Her feet try to plaster to the ground, to keep her from moving. But the Morning Star's attack is far stronger than she can handle without the help of a barrier. The spikes from the mace of its hand threatens to push closer to her and before they dare to graze her body, she lets go of all her strength. The mace continues its swing and sends Sam flying backwards.

"Aah!"

The cry rips from her throat as she hits the ground, bouncing slightly while her Keyblade slips from her grasp. Shock waves of pain thunder through her body and she wishes it would just stop. She can't even manage to get up yet. All she can do is lean on her left arm and prop herself up the best she can. Her breath comes out in ragged pants as she tries to get her head to stop throbbing and spinning all at the same time. Her eyes glance about the area in search of her Keyblade. But she doesn't find it or rather she can't find the need to worry about it.

"Sam, are you okay?"

She looks from the Morning Star to Terra and her eyes widen. She wants to warn him, save him from what is about to happen. But she can't make a sound. Her lips part yet nothing comes out. Sam can only stare at the Spring Metal floating behind Terra as a tornado begins to brew with it being the eye of the storm. Her breath catches in her throat as the other Morning Star pulls its tiny arms inside like the other and extends his arms with the maces on the end. It hobbles closer to Terra before winding one back and slinging it towards him.

Terra has better senses than she thought. Even still, his guard does nothing but keep the damage to a minimum. He grits his teeth as he's sent skidding backward and straight into the tornado that's getting larger by the second. Terra is caught in the blast and is sent flying up into the air from the sheer force of the wind. A second later he plummets back to the ground and hits it with a sickening thud. One that has Sam horrified to the point where her blood runs cold at first.

That is until she sees the Spring Metal preparing for another attack and the Morning Star backing off to slip into a spinning stance. Sam shoves herself up to her feet and summons her Keyblade back into her grasp. She slashes at the Armored Knight running forward her and jumps up, using it as a spring board. The extra leverage has her closer to Terra when she hits the ground running.

The Morning Star seems to lock onto her, not pleased that she's going to interfere. She notices it out of peripheral and spins around. Her Keyblade draws up just as the Morning Star spins toward her and slams into her guard. This throws her backward as it comes to a stop. She falls near Terra but quickly drops into a roll and launches back up onto her feet. Glancing to the right she notices the Spring Metal is about to launch an attack. Without thinking she throws her arm to the side, pointing Spellbook straight at the Heartless and sending out a Thundara spell. It zaps against the Spring Metal and dazes it, giving both Terra and Sam just enough time to gather themselves.

Sam hurries over to him and extends a hand and helps him up. Terra takes in their situation and realizes that this is far from an appropriate training mission. The Spring Metal behind them is still struggling to straighten itself out of the paralyzation the lightning strike caused. However, the two Morning Stars and six Armored Knights aren't having any trouble at all.

Terra glances over to her, "Follow my attack."

She nods and the second he takes note of it, he's running off to the closest Morning Star. The end of his Keyblade swings up and slashes across the Heartless' front before Terra brings it back down. As he jumps past it to start slashing at the Armored Knights that have gotten too close, she launches a Blizzard spell before stabbing at it. The large Heartless vanishes and she runs toward Terra as well as putting safe distance between them and the Spring Metal.

He swings his Keyblade in an upward swipe, jumping at the last second. The Armored Knight is flung back down to the ground and a second later Terra's Keyblade collides with it, sending a shock wave of energy and spikes of earth throwing two others back and destroying the one. Sam summons a Magnet spell that pulls together remaining three that dare to surge toward Terra. The smash together as the spell gradually inflicts small bouts of damage.

Sam runs up beside Terra only for him to throw out his arm, keeping her behind him. A second later he throws up his Keyblade in a guard as the last Morning Star bounces off of it. She runs forward once Terra lets down his guard; slashing in a four strike combo against the Heartless. Just as she jumps backward Terra dashes through it in a dark haze, destroying it.

As Terra rights himself, Sam is already swiveling back around on her heel. Her barrier comes to life and blocks the attacks by the Armored Knights. The counterattack of light destroys only one of them and sends the rest skidding backward. Terra runs by her and swings his Keyblade while turning partly. The barreling slash destroys two more and just as Terra prepares to take out the remaining two, a large Fira swirls by him and does the job first. He glances back with an approving smile before nodding for her to join him as they turn all their attention to the Spring Metal.

Terra rushes in first and takes advantage of the fact that it's hovering closer to the ground. He does an upper slash that has large bouts of earth coming up and smacking against the Spring Metal. As he jumps up into the air, preparing to slash back down, Sam readies a Fira spell that slams into the ground below the Heartless. The Fira creates a small explosion that has the Heartless dazed and struggling to kick up a tornado to defend itself.

But it's too late. Terra is already sailing back down. His Keyblade slashes against the Heartless and destroys any hopes it had of trying to fight back. Just as Terra's feet hit the ground, Sam is jumping up in a spinning slash to finish it off. By the time her feet touch back down the Spring Metal is no more. They catch their breath and brush themselves off. They ache and surely need a Cure or two to make things bearable on their burning muscles.

Yet when they turn to each other there's nothing but smiles on their faces. Terra chuckles, "You handled that pretty well."

Her grin mirrors his own or at least until he plops onto the ground. Sam rushes over to him and sends out a Cure. The green light falls over him and begins to patch up any small scraps and make his body ache less. She laughs, "I guess we're even now. Those were a lot bigger than the normal big-headed rats though."

Terra stares up at her and Sam isn't sure if it's with worry or not. Either way she knows that her words surely brought their argument back to his mind as it did hers. She's never fought Shadows around him and that's the only telling sign. Especially as she watches it slowly click inside his mind. Sam hurries to think of something as she takes a step back to allow him to stand. But she can't think of anything and Terra seems to be caught in deep thinking, even as he looks up at her.

"Who are you?"

The look on his face is one she can't discern between. It's caught in between anger and confusion – possibly frustration. She simply doesn't know what to do and it frightens her. Even more so that she can't grasp at anything good that can come from this. Sam takes another step away from him as he quickly rises to his feet. "I... I'm-"

"Sam." His strong tone silence her, makes her feel as though she's tinier than any bug. He steps closer to her with slightly narrowed eyes. "Who are you?"