Chapter 8: A new start
"The importance lies not within the ability of never falling, but in the knowledge of how to land in order to always get back up again." (Words of wisdom within the teachings of martial arts)
"Hey, I think he's waking up! Mom! Get the soup warmed up!"
Sora grimaced at the sound.
He was hurting all over; in his muscles, in his joints, in his bones… His skin felt like a blanket of soreness, and his head felt like it had been banged hard against something unfriendly for quite some time. A slight groan escaped his lips as he forced his eyelids apart and then tried hard to focus in the sudden light against his eyes. Moving towards him was a blurry figure and Sora blinked a couple of times before he could see the guy clearly.
"Welcome back to the world of the living!" the stranger said with a smile on his lips.
Sora figured the guy was about the same age as him, perhaps a bit younger. He had brown hair cut short on the sides, revealing a gold ring hanging from his left ear, but it was kept long on top and at the neck, Sora spotted a thin braid. The clothes matched his hair in color, all being in a shade of brown; a dark and much worn leather jacket with buckles at the front, a tan shirt underneath this and lighter colored pants with wide legs that just about covered the top of the calf high dark brown boots.
The brown clad guy sat himself down at the foot end of the bed Sora was in.
"I got kind of worried there for a while, you were quite cold when I found you, you know."
Sora slowly raised himself up on his arms, feeling way older than his 18 years, and returned the smile.
"Thanks, I think," he said, his voice raspy as if he'd been screaming hard for an hour or so. "Uhm, where am I?"
The other guy smiled apologetically.
"Sorry about that," he said and patted the wooden bedpost beside him. "You're at my mom's place, The Benbow Inn. I found you lying unconscious out in the swamps and brought you here. It's no hospital, but at least we've got good beds and food."
"Oh," Sora replied, thinking hard as he tried to remember what had happened that had brought him here.
He had been taken by the darkness. The heartless created liquid matter had been ripping at him from all sides and he had screamed as it had reached for the scar over his heart. It had hurt something fierce, a cold so freezing it felt burning at the touch and sharp claws without owners had made invisible scars along his entire body.
But just as he'd been about to give in to the prodding touches, the keyblade had materialized itself. Sora, who'd just about forgotten all about the weapon in the midst of all the pain, had grabbed the hilt as the last hope of a way out and without him doing anything, the blade had opened up a crack in the darkness, showing him a world of more colors on the other side. Not caring to look at what kind of place it was, Sora had desperately flung himself through the opening, knowing that it at least had to be better than staying in the darkness. He remembered hitting something soft and hearing a splash of water, but that was the last memory he had before waking up in this bed.
"Are you ok, buddy? You still look a bit pale, you know," the guy in brown said, looking a bit worried.
Sora slowly shook his head.
"Nah, just a bit dizzy," Sora replied.
"Alright," the other said, not entirely convinced. "I'm Jim Hawkins, by the way."
"Errr, I'm Sora," Sora said, a bit unsure of what more to add.
"So, Sora, mind telling me what happened? Were you mugged or something? I couldn't find any bags or stuff like that where you were, so if you had anything with you, I'm sad to say you might not get it back."
Sora just shook his head.
"I didn't… I just… fell."
Jim narrowed his pale blue eyes at this and leaned a bit closer.
"Fell? From where, a space ship? You were unconscious!"
Turning his eyes away, Sora ransacked his brain for an explanation that would do, but couldn't find any that fit. So he settled for a halfway truth, seeing as Jim, from his comment, seemed to be a bit accustomed to the thought of worlds other than his own.
"I… I don't really know. All I know is that in one minute, I was fighting off enemies invading my home islands, and then I tripped over something and fell into an opening, landing here, wherever here is."
"Sounds like a warp portal," Jim said, lowering his eyebrows in thought and proving Sora's assumptions right. "I've seen one once, so I bet there has to be other forms of it as well. Who were those enemies you spoke of?"
"Darkness come alive," Sora replied without hesitation, figuring he might as well give the guy a fair warning of what might come.
"Say what?"
"They are called heartless," Sora explained. "They look more or less like moving shadows with glowing yellow eyes. The first ones were created out of the depths of darkness in peoples' hearts, and they are what's left after a person loses their heart to them. They steal peoples' hearts in a try to regain their own lost light, but if you've turned into a heartless you won't turn back unless you get back your own heart. But as far as I know, that's only happened once."
Jim stared at him with wide eyes as he listened.
"You seem to know a lot about this…"
Sora nodded slowly, a strange sadness creeping into his features.
"You're bound to pick up a few things when you've spent two years fighting them."
Jim went silent for a moment at this, reflecting upon the thought of having to join such a war at his age. This guy sure carried a lot of surprises with him. If all that he said was true, that was.
"You said there was someone who'd managed to turn back from being a heartless," he said after a while, his eyes returning to Sora's and his facial expression telling of a hope to change the subject into something more optimistic. "Someone you know?"
Sora hesitated for a moment, then decided he should keep to the truth.
"Yeah, you could say that," he said and unzipped the red top he was still wearing.
"Who was it?" Jim asked, curiosity coloring his voice.
Sora opened the top up and Jim's eyes widened when the star shaped scar on his chest was visible.
"Me," he said.
The shock in Jim's eyes was easy to tell and Sora almost regretted having told him, but he kept his eyes at him while he zipped the top closed again.
Jim, recognizing a touchy subject when he faced it, decided to leave the rest of his questions concerning it for later. Instead, he picked up a thread of the conversation that he'd still missed to follow up.
"You said you were fighting them, so I guess there's at least some way of defeating them, right?" he asked, a tiny shine of hope noticeable in his eyes.
"You can't fight them with any ordinary weapons," Sora commented, glad to turn the attention away from his own tragedy for a while. "But yes, you can fight them. What it takes is a strong heart and magic," Sora said as he slowly swung his legs over the side of the bed, careful not to spin too fast for his still hurting head.
He found his yellow shoes at the floor, somewhat stained by spots of dried mud, and started putting them back on.
"Magic?" Jim asked, doubt sneaking into his voice. "Are you kidding me?"
Sora finished buckling his shoes and sat up straight to look at him, his face as serious as ever, as he locked his eyes on Jim's.
"I'm serious. Magic from the light inside of your heart creates the most powerful weapons against the darkness that the heartless come from."
As he saw the still doubtful look in Jim's face, Sora sighed and held out his hand in concentration.
The keyblade was in his hand within a second, appearing in a flash of bright light and slightly glowing in the dim light of the room they were in.
Jim almost fell off the bed, staring in wide eyed surprise at the weapon now fully materialized in Sora's hand.
"Wow…" he breathed out as he gathered himself.
Sora couldn't help slipping a smile onto his lips.
"This," he said with an inclination towards the weapon in his hand, " is a keyblade. It's the one weapon able to release the stolen hearts from the heartless it hits, and in so doing, completely erasing the creature from existence. If it is cut down by any other weapon, be it ever so effective, the heartless will sooner or later regenerate itself and continue its pursuit of the hearts of others."
"So how do you get one of those?" Jim asked, his eyes still fixed on the keyblade.
Sora's smile faltered.
"You're not able to choose. The weapon chooses you, when the time comes," he explained, letting the Kingdom Key slowly go back inside him in another burst of light. "I don't really know how it works; just that it's the way it is. A gift… and a curse…"
Jim nodded as if in understanding and Sora was thankful for it. The brown haired teen reminded him, in a way, a lot of himself, the way he was about four years ago, before his seemingly never ending quest had begun. For all that he knew, the guy beside him could very well become a new and important friend, and he sure could use one right now.
"Oh, so you're looking for your friends?" Dr. Delbert Doppler asked while his dark eyes kept studying Sora as if he was an exhibition object of highest interest. They were standing in the big dining area at the entrance floor of the Benbow Inn, for the moment an empty room, save the three of them. Jim had explained that it was low season and that the few guests they had were sleeping at this hour.
Sora was still a bit dizzy from his headache and his body still felt more or less sore all over, but after having eaten a bowl of soup and a piece of bread he had felt strong enough to stand on his feet. Once the stranded teen had told Jim about his plan to try and find his friends, he had helped him downstairs to meet with Dr. Doppler, a friend of the family and, most of all, a man with a great heart.
The doctor (a science related title, rather than one of a person dedicated to the business of healing others, Sora had learned) was an interesting mix between human and dog, the later characteristics shown in his large dog-nose and the hanging triangular ears on each side of his head. In more or less all other means he looked human, from the dark brown hair held back in a pony tail, to his white shirt and brown vest, tan tailored pants and brown leather shoes.
To be honest, Sora had at first been a bit surprised by the man's appearance, not expecting this world to be one where different species of people interacted. But after having met two so strange fellows as Donald Duck and Goofy Goof, Sora had gotten used to seeing people of a different kind of heritage and quickly accepted the strange features. This had made it so that he wasn't all that surprised as the doctor's wife, Captain Amelia, showed up with one of their kids on her arm.
The woman was what could be best described as a humanoid, tall and very slim fit cat, without a tail. She was dressed in a tailored suit of navy blue and white with gold details. Her red hair was short and slightly curled over the big cat ears and contrasted sharply against her bright green eyes.
"If you're looking for someone, then the best place to go would be the Montessor Space Port," she said briskly, patting her somewhat distracted mate on the head as she swept by them, disappearing into the kitchen to talk with Jim's mom.
Sora turned to Jim, who was standing beside him.
"Where's that?"
This question caused the doctor in front of them to raise his dark brown eyebrows in surprise.
"You mean you don't know? Dear boy, how did you get to Montessor if you didn't pass the port?" he asked.
Jim and Sora realized they hadn't told him all of it yet and Sora decided to make the story as short and easy as possible.
"My coming here wasn't planned. My world was attacked by an enemy called the heartless, Jim can explain it all later," Sora said. "I fell through one of their portals and just happened to land here. Right now, I want to find a way to get back home, or if that's not possible, at least see if I can find my friends."
"And what makes you think they'd be here then?" Dr. Doppler asked, too perplexed by this rushed information to ask more about the whole nature of the heartless.
Sora shrugged.
"Honestly, I don't know if they are," Sora answered honestly. "I'm just hoping that they are. Since I landed here, my best guess as to where they could have gone if they followed through another portal; would be here. If that's not the case, I'll find a way to get to where they are, no matter where that'll be."
At this, both the doctor and Jim looked at him askance.
"You seem surprisingly sure of that," Dr. Doppler noted and pushed up his tiny glasses to the root of his snout-like nose.
"Well, I've been through something like this before, and I found them back then, so I guess I'll find them this time as well. I don't know anything for sure, but the least I can do is keep hoping and search for ways to find them."
A look of surprised admiration took place in the dog-like man's face, and he smiled approvingly.
"Then at least we can try our best to help you on your crest…errr… I mean quest," he said and gave Sora his hand to shake.
Sora took the offered hand in a firm grip and smiled back.
"Thanks! I appreciate it. By the way, Jim, tell your mom I'll do my best to repay her for her hospitality as soon as I can," he said, turning his face to his new friend.
Jim silently shook his head.
"Don't worry about it. She's happy to help a person in need when she finds one," he said with a smirk. "Besides, we've got enough to keep us going, with all the travelers passing the Space Port."
"Speaking of which," Sora cut in, remembering he hadn't gotten a clear answer on his previous question," where is this port, and how do I get there?"
Dr. Doppler pointed with a thumb in the main direction of the large window behind him.
"If you turn off the hologrammatic… hologrophic… erm, holographic shades, you'll be able to see the port in the sky," he said, stumbling over his words in a manner that Sora found a bit funny.
Sora went over to the window, showing a sunbathed field of rainbow colored flowers underneath a clear blue summer sky. He got some help from Jim to partly turn off the shades, revealing a much more grey scenery and a night sky filled with stars.
"It's over there," Jim said and pointed at what looked like a crescent moon and Sora blinked in wonder.
"So, how do I get there?" he asked, keeping his eyes at the distant port in the sky.
"Solar sail raft or the likes of it," Jim said and turned the hologram back on. "I've got a small vessel we could use, but it's too late to go tonight. We can get up there early tomorrow morning."
Sora looked at the illusion covering the large window and forced back an exasperated sigh. He was worried for Kairi and Riku and wondered what had happened to them since he let go of their hands. He figured that the heartless without a doubt had taken the islands, making a try to find a way back home pretty un-necessary. The masses they'd come in were far too great to have been defeated by anything less than an army. Had he and Riku been in top shape, then maybe they could have done something, but as it was, neither of them had used their powers actively for two years, which made them more or less just as capable as Kairi, who'd never used her keyblade for more than one fight.
The feeling of loss as he thought about them weighed down heavily on his heart and unaware of doing it, Sora lifted a hand and put it to his chest, lightly pressing down on the scar to ease the pain.
Jim looked at him with a worried expression in his eyes.
"Are you ok?"
Sora snapped out of his thoughts and moved the hand to the back of his neck.
"Uhm, yeah, just a little tired I guess."
"Does it hurt much?" Jim asked, nodding towards Sora's chest.
Looking at Jim's troubled face, Sora realized that the guy actually did care and wasn't just asking. Just like so many times before, Sora had had no problem with making a new friend on a world far away from his own. Something about this ability, however useful it was, felt strange. Especially since his old friends back at Destiny Islands had shied away from him.
"Sometimes," he answered Jim honestly. "Other times I just feel empty."
"You miss them, huh?"
Sora nodded and stared blankly at the false view the window showed him.
"They're all I have," he said silently.
Suddenly one of the flowers on the imaginary field seemed to move and Sora blinked in surprise as it swelled out towards him, for a minute hovering in the air right in front of his nose, before its petals melted together into one, fist sized blob of dark pink goo of some sort. As the hovering little lump of see-through matter opened its large, compassionate eyes, Sora realized that this was actually a living creature.
"Oh, so that's where you were hiding, Morph!" Jim said with a smile at the pink thing still hovering in front of Sora.
Morph, as Jim had called it, only had eyes for Sora though, and with a sad expression it suddenly broke out in a wail, tears showing below its closed eyes.
"Errr, there, there, don't cry," Sora hummed in a calm voice and cupped one of his hands around the crying pink blob.
Morph sniffled and looked at him again, forcing a smile onto its face.
"That's the spirit!" Sora said encouragingly and smiled.
Jim chuckled.
"Morph's kind of empathic. He's mostly all giggles and smiles and full of energy, but if someone's sad, he gets sort of over dramatic."
Sora felt his cheeks heating for a moment and looked the little creature in the eyes.
"I'm sorry for being such a depressive bastard at the moment," he said and patted Morph on the head. "No hard feelings?"
In reply, the pink little creature swirled up out of his hand with a giggle, licked Sora in his face with an enlarged tongue, before speeding off towards Jim, circling his head once, then continued into the kitchen.
Sora blinked in surprise, then couldn't help letting out an amused, hearty laugh, which Jim joined in on.
"That's Morph for ya'," Jim said, still smiling a moment later. "Can't really stay sad or gloomy for long when he's around."
"Where'd you find him?" Sora asked, still having a hard time not to giggle.
"I got him from a great friend of mine who had to go away for some time. He sort of gave Morph the mission of not letting me feel all too lonely in his absence," Jim said, a slight smile on his face and his eyes filled with a warm emotion that made Sora think of his own feelings towards his friends.
"Did it work?" Sora asked.
Jim nodded.
"Yeah, sort of. At first I almost couldn't bear the thought of not seeing him every day, but Morph made it all better. Having Morph around reminds me of him and makes me wanna' keep on going, so that when he comes back, he'll be just as proud of me as he was when he left."
Sora nodded in understanding. During two years of war against the darkness, he too had experienced moments of wishing to just give up. At the beginning, Kairi's heart had lent him the strength needed to keep on going, and after that, the thalassa shell charm she'd given him had served as a reminder of just why he was fighting, and of the fact that there still was a place for him in the world, where someone waited for him to come home.
"We all fall down on our knees sometimes," Dr. Doppler suddenly said from behind their backs and they turned around to meet his softly smiling appearance. "But no matter how many times you fall, you can always get back up."
He put a hand on each of their shoulders and looked at both of them in turns.
"So if the two of you are finished licking your wounds, what do you say of making up a plan for tomorrow, hmm?"
The two teens looked at him, then at each other in silence for a few seconds, before they burst out in laughter.
Sora suddenly felt warm inside, something clicking into place as he walked towards the kitchen with his new friends to meet with the two women in the kitchen and get some advice. He felt… happy. Despite the tragedy of his situation in total, he had found a place of peace, telling him it was alright to just be him. He looked at Jim and Morph with a smile as the little pink creature morphed itself into a miniature copy of the teen, teasing him to chase it.
In that moment, Sora knew with a heartfelt certainty, that he was going to make it back to his friends. He was going to rise back up, because he had friends who would support him and believe in him.
