of that, family and friends. It was only right that they should try to take revenge on me, which they did try to the day that Hollow Bastion fell with terrible success, but two years later they had improved enough to do this to me and the scar on my back. Right now I doubt I could even beat them, but I could still manage to do a good bit of damage to them if a fight ever came on. It's not that I don't believe I deserve to die for my failure, it's that I made a promise that I would live on to find someone and that is why I took this job, because the pay for doing what me doing this is to find that someone. That is all I'll say for now, but I will eventually tell you everything about those events that made me the mercenary I am today."

"I hate to wait," pouted Neko as she sat back in her seat, but she didn't think to lock the seat, which doubled as her bed while Ban took his usual place hanging upside down on the ceiling. "But I guess I have to since you won't give me anything if I force you. So what task do we have to accomplish next or 'try' to accomplish."

"He just sent me the message that they are heading for Port Royal and we are to hand information to a certain individual," said Ban as he switched the ship into gear and then looked at the mission file. "All we're doing is delivering the gold to someone so it seems like we can't do anything to sabotage it other than make the gold pieces go missing, but such a move would only serve to blow our cover and I did not take this job to screw it up. We'll deliver the gold and then I'll wait for further instructions while you find a way to get information on Legat to the keyblade wielder."

"Yeah it would be bad for them to have to find out about our operation so early," said Neko as she picked up her sword where her white dragon and black dragon summons resided in sleep. She rubbed it proudly, swinging it around a good couple of times until Ban snatched it up before it cut him. He held it up, she grabbed for it, and it ended up hitting her head as the gummi ship launched off the ground.

"You'll put your eye or my last eye out," said Ban as he led the gummi ship to it's course.


"You know I wonder why he failed all those times," said Yuffie aloud as she rocked into her seat and talked to Riku. She had decided not to assume the worse of him since he had been the one to save her from a score of heartless the day Hollow Bastion fell and she remembered that he had a lamenting look on his face, as if he were regretting not coming sooner or something. It was when she saw the city being overrun by heartless that she figured out what he was lamenting and when she saw him at the transport she asked him about the city. He just told her to take the ship off their world and to make sure that she got the others to safety. The only other conscious people on the ship were Tifa, Aerith and Cid who was at the controls despite the menacing glare that he was giving Ban at the moment.

"Maybe he wants us to know and next time will get it right so that we can face him," replied Cloud without bothering to look up from over the catalogue he was looking at for gift ideas. Cloud was well educated in everything social, despite his lack of showing it, in everything but gift giving. "Either way you want to look at it, he was still responsible for the fall of Hollow Bastion and afterwards worked for the heartless who destroyed our homes so we know where he stands. The next time we see that traitor we'll bring him to justice, you can count on that and we won't let him get away either. The last time we fought him he barely managed to beat us so we should have surpassed him right now."

"Fine, but you can count me out," replied Yuffie as she sat back in her seat and continued to talk to Riku, but Cloud's eyes immediately picked up interest into the other keyblade wielder who had found something.

"Hey, what's this," asked Sora as he picked up a silver coin that had the image of a wolf on one side and on the other side of it had the coat of arms that was on the old Hollow Bastion flag. Without thinking, the young keyblade wielder flipped it into the air and both Cloud and Leon were taken into a flashback of another, older, but still young man flipping the same coin with a saber in the other hand.