Disclaimer: I do not own Kingdom Hearts or its characters, they belong to Square Enix.
(Edited: 26/07/18)
Chapter 10: Hollow Bastion
Four hours and a cat nap later, we finally arrived in Hollow Bastion. The trio rushed out of their ship to get a glance of the world, I lazily walked out while dragging myself out and scratching the back of my head. Looking around, I gawked at the scenery, sure it was really damaged but it was still pretty to look at.
The sky was a mixture of three colours, orange, pink and purple. A large demolished castle stood before us, it was mainly white in colour with a tall tower still standing, there were other parts of building that were held up by the cranes I could make out. I bet before it was ruined it must've looked beautiful.
"It's Hollow Bastion!" Sora said excitedly.
"Garwsh, it looks kinda different now." Goofy added as he looked around slightly.
"I hope Leon and the gang are doing okay." Donald said. At the mention of one of my favourite Final Fantasy characters I grinned in excitement at the opportunity to meet them. Goofy looked to one of the distant buildings and spotted a pair of Soldiers standing on top of one of the buildings' roof before jumping and disappearing in orbs of darkness.
"Uh-oh. Looks like we're gonna have to do some fightin'." before we headed towards the marketplace.
We sped down the stone steps and arrived at the square, glancing at the shops around us, wooden signs with different images painted in white, including a staff, a shield, a sword and clothing or armour. There was also a shop had coloured pictures of rings above the counter. When we neared a giant freezer I called out for the boys to stop for a moment while I buy a few things. I walked over to the shop opposite to it and purchased a few potions and ethers for fights to come.
We soon walked under a stone archway that had bronze pipes coming out of it and connected to generator like machines. Out of nowhere a cylindrical hologram appeared and started circling us with an orb occasionally appearing in its centre.
"Hey, what's going on?" Donald inquired. I knew right about this time, Yuffie would answer his question.
"That's the town's defence mechanism." A new voice said.
"Right on cue." We looked around to see where he voice came from, we glanced up and found the ninja herself stood on top of one of the ledges beaming at us.
"Yuffie!" Sora exclaimed in surprise. She gave a kind of saluting wave before warning us,
"Look out!" Sora turned his head to spot a Dusk slithering towards him and swiping at the brunet as he summoned the Kingdom Key, missing a swing when it jumped back and four more circled us. For this fight I decided to turn into a velociraptor.
Springing into action, attacking the Nobodies with everything we had with the defence mechanism aiding us. I lunged at one of them and only just managing to tear into its side with my claws. Pouncing on the one I just injured, my teeth sank into its neck and my sickle claws piercing its chest, as it fell to the ground due to my weight. Yanking my head up to taking a chunk of it with me, the Dusk writhed and shook before disappearing in a crackling silvery light.
Turning around, I spotted two Dusks charging at me, just a few mere steps away from me. Before I could get out of the way, one of them managed to rake its hand along the left side of my muzzle, the point tracing the curved underside of my eye and stopping near my earhole and the other inflicted a strong head-butt to my side, sending me flying and causing a pained screech to tear out of me.
Hearing my cry, the others rushed to my aid. Sora lunged at the two Nobodies with his Keyblade, managing to nick one of them on the arm.
Both of them backed off, dodging my friend's weapon. I took this chance to lunge at one of the Nobodies and tear it to pieces as Sora finished off the second. I looked around and when I saw that there weren't any enemies left, I let out a sigh of relief as I gingerly felt the cut on my face. My clawed fingers retracting, the pads dipped with red.
"Aimée, are you okay?" Sora asked, I looked up at my friend from my now three foot stature and gave a shaky 'no'. The bleeding was starting to slow down but I needed to heal fast before it got infected. A glint of silver caught my eye, looking up revealed Sora had his Keyblade pointed at me which caused me to take a step back.
"Heal!" He proclaimed. A green glow emitted from the blade, wisps of magic sprouted out and making contact with my face. I closed my eyes reflexively, only slowly opening them when I felt warmth spreading through the cut on my face. The tepid heat lingering until dissipating. Patting the spot where my injury should have been, surprisingly, I was met with no stinging or blood in sight. Wide-eyed, I gazed up at Sora and quietly uttered a thank you to which he smiled in kind.
I directed my gaze up to the ninja when she jumped down to greet us,
"Hey, you guys!" she waved before jumping off the ledge, landing in front of us with a light thud. "I see you're still in top form." Sora beat a fist against his chest and replied cockily,
"What'd you expect? Looks like you're doing okay." Yuffie placed her hands on her hips and mimicked what he'd just said,
"Well, what'd YOU expect?"
"How are the others?" Donald asked.
"Great!" She answered. The ninja looked down at me curiously and asked,
"Who're you and what are you?" I blinked and said as I pointed to myself with a clawed finger,
"I'm Aimée. It's a pleasure to meet you, Yuffie. And right now I-I'm a velociraptor." She raised a brow. The woman hopped back in surprise when I morphed back.
"Hey, Yuffie. Have you seen the King and Riku?"
"Nope." She said as she began walking off, Sora slumped in disappointment. Yuffie turned around to face us and added, "But I had a feeling I'd see you guys again." the Keyblade Master perked up a bit then quoted what Leon had said to him a year ago and mimicking his movements.
"'We may never meet again, but we'll never forget each other.'" The ninja giggled amused,
"Is that supposed to be Leon?" she inquired. We started snickering as the brunet stood rather proudly about his impression of his other friend. "Everybody's working on stuff over at Merlin's house. C'mon!" with that being said she took off to the wizard's home. Soon after, we did too, although we had to get past more Heartless along the way. We didn't have far to go it was literally just around the corner. I could feel my body tensing with anticipation as I couldn't wait to meet the rest of the Final Fantasy gang but I was also nervous.
We arrived shortly after and when we opened the wooden door, we were greeted by a cheerful Yuffie.
"Meet the Hollow Bastion Restoration Committee!" she gestured to three individuals standing in front of a computer, they turned around to face us and began greeting us. Starting with Aerith.
"We missed you!" Then Cid.
"Well, if you ain't in top shape." And finally Leon.
"I knew it." The three boys and two girls, including me, ran forward to close the distance between, though I partially hid myself behind the others out of shyness.
"Knew what?" Sora asked curiously. Leon filled him in,
"A while back, everyone suddenly remembered you guys, all at the same time." Sora, Donald and Goofy jumped back aghast and hurt at having been forgotten. In turn, the boys' reason of being asleep for a year made everyone shoot them incredulous looks.
The rest of them who hadn't met me introduced themselves as I did to them. When Leon had told that Hollow Bastion has got problems new problems, we instantly deduced it was the Heartless and Nobodies.
After another exchange, we traversed to the borough with Leon. Looking over the stone balcony sent a shiver down my spine. Where Maleficent's headquarters stood, a mass of ink black bodies and beady yellow eyes filled the chasm surrounding it. Heartless, thousands of them. Leon began explaining,
"We want to restore Hollow Bastion to what it used to be. Who knows – maybe even something better. There's still a lot to do, but I'm sure we can handle everything- Except... for that..." he then pointed to the ground below, "And that." he was referring to the two Dusks that were slinking their way to the gorge.
"We'll handle 'em." Sora assured. Leon smiled and replied,
"Well, that's good to hear. So, Sora. Do you know what's going on then?" Sora then told him the situation at hand,
"There's this guy, Pete, who's been going around plotting with the Heartless. But he's not smart enough to tie his own shoes. The ones we need to worry about are the Nobodies."
"And those Organization XIII guys in charge, too!" Goofy added. A deep, almost echoing voice chimed,
"You called?" We looked around to find the source but when we could find none, we headed back into the main part of the bailey where we drew our weapons. Another joined in,
"You're doing well." Then the first one spoke again,
"This calls for a celebration..." after that, a group of Dusks appeared before us. The gates began closing, denying any form of entry or exit. The Nobodies immediately headed for the iron bars that blocked them and we gave chase, hacking at them with all we had.
Donald and Goofy were defending the gate while I helped Sora and Leon with getting rid of these pesky Dusks. Things just started getting tougher when a new caste showed up, the Samurais.
After a few close shaves with the end of several katanas and some minor scrapes we finally managed to fend off the remaining few. Once the threat was gone, we headed out to the exit so we could meet Organization XIII face to face.