Chapter 10: Road to a Hero
The Lanes Between – Jolly Roger
"If the brat defeated the rock titan back when he first got his hands on that Keyblade, what chance does it stand against him now?" Captain Hook asked as he, Maleficent, and Hades stood around the old holographic projector table they used to use back in the old days when it was just the three of them plus Ursula, Oogie, and Jafar hunting the Princesses of Heart while using the Heartless to spread their reign across the known worlds. It felt good to have some of the old gang back together again, he realized as his ship sailed through space towards their next destination.
"Lythos is merely a distraction," Hades replied as the projector showed the three "heroes" who had quickly become a thorn in their sides and remained lodged there for the past three years. "We have multiple spies scouting candidates for our new stronghold. We don't stand a chance at seizing Olympus but making those fools think that we want it as our base will help throw them off our scent, allowing us to take our real prize undetected and unopposed."
"Precisely," Maleficent confirmed as the view once again shifted to show the events currently transpiring in Port Royal. "And with that bumbling oaf Pete leading the other Keyblade wielders on a wild goose chase, we're free to move about unhindered.
"I must say," Hook added as he leaned back in his desk chair, "it's fun having the old gang back together. What's left of us at least. Good riddance to Oogie Boogie but the other three really livened up the place. If only we could get the only one of those three still alive back on our side."
"We made a gamble by sending our old friend to barter with the so-called "Mad Titan," and we lost," the green-skinned witch replied as she deactivated the projector with a wave of her hand. "Now he's been incarcerated in the dungeons of his homeland. Unless our plans for the Book of Prophecies fail and we're forced to resort to Plan B, I have no desire to start a war with his people." The conversation was interrupted when a squeaky voice came over the ship's primitive intercom.
"Captain," Dr. Jacques Von Hamsterviel called from the hold where he was examining the machine they'd found in orbit over Disney Town. "My analysis of the disk is complete and I've found a few things that I believe Maleficent will want to see." After the Jolly Roger and the Flying Dutchman split up near Port Royal, Maleficent had used a corridor of Darkness to acquire a computer that could read the disk they'd found inside the robot, allowing the gerbil – like alien to dissect and study their find.
"Very well," Hook replied. "We'll be down momentarily." He smirked when he noticed Maleficent turn a darker shade of green as Hades leaned over and kissed her on the cheek before the three founding members of what they used to informally call the Hellfire Club headed made their way through the bowels of the ship to see what the mad scientist had found.
Mount Olympus – Mountain Slopes:
"Take that!" Sora shouted as he hurled his Keyblade at the Rock Titan before it came circling back to his hand. Catching up to the beast had taken a few hours of climbing and fighting Heartless along the way, but they'd managed to catch up to the lumbering beast by nightfall before it reached the gates of Olympus. Using a new summon spell the Fairy Godmother had taught him before leaving the Castle of Dreams, the young Keyblade wielder conjured an enchanted train that he, Donald, and Goofy were using to travel around the behemoth to reach its weak points.
I've come a long way since I first got the Keyblade, he thought to himself as he hurled his weapon at the giant's incoming fist, knocking it back as the magic train swerved to avoid its flailing arm. When I first started individual spells took up so much of my energy, but now I'm casting spells and summoning enchanted constructs without even breaking a sweat. Although consummately humble by nature, Sora was still proud of his accomplishments with the Keyblade. Returning his focus to the battle at hand, he continued flinging the Keyblade at the gargantuan stone warrior while Donald blasted it with Firaga spells. Goofy couldn't cast magic and his shield didn't magically return to his hands like the Keyblade did with Sora, so he just held on to the back of the train for dear life.
After a few hours witling away at the titan's armored body, the monster finally fell. The magical train glided back to the ground to let the trio off before disappearing in a flash of light. The three heroes could see their Gummi Ship from here, but before they could resume their trek for their ship, Sora stopped. A few steps further Donald stopped too, leaving Goofy continuing toward their goal, oblivious to his companion's pause. Sora looked around, trying to figure out what was causing the hairs on the back of his neck to stand up. He hadn't felt that way since… his eyes widened.
"Get down!" He hollered as he sprinted forward and tackled his two friends to the ground seconds before a ten-foot long katana slashed through the air where Sora's neck used to be. With reflexes honed from three years of experience he leaped up just in time to block Sephiroth's blade. Donald quickly shot a Blizzaga spell at the silver-haired warrior as Sora blocked another rapid series of strikes. Goofy was the slowest one to get up, barely managing to bring his shield up before Sephiroth brought his blade down. But before the balde made contact, the man paused.
Confused, Goofy hastily backed up to where Sora and Donald stood, forming a circle. For some reason Sephiroth was no longer paying attention to them. Instead, he was looking up at the top of a nearby cliff, as if waiting for something to appear.
"I was wondering when you'd show up," he called out when a blone, spiky-haired man appeared at the top.
"As if I'd let you run loose, Sephiroth," Cloud fired back as he leapt down to face the embodiment of his inner darkness. Words did not need to be said as the battle against Sephiroth quickly evolved from three against one to four against one.
The battle itself lasted a little less than an hour before Sephiroth finally decided to withdraw and fight another day. When he was gone, Sora, Donald, Goofy, and Cloud exchanged greetings as the gods and goddesses of Olympus came down the mountain to congratulate them on their success. Despite the group explaining why they were there and that they needed to hurry to protect the remaining free princesses, it was several hours before the four of them could sneak away from the celebration to discuss what had happened at Disney Town.
"So you guys created a simulation of our first adventure on a computer?" Sora asked to clarify that he understood everything.
"Yeah," Donald replied. "Jiminy found a message at the back of his journal that he didn't write, so we digitized the contents of the journal to solve the mystery."
"And Maleficent stole the computer with the journal on it because she thinks that it's somehow connected to these ancient books that are part of the legend of the Keyblade War?"
"It looks that way," Cloud answered as the quartet walked over to their ships. "Your friends are following Maleficent now, but with both Xehanort and Maleficent running around, we decided that there's no point in worrying about interfering in the affairs of other worlds anymore. Their machinations require us to interfere in order to stop them anyway, and we need all the help we can get."
"Yeah," Goofy agreed as they reached their ship and Donald went inside to get the engine up and running. "We were talking about that on the way up. Hercules already offered to help us, but the problem is the amount of Gummi Ships in the worlds is limited."
"Leon told me he'd talk to Cid about that," Cloud replied as the trio's ship roared to life. The four were just about to say they're goodbyes when they all stopped as they sensed another ripple in the universe. Another princess captured.
"We need to get going," Sora said quickly when they recovered from the shock. "Before any more princesses get captured."
"Good luck," Cloud called out as the three heroes raced aboard their Gummi Ship to find the next princess before Xehanort.
"Thanks," Sora shouted back before the doors closed and the ship took off, heading off to make up for lost time. He could only hope that this time they might actually get lucky.
Before anyone asks, the reason Cloud shows up will be explained when we switch back to Riku, Mickey, Aqua, Lea, and Kairi next chapter.
I know my story may seem a little light on the action but there are three reasons of that.
1) When writing this story I'm more concerned with the details of the plot than with the small field battles.
2) Other than the rock titan we know nothing about what the world bosses will be so I choose to leave the specifics of Heartless to the reader's imagination.
3) Combined with not knowing anything about bosses, it'd be hard to write a beat-by-beat action scene for something that I don't know anything about.
The reason I glossed over the first Sephiroth battle is because he's so & #$ing hard to defeat in the actual game I don't think I could do him justice in a fight scene yet. That and since it's supposed to be Sora Donald and Goofy barely hanging on as he ambushes them, I wanted to focus more on the trio's scrambling to defend themselves until Cloud shows up. Rest assured though the more Sephiroth shows up, the more detailed his fight scenes will be written. And the major action scenes at the end (the long awaited No Holds Bared Beatdown of Xehanort and his minions for instance) will be lengthy, detailed, and epic.