Heyas: Well, sort of short chapter. Not much besides a fight scene; it's a transitory chapter, between worlds. Also, I'd like to remind everyone this takes place about four to five hundred years after KH2, so everytime you see a familair weapon or whatever, don't assume it's the same person. Sephy is the exception, as he absorbed Cloud to complete himself and became the Angel of the Abyss, making him a nigh-immortal god. Also, I have a sub-theme going of important unique weapons. People may come and go, but some powers are eternal. The Keyblade is one example, as is Ocean Nocturne, Xencarsse's (formerly Demyx's) Sitar, or Lionheart, the famous gunblade.
Chapter 11: Stolen Friends
Daxtin awoke to a pounding in his head and the salty metallic tang of blood in his mouth. He opened his eyes to the dimly lit room of the mansion's secret basement. Wiping a hand across his face, he felt dried blood crumble off onto the floor in little black flakes. How long had he been lying there?
Sitting up, he winced as he put too much pressure on his left hand which ached something fierce. Scrabbling inside his coat, he pulled out one of the potions he had bought while they were in Twilight Town, popping off the cap and chugging it down. It tasted strange and tingly, and instantly he could feel the aches lessening in his body.
Across the room came a muffled groan. Getting up, he hurried over as he saw the crumpled form of Anya lying against one wall. As he leaned over and sat her up, asking if she was okay and checking her wounds, he wondered where Kairi was.
Then he remembered.
That man, the man from Organization XIII, had taken her. He had failed to protect her; against one man, he had fallen so easily. Was he really so weak? Shaking his head, he concentrated on the present situation.
The slash across Anya's chest had mostly stopped bleeding into her shirt, but the bullet hole in her shoulder was still oozing sluggishly.
"Here, I've got some potions," he said, rooting around in his coat again, stopping as the young girl raised a hand and grabbed his arm.
"Don't bother. I've got this," she said wearily. Closing her eyes, he felt her fingers tighten on his wrist as she concentrated. Slowly, before his eyes, tendrils of darkness slithered out of her wounds, like so many hidden snakes. Across the bloody slash they seeped into her white shirt, absorbing the blood while other strands of black knit her wound together again, closing over in a clean sheet of white skin, unmarred in any way. As they did, other wisps of shadow worked inside her shoulder wound until, little by little, they pushed out the bullet, which fell to the floor with a faint metallic ringing. Then the bleeding stopped, and soon that wound too closed over. Finally, strands of darkness knit together over her clothes, repairing the holes, the ones on her shirt fading to white as they finished. When she stood, there was no indication that she had ever been wounded, though she looked tired and worn out from the effort. "So now what?"
"We go after her," answered Daxtin with more confidence than he felt. Getting to his feet, he walked over to the portal of darkness that still pulsed and glowed in the corner. "Whatever comes, whatever happens… I will have answers. And this time, I will protect Kairi."
This said he stepped forwards and into the unknown.
Inside the portal was the familiar flare and shine of millions of colors as symbols indecipherable flew this way and that in the nothing. They walked for what seemed an eternity until finally, in the distance, appeared the portal that would take them to the World That Never Was. As they came closer, they could see a figure standing in the way. However, rather than the expected black cloak menace, this figure was shorter and wore a short sleeved jacket over his shirt and mismatched pants. His lanky brown hair hung down low, threatening to try and cover one side of his face, and his bright blue eyes shone with an intense determination as he stared forwards at them. In his hand he held the Kingdom Key, its silver length and gold guard shining and flickering wildly in the light of nothing.
"I know who you are now," said Kir darkly as Daxtin and Anya approached. "You're his other side. The other side of his heart."
"What are you talking about?" asked Daxtin cautiously, Joiner and Divider appearing in his hands as he readied for trouble. Anya readied similarly, though she did not yet call upon the Shadow Lance.
"You're the missing part. You're the reason I can't find him," breathed the Keyblade Master through clenched teeth. "It's your fault Diant's gone! Give him back!"
"I don't know what you mean," Daxtin tried to explain, confused and distressed by how worked up the boy was. "I-I… I don't even know who Diant is! How can I give him back?"
"So you refuse. You cling to his life so you can have a shadow of it for yourself," muttered the young boy sadly. "You're not even supposed to exist! You're nothing!"
"What are you saying?" yelled Daxtin, his head pounding, his ears filled with noise, the boy's words repeating over and over in his head drowning out all thought. "Just leave me alone!"
"Fine… if you won't give him back… I'll destroy you, and take him back from you," said Kir coldly, his eyes set and determined, wiping away the tears that had formed in his rage.
"You'll have to go through me," interrupted Anya, stepping between the two boys, the Shadow Lance appearing in her hand. "I… I won't let you kill him. I won't let you take my friend."
"Friend? Since when do Heartless have friends?" shouted Kir spitefully. "But then I see why you like him. You don't get the urge to devour his heart every five seconds, like you do with everyone else, huh? Because he hasn't got one!"
"That's it, I'm sick of this crap!" yelled Daxtin, charging the key bearer before his hysterics went on any longer. He swung out with Divider, Joiner following a second later, but Kir easily blocked both hits before counter attacking. Daxtin jumped away, only to be replaced by Anya who lunged in with the spar of darkness she held. Kir parried the strike and moved in close, smashing her in the gut with the butt of his keyblade then knocking her away with a swift horizontal slash.
"Fire!" yelled Kir as he shot a blast of flames at Anya before she even hit the ground, catching her in the stomach with the burning projectile. He grunted in pain as Daxtin slid in behind him and attacked with the aura blades, then ducked and turned with a quick strike, taking the older boy out at the knees while avoiding another blow. As Daxtin hovered momentarily before hitting the ground, Kir shot around him in a circle, going faster and fast until he was a blur, the air kicking up into a frenzied squall, lifting the blonde haired fighter into the air in its center. Then Kir was there above him, keyblade raised over his head with both hands. "Whirlwind Slash!"
Daxtin grunted in pain as the blade smashed into his unprotected side, sending him crashing down hard into the solid nothing of Betwixt and Between. Groaning, he rolled away and scrambled to his feet as Kir landed next to him, keyblade striking the ground in a downward hit that would have crushed him if he had lain still. Then Anya was on the boy, attacking in a flurry of wide swings and jabs, her lance slicing through the air with a sharp whistling sound. The young brunette was hard pressed to stay out of the range of her weapon until he saw a chance and jumped up, landing on the spear momentarily as it struck out, then leapt back, pushing away from her. Well out of her range, he began shooting volleys of fireballs at her, though he was cut short as Daxtin swooped in from the side. The boy turned barely in time to block his double-bladed attack, quickly jumping away from the next strike then shooting back in, cutting right through the older boy's defenses. As soon as Anya came in to attack, Kir grinned, then blurred and disappeared. Suddenly, he shot out from one side, striking out at both as he blurred past then disappeared again immediately reappearing on another side and striking at their turned backs. In a frenzy of motion he shot by and through them in a series of charges, each time disappearing and reappearing faster and faster until they could see nothing but a blur of pain as he shot by, finally appearing above them.
"Give me strength!" he shouted, reversing the grip on the Kingdom Key as he shot down, slamming the blade into the ground, unleashing a massive shockwave that sent both of his opponents flying. Charging after Daxtin, the boy in the white sleeveless coat barely had time to get to his feet before the raging keyblade user was upon him. Daxtin could only block the flurry of attacks hopelessly, giving up ground as the relentless assault continued. Then Kir finished with an especially strong blow, knocking Daxtin off his feet and sending him sprawling. He tried to get up, to wield his blades, but the shock of the blow had turned his arms and legs to jelly. Finality in his voice, Kir said, "Now let's finish this."
Daxtin could only watch with wide eyes as the boy raised the blade behind him, glowing incandescent in his hand as he readied the final blow. Jumping back to get ready to charge, Kir lowered the keyblade to his side to hold it two handed for a strong lunging thrust. Shooting forwards, there was a flash of light as he struck out at Daxtin and ended it.
Or tried to.
When Daxtin's eyes opened he was Kir completely stopped in mid-lunge, unable to even move an inch forwards. The boy stared in wide surprise at the arm and shoulder that reached up, the pale white hand clutching the haft of his shining keyblade. Pulling out of an inky black pool of shadow that should have been impossible in the presence of the shining key, Anya stood up, still grasping the keyblade in her hand. Her hair and clothes floated upwards in drafts and rises of power, dark ribbons of night smoking up from her other arm which was completely black as it clutched the Shadow Lance. Though he could not see her face, Daxtin knew that her eyes were now black with shining white centers.
"Light!" shouted Kir, the stunned look disappearing from his face. The keyblade flashed incandescent, giving off a blinding white light that blew away Anya's very essence, the darkness flying off like leaves before a storm. When the flash ended, Anya stood swaying, smoke coming from her hand that held the keyblade, her other hand burned and empty. Kir looked at her coldly, then giving the Kingdom Key a little shake, watched as she collapsed on the ground. "With that spawn of darkness out of the way, now I'll–"
Daxtin never found out what he was going to do. At that moment a giant blast of water shot out of the nonexistent ground, slamming into the younger boy's side, sending him flying.
"You!" shouted Daxtin in surprise as a black cloaked figure swaggered up, hands dancing across the triple strings of a blue and white sitar. Sweeping back his hood to reveal his sea-green hair and blue-green eye, Xencarsse gave him a smooth grin as he walked over, approaching the drenched key bearer.
"Hurry up, we're expecting you," he said with a smile as he walked past the fallen Daxtin.
"Get out of my way! I have to destroy him!" yelled Kir at II as he approached. The musician only laughed.
"You've got bigger things to worry about," murmured Xencarsse smoothly, his hands dancing across his instrument. "Like me, for instance."
As he said this, swirling spouts of water came up out of the ground, twisting until they formed water clones of their master.
"Dance, water," crooned the River Walker softly, fingers picking out an intricate flowing melody. As he said so, the doppelgangers all shot forwards at the keyblade master who defended skillfully. However, as the boy became engulfed in destroying the water forms, Xencarsse suddenly changed tunes, showering huge pressured bubbles of water on Kir and dropping the water clones, which disintegrated into puddles of water, taking him by surprise. As the deadly shower ended, the musician struck a hard power cord, sending a wall of water firing up from beneath, slamming Kir up into the color-wild air. "Feel the groove," he murmured with a smile.
As Kir dropped back down, Xencarsse shot forwards, slamming him in the gut with the point of his sitar, sending the boy flying back into a portal of darkness that opened at a snap of the Nobody's fingers. Turning, the musician addressed the stunned Daxtin before stepping in to follow the key bearer.
"So hurry up," he sneered. "He's waiting, you know."
"Who's waiting?" shouted Daxtin, but it was too late; the black cloaked man was already gone, the dark portal closing behind him. And with that, it was just him and Anya, who lay on the ground, moaning in pain and occasionally stirring.
Despite her protests, Daxtin administered the rest of his potions to Anya to heal the wounds she had sustained during that last fight. Even with that, she still ached all over, as did Daxtin. Struggling on, they crossed the length of Betwixt and Between to the portal where they had first spotted Kir. Taking a deep breath, Daxtin stepped forwards and into the portal, walking into the World That Never Was.