Final chapter here – and so the story is complete for the second time. I'm much happier with this version than the first version, and so I don't anticipate doing another total rewrite. I will probably keep tweaking this version anyway, though, as long as I keep catching typos or things that I think could be explained better.

And now, I'm very curious – is there anyone who would want to have the original version posted somewhere so that you can compare the two? I don't hate the original version of this story – it was just too short, among other things. The original had a few scenes I really liked that I could not find anyway to transport into the new version. I suppose that might just be a typical outcome from completely rewriting a story.

Anyway, I want to thank everyone who's stuck with this story through a second time. It was a lot of work to rewrite, and I find it very gratifying to have people willing to read the work that I spend so much time on.

As always, I don't own Carebears, but I do claim Hale, Mira, and Floyd. As I look outside at our crazy snowstorm, I wish a Happy Impending Spring to all of you!

Darkest Hearts

by Maelstra

Ch 9: In Finality


As hard as it had been to use the pendant to restore Dark Heart, it was noticeably harder to turn it now. No Heart strained with all the physical strength he could muster in his shadow form. His green gloves kept slipping as he tried to force the pendant which clearly did not want to be turned. Nevertheless, he persevered, and by brute force he made the pendant reach the three-quarters point of its rotation. Then, it would turn no further.

No Heart strained, but then finally released his grip and glared at the pendant. The stone was glowing bright red again, but he suspected that if he left it for too long, the red light would go out, and the pendant would fall. And then he would have to start the whole process all over again.

I can do this. No Heart reset his shoulders in preparation. "I will do this." He clamped his fingers around the triangular shape as tightly as he could manage, and then turned it, leaning to the right and putting all of his body strength into it.

By all his exertions, the pendant rotated a barely perceptible amount.

"Grraaarrrgghh!!!!" No Heart released his grip and smacked the pendant with his fist. It did nothing – not even hurting his hand since a shadow had no sensation in its limbs. No Heart slowly reigned in his anger and considered his situation. Dark Heart is fading away – the only thing I could do to prevent that is to purify the magic in this chamber. With my dark magic, I can do nothing to purify things the only thing I can do is release these crystals' energy and hope that that will help. So, it all comes back to mean that I must find a way to make this accursed pendant finish breaking the spell!

No Heart fidgeted. He knew how the pendant worked – it needed caring to restore stolen caring. But how was No Heart, a self-proclaimed master of evil and hate, supposed to produce the caring necessary to fuel the restoring spell? How could I care – I don't care about anybody –! No Heart cut himself off, realizing that that line of thought would accomplish nothing. I admit that I seem to have feelings, and if I'm honest, I would have to admit that only a dead thing could be completely without feelings . . .

The stone in the triangular pendant began flickering: a failing light, a shrinking window of opportunity.

Okay, okay, so if I want to make this work, I have to care. Fine! I c- . . . I c-ae- . . . I. care. There, see? He grabbed the pendant again and wrenched it counter-clockwise. The pendant moved . . . slightly. The stone lit up fully again, but it still lacked almost a quarter turn to make a full revolution.

Fine. Okay. It's a start – I can admit that I . . . care. But maybe abstract isn't strong enough? Yes . . . I need to be more specific. I . . . care about . . . what? No Heart ran through his mind every familiar thing from his life: his castle, his shadow minions, his spellbooks – none of them elicited any strong emotion. "What do humans . . . care about, anyway?" He tried to remember – then failing that, tried to guess. I think they care about . . . other animate objects. Associates, pets, and the like. No Heart then thought of Beastly and Shrieky. The notion of caring about those two made him shudder. Only carebears could care about them!

He glanced down, peering through the pale crystals, and tried to see how Dark Heart was faring. Then, he caught himself. Why am I checking on him? Whether I can see him or not will not influence how he will fare! And why should I care how he's doing anyway . . . ?

Finally, No Heart had to admit that he was in denial. Okay . . . so I really do care, somewhat, about Dark Heart. I'm not very comfortable with the idea, but I do admit it. Is that good enough? No Heart wrenched the pendant again. The red light became strong once more, but it did not turn. "Grrrrrr." He glanced down through the crystals again at his brother, and saw only a brief glimpse – but it appeared that Dark Heart was starting to become transparent.

"Curse it all! Very well . . . if that's how it must be . . ." No Heart screwed up his courage and braced himself. "I admit that I care about Dark Heart! And, I don't care if the whole world knows it!!" No Heart bellowed. His voice echoed through the chamber, and he thought he heard his own words coming back, taunting him, 'care, care, care.'

He bit back another growl, instead focusing all his attention on the stubborn stone. As before, he grasped the triangular piece as tightly as he could, and threw all his weight into creating torque. Excruciatingly, painfully, irritatingly slowly, it turned. Thirty degrees lacking, and then just ten. Again the rotation became much more difficult, but No Heart refused to give up. Dark Heart, you had better be alright after all I've just gone through!

Suddenly, the pendant rotated freely, and it came free from the central crystal. Streams of blinding light shot out of the golden crystal, and then it shattered in a ultrawhite flare. No Heart covered his eyes – even in the shadow form, they could not take such abuse. He felt like he was falling, so he tried to put more power into levitating – but the weightless sensation persisted. He looked but could see nothing to gage his position from.

Then he slammed into something hard and lost consciousness.


Hugs jumped behind a half-shattered building, trying to hide from the Unspeakable's sight. She had lost sight of Tugs, and most of the others. They had managed to gather a group of ten to go against the Empress . . . but it had been largely unsuccessful. The Empress appeared to be immune to their 'stare,' and had simply called the Unspeakable to swallow those who were annoying her.

The gigantic, slimy monster roared, but it almost sounded like it ended by choking. Hugs could not resist peering around the splintered wood to take a look. The creature was twisting, condensing, and pulling all its limbs closer to its main body.

"Hugs?"

She spun around and saw a small shadow that was looking increasingly like a carebear as the spell wore off. "Tugs! You're alright?"

"I dodged around the monster's other side. I was worried about you . . ."

"I was worried about you, too . . ."

"What's it doing now?" Tugs asked, puzzled at the monster's behavior.

Within a moment, the animate, black blob made a slurping noise and collapsed down to half its previous size. It wailed weakly, then shloomped and shrank down to a much smaller mass. The twin cubs, irresistibly curious now, darted over for a closer look.

The creature was now almost impossible to see above the mountain of rubble and debris it had created. It slurped and shrank once more, reaching the size of a single human. And then it exploded.

White light blanketed the whole area, washing over the entire visible region. As the energy touched the remaining buildings, they crumbled and turned to dust. Hugs and Tugs were surrounded by the light as well, but were completely unharmed. They watched in silent awe as the light dissolved all the debris and all of the visible city as well. After several minutes, the burst of light spent itself out and dissipated. The cubs found themselves standing on a vast plain that stretched out for miles in every direction, with nothing taller than themselves and the few other carebears who had evaded the Empress's monster.

Speaking of the monster, in the spot where it had expired was a brighter sphere of light, almost as tall as the original creature had been. Once the light from the explosion had completely faded away, this ball burst as well. From inside came numerous smaller lights, which each descended to the ground and turned into a solid shape. After a moment, several of the shapes started moving. With an victory shout, Hugs and Tugs rushed over to greet their friends.


Something smelled very pungent and sweet, and No Heart did not like it. He waved his hand around blindly, then finally found the smell to be originating from a gooey mass on his forehead.

"Hey, take it easy. I just thought you needed something for that bump on your head."

No Heart finally decided to open his eyes. Instantly he closed them, then tried to squint. Strangely, the Empress's city seemed a lot brighter now. After his eyes adjusted a little to the brightness, he recognized the blurry figure with a mass of dark hair as Hale. No Heart sat up quickly, then rubbed a finger in the blob on his forehead. He found there was indeed a bruise underneath, but the goo seemed to be mostly cutting any pain. Whatever the ointment was, it stained his green-gloved fingertip a bright purple. No Heart wiped it on an edge of his robe, then looked around to try to orient himself. All he could see was miles of a flat plain covered with silvery sand, with the only breaks in the level being some small shapes off in the distance. "Why did you bring me here?"

"I haven't moved you, or your brother, actually." Hale sat down beside No Heart. "We'll have to ask the others exactly what happened."

"Ngh . . . What's going on?" Dark Heart stirred and slowly opened both eyes.

To No Heart's relief, his twin had fully regained his color, and seemed to be recovering well. "I finished the job with that blasted pendant after you fainted . . . and I'm not sure what happened after that."

Dark Heart stared. Then he sat up and continued staring. Finally, he grinned, "Well, just look at you now."

"What?" No Heart frowned. "Oh, Hale says that goo is just for my bruise . . ."

"No, no, no, that's not what I mean. Hale . . . can you make a mirror?"

Hale could, and he gave a plain, magically generated hand mirror to No Heart.

No Heart immediately understood why his brother was staring. He had already recognized that, at some point, he had unconsciously shifted forms – so, he was not startled to see his green hair or the dark magic tattoos. And No Heart also noted that the blob looked even sillier than he had feared.

But what Dark Heart had unquestionably been staring at were his eyes. "Blue?" No Heart squeaked.

"They look good on you," Dark Heart reassured.

No Heart expected that he would flinch at the mention of 'good' . . . but bizarrely, he felt no reaction at all. Just a memory of how he would have reacted before. "Hm. So, I guess I broke whatever . . . spell you were talking about?"

"Yep. How do you feel now?"

"Confused." No Heart stripped off the purple-stained gloves, and carefully ran his fingers through his hair, checking for other bruises. He seemed to be otherwise unharmed. I guess I did fall at least part of the way – but not all, or I would have been hurt more seriously.

"So, Hale . . ." Dark Heart was adequately satisfied with his brother's well-being for the moment, so now he wanted to get some of his other questions answered. "What exactly are you and Songfellow? You're obviously not really human . . ."

Hale folded his arms in his lap, then looked searchingly at Dark Heart. "We are Sky Fairies. Our race used to do a great deal to help humankind, doing much of the work that the carebears now do: caring for people, and helping them learn to understand their feelings and care for others . . . But, because of the Empress's attacks on us, years ago, we were forced to retreat to the farthest corners of the sky kingdoms. With the exception of Songfellow, the rest of us have had few – if any – interactions with Earth ever since."

"I do remember that part, I'm afraid." Dark Heart sighed. "I'm terribly sorry. We caused your people so much suffering . . ."

"Tch, it's not all your fault," No Heart said, interrupting Dark Heart's attempt to angst. "We . . . were under the Empress's spell and just did whatever she told us to, without thinking. I didn't realize how strong the control was until . . . just now."

"Well, you were under the spell for much longer than I was," Dark Heart commented.

"Yeah . . . Hey! I wonder what happened to that shadow pendant."

"I don't know."

"The vault used to be somewhere around here . . ." No Heart got to his feet and started looking around.

Dark Heart quickly followed suit. "Sheesh, there's nothing here but sand. Maybe since we freed all the shadows, then the pendant couldn't exist anymore."

No Heart rubbed his chin thoughtfully. "That's a reasonable idea." He looked at his fingertips and saw they had turned black. With a grunt, he returned to where he had dropped his gloves, and started using one to wipe off his face.

"I guess I'd better ask Songfellow," Hale mused out loud.

"Huh?" No Heart paused and looked at him. "Ask him what?"

"Never mind. Shall we go see how the others are doing?" He pointed out to where those of the other invasion party were milling around.

"Oh, sure. Whatever," No Heart grunted. He noticed the purple goo was rapidly hardening. At last he gave up poking at it (and just hoped he could find a way to get it off later). No Heart made a quick effort to wipe the swirly, black paint off his arms, then he shoved his gloves into his sleeve.

"Race you," Dark Heart said, shapeshifting into a red hawk. He immediately took off.

"Hey!" No Heart quickly poofed into a similar, but green/violet hawk. "That's cheating! But I'll still win!" He flew like a green blur after his twin.


"I won," No Heart informed Dark Heart once the red-haired twin landed.

"Yeah . . . I can see that." Dark Heart changed to his normal form, gasping for breath but grinning.

"Are you okay?" No Heart grabbed his brother gently by the shoulder.

"Yeah . . . I'm just not totally recovered yet. Don't worry though," he smirked, "I'll beat you for sure next time."

"In your dreams, perhaps . . ."

"Hey, are you two alright?" Songfellow Strum walked over to the twins. He looked perfectly well, and presently wore his white hat with a rakish tilt. "Did your plan to release the shadow vault work out?"

"Uh, yeah. I think so." Dark Heart glanced over at No Heart briefly for confirmation. "Did you guys get rid of that Yu'Ng-er . . . Unspeakable thing?"

Songfellow encompassed the whole plain with a wide gesture. "Apparently all this is the shockwave from it."

"Wow."

Hale finally caught up to them, and immediately went to talk to Songfellow. Meanwhile, several carebears clambered up to join the group. Songfellow's shadow-illusion on them had long worn off, and all were back to their rainbow colored selves. True Heart came up and took charge. "Yes – everything seems to be well now. Thank you, everyone."

"But wait – what about the Empress?" asked Tugs. "Is she gone now?"

No Heart mused, "She would likely be severely weakened by the release of the vault's energy . . . but she was not really dependant on it . . ."

"Probably not," Songfellow replied more firmly. "You see, her evil is like bad feelings: they are always there, lurking in the background, but with good feelings and love, we can keep them away."

"So the Empress will come back?" Hugs asked.

"Oh, eventually. But don't worry – we'll continue doing what we've always done, helping humans and others learn to care and share their feelings. And by doing this, we'll always be on guard and ready to stop the Empress again when she tries to return." True Heart concluded with a warm smile.

A long pause lingered after her words. "Well then . . ." No Heart finally spoke up into the silence. "I suppose I shall be going."

"Going where?" Dark Heart instantly demanded.

". . . Back to my castle."

"Ugh. Why do you want to go back to that creepy old place?"

"Well – it's . . ." No Heart paused. "Oh, I don't know. I suppose I just don't know where else I could go at this point."

"You could always come stay with us," True Heart offered sweetly. Hugs, Tugs, and a dozen other carebears added their accordance.

No Heart winced slightly. "Um . . . I appreciate the sentiments you're offering . . . But I don't think I'm quite ready for that . . ."

"But we'd love to have you!" Hugs said.

No Heart covered his face with one hand. "I know . . ."

Songfellow cleared his throat. "Actually, you guys have another option. Hale has pointed out that since you two are still here, mostly unaltered, that means that you are not creatures originally created by the Empress."

"Yes, we know that," No Heart answered a bit apprehensively. "We both remember a little bit of when she captured us . . ."

"Right," Songfellow continued. "So, perhaps you recall that the Empress captured many of our people. We assumed she just drained them all to create her shadow slaves – but it seems that in your cases, she chose a different tactic."

"So . . . you're saying that we really are like you?" Dark Heart eyes lit up. "I've been wondering for years, since I realized that I wasn't really a human . . ."

"Yes." Songfellow crossed his arms and smiled faintly. "No doubt you used to go by different names . . . but I'm quite convinced now that you are part of our race. And so, I'd like to give you two the option of coming back with us."

"Wow." Dark Heart suddenly frowned. "But wait – would we have to stay there forever? Could we go visit our friends?"

"Of course." Hale rolled his eyes. "We wouldn't keep you as prisoners."

No Heart frowned in thought. "What about Shrieky and Beastly?"

Songfellow laughed. "If they want to come, they are welcome, too. I was already certain before that Shrieky was one of our people."

"Ah. And Beastly? Heh. I don't even know what he is."

Hale answered matter of factly, "He's one of the last members of a race of earth sprites. They were practically legendary for their kind nature and helpfulness."

"You're serious?" No Heart made a strange face. "That hairball . . ."

"We should all be going," True Heart said, cutting into the conversation. "We need to check on the others back in Carealot . . ."

"And help Mira, too!" Hugs piped up.

"Of course. Don't worry," Songfellow assured. "In fact, someone might have already helped her wake up."

The carebears summoned several cloud cars, and started preparing to fly away back home, but Hugs and Tugs hesitated before Dark Heart and his twin.

"Promise you'll come visit us soon?" Tugs asked, coming over to give Dark Heart a hug.

"Of course, Tugs." Dark Heart crouched down to return the hug.

Hugs ran over and joined in the group hug. Then she abruptly turned and gave No Heart a squeeze around the knees. "I'm so glad you turned out to be nice after all!" she chirped.

No Heart flinched, sighed, then patted Hugs on the head. "I'm glad as well."

Hugs released No Heart, and Tugs gave him a quick goodbye hug as well. "Will you come visit us, too?"

"Oh . . ." No Heart frowned and glanced over at his brother, who gave him an encouraging smile. "If you really want me to . . . I suppose I can come by whenever he does."

"Great!" Tugs and Hugs both backed off and waved farewell before True Heart shooed them into a cloudcar. "Take care, then! We'll see you later!" Tugs yelled.

"You take care as well!" Dark Heart answered, waving back enthusiastically.

No Heart waved with only a slight hand movement. "See you . . ."

Songfellow chuckled, then grabbed both the twins with one arm. "What an adventure this has been! I'm really proud of the both of you."

"Are you sure your people will want us?" Dark Heart asked hesitantly. "I mean, after all, we did aid the Empress in attacking you . . ."

"It'll be fine." Songfellow chuckled again. "Don't worry. Besides, in helping us defeat the Empress, you have taught everyone – including myself – a very valuable lesson: you must never forget how much good you can find, even in the darkest of hearts."

The End!