Chapter 12

Twilight Town, Ghost Town

Twilight Town - Central Station

"Twilight Town is just through those double glass doors," Sora remarked as he came striding out of the train compartment and onto the platform. "It's been such along time since I last came here!"

"Actually, we're already in Twilight Town," Roxas corrected. "Central Station is a part of Twilight Town, and it was one of my favorite places to hang out in as a kid. I used to sit up on that ledge up there and watch the trains going in and out. In fact, my bedroom window in my house let me have a perfect view of the trains coming from the station."

KazeRyu grinned sarcastically. "I take it you like trains." But then he grimaced. "I do not like them. They are noisy, they stink, they are too slow and they are too crowded. By the gods, I can move faster than any of those stupid trains do, and I do not use coal or electricity for energy!"

"Of course not," Naomé teased. "You have it much easier, KazeRyu…you just use the hot air coming out of your mouth instead."

Sora and Roxas practically collapsed into each other's arms laughing as KazeRyu pinned his ears back, narrowed his eyes and bared his fangs in irritation. He allowed a small growl to escape from within his throat. "I did not think that was so funny."

"They did, apparently," Naomé replied, grinning at KazeRyu. She chuckled as she dodged a swing from her wolfish friend. "Hey, hey, now! I was only joking!"

"Naomé, sometimes you are too much of a smart-aleck for your own good," KazeRyu gritted, wagging a claw at her. "One of these days that smart mouth of yours is going to get you in big trouble."

"Yeah, and you'll be right there to get me out of it, won't you?"

KazeRyu snorted as he started following the winded Roxas and Sora. "We will just see about that, Naomé. Hey, you two hyenas! Stop laughing and wait for us!"

"But KazeRyu," Roxas sniggered. "I thought Wind Dragons could fly."

Sora's body wracked with laughter as he struggled to put one foot in front of the other, literally drunk on his own mirth. He leaned against the glass doors with his head and both hands as he fought to control his giggling fits, bright ocean blue eyes glittering with laughter of their own. However, his delight vanished when he looked through the glass, his voice tight with shock as he called out behind him. "Roxas!"

"What?" Roxas asked, turning to Sora. When his eyes locked on the view outside of the glass doors, he felt himself pale to the point where even any sensation of warmth left his body. Lost within his own mind, he staggered over to the doors as though in a trance. "What…Twilight Town? It…can't be!"

"What is it?" Naomé asked, her and KazeRyu coming up to see what was wrong.

"Twilight Town!" Roxas replied. "It's been destroyed!"

KazeRyu's ears perked visibly. "Destroyed? How?"

"It looks nothing like it did ten years ago," Sora explained. "Twilight Town never looked like this before! I don't think it has, anyway."

Roxas was now truly lost within his own mind, his body numb to the world around him. Twilight Town's been destroyed…my home…my family…my friends…they're probably all gone…I'm the only one that's left…I'm the last citizen of Twilight Town left alive…I'm the only one…

KazeRyu pushed his way between Sora and Roxas and opened the doors. "Look, if it is that bad, why don't we go out there and find out what is left of the place? We may even find someone who remembers you, Roxas!"

"Sure…I guess…" Roxas replied, frozen.

Twilight Town – Station Plaza

Twilight Town was bricked with blocks of a reddish-golden hue that, when hit by the glimmering sunlight, would turn to a sparkling gold…once. Now, they looked a muddy reddish-gray, the once shining sun and the brilliant fiery sky now all covered over in thick gray clouds, turning the once beautiful Twilight Town into an eerie graveyard of dull colors, making everything seem as dull in tone as Hollow Bastion had been.

Roxas stood out in the Station Plaza, his mood as gray as his old home. His previous jovial self had vanished at the sight of his beloved home turned into a ghost town, delight rapidly giving way to extreme depression. His eerie crystal blue eyes had lost their normally radiant sparkle, the grayness of the world around him turning them a dusky blue-gray. He seemed turned to stone, a silent statue that watched over his once glistening homeland.

Naomé stared out into the deserted streets of the town below, shaking her head at the sight of the wondrous beauty of Twilight Town now overshadowed with dusky clouds and light wisps of fog rolling along the streets like silent waves of spirits that'd abandoned the lost town long ago. She addressed Roxas as she continued to stare, agate-gray eyes taking in everything they saw. "You call this home? No wonder you left."

"It's not what it used to be," Roxas replied glumly. "Twilight Town didn't look like this when I was a boy. This place was beautiful, full of wonderful colors accented with the golden tones of the setting sun. The sky wasn't cloud-covered, but a myriad of hues from kingly gold to rich crimson and fiery red, light amber clouds occasionally rolling through. Rain would come sometimes, but somehow the sun always shone through. I used to call those 'sunshowers.' I loved Twilight Town so much that I never wanted to leave. But in the end I did, my lust for adventure overpowering my love of home, of my friends and my family. I left to retrieve my fiancée."

"Fiancée?" KazeRyu asked. "You were engaged?"

Roxas nodded. "Yes. Organization XIII had kidnapped Naminé, my fiancée, in hopes of capturing me for some reason. I found out later that they were planning to use me as Sora's decoy, a way to draw him out so they could destroy him. But, Sora rescued me and we both got away. Naminé was free for a while, but the Organization found her and abducted her once again, telling me that the only way to get her back was to bring them Sora's Keyblade."

"Did you?" Naomé queried, noting Sora's expression suddenly turn icy.

"Yes, but it didn't matter in the end. Naminé was dying when I brought the Keyblade. It was after that I returned the Keyblade to Sora and told him to avenge Naminé for me, since I didn't have the power to stop them. In the end, my theft of Sora's Keyblade cost Naminé her life and Sora to lose ten years of his." Roxas sighed and turned away, his head hung in sorrow and defeat. "I'm the reason behind everything happening in Kingdom Hearts. This is all my fault..."

Sora's icy anger suddenly dissipated. He became shocked and humbled, reaching out to touch Roxas's shoulder in sympathy. "Oh, Roxas…I'm so sorry! I forgot about Naminé dying! I got mad at you, and it was all for nothing! I'm sorry, Roxas. Really, I am. Forgive me!"

Roxas smiled sadly. "It's okay, Sora. You were right to be angry with me. I stole your Keyblade…I betrayed you. I'd be surprised if Naminé's spirit isn't angry with me, since I betrayed her, too…"

"But you did not betray her," KazeRyu said abruptly. "The Organization kidnapped her! What happened to her was beyond your control! You found it out for yourself when you brought them Sora's Keyblade! By the time you had brought it to them, you were too late! Somebody thought it a cruel joke to kill her and make you have to suffer! I told you that Organization XIII was a pack of demons! They did not care if Naminé lived or died! They just wanted to get rid of Sora more than anything else! You and your fiancée were just decoys! They used you to get Sora!"

"We were 'expendable assets,' you mean," Roxas replied grimly, using a term Organization XIII was well known for using. "They just looked at us like a child looks at its favorite toy. They use it until it wears out, then throw it away and look for a new favorite toy to play with."

"But," Naomé protested. "They were using people's lives as toys! That's barbaric!"

"They didn't care," Sora replied. "They don't have any hearts, so they don't care what happens to the hearts of others. That's their way at getting back at those who still had a heart of their own. They were so bitter with jealousy that they thought it a game to use people's hearts to forward their efforts to take over Kingdom Hearts and open the Door to Darkness. To them, doing such terrible things was the most fun they could ever have."

Naomé banged her fist into the railing of the edge that bordered Station Plaza, grinding her teeth audibly. "Monsters! I'd like to do that to them and see how they like it!" She felt her fury rise up within her soul, causing her to feel like she was burning in an intense bonfire and there was no way to put the flames out. "If they ever did that to someone I loved, I'd kill them, even if it meant sacrificing myself! No one would lay hands on someone I love like that! No way at all!"

Roxas suddenly seemed to undergo a change. Without saying a word, he strode over to the other end of the plaza and began walking into the deserted town, his step more determined than usual. He squared his shoulders as he began heading into the shadows of an overhang, as though he were preparing himself to face something dreadful.

"Roxas, where are you going?" Sora called out.

"I'm going home!" Roxas replied curtly. "You can follow me if you want to."

Naomé, Sora and KazeRyu looked at one another, and then took off after Roxas, failing to notice that a deep royal-blue-robed figure was standing within the glass doors, watching them. As they vanished, the figure stepped out and began walking after them, as though curious of their movements.

Twilight Town – Station Heights

Roxas seemed oblivious to the fact that the World around him was lifeless and silent. His only focus was on the path to his house. He walked the streets of Twilight Town as if he'd never left, his memory his only map back. Striding past the old storage warehouse he used to work at during the summertime, he entered an area he knew all too well. An old sign, slightly faded from age and attached to an aged street post, read Station Heights.

KazeRyu noticed the sign, as well. "Roxas, where are we going? That sign said-"

"I know what it said," Roxas replied. "Station Heights was where my home was. I used to work at the warehouse behind me during the summer when I was a teenager. I remember that all I had to do was walk out the door and I'd almost be to work. I just had to walk up the street a little ways and I'd be there. Also, if I took a hard left, I could head into the back alleyways and meet my friends in our favorite hangout. So, you can guess that my house…"

Suddenly, Roxas stopped in mid-sentence. He stared straight ahead, then took off at a dead run, dashing straight ahead to the brick house in front of him, a cloud of dust kicking up behind his shoes as he bounded up the steps and virtually kicked the door in.

"We can guess that his house is on the corner," Naomé finished for Roxas, jerking her head in the direction of the building. "Come on, guys. Let's see what Roxas's place is like!"

"I wonder if there's any food in there," Sora pondered. "I'm starving!"

"I am too, but I would not want to eat whatever is in the fridge," KazeRyu replied, pulling a disgusted face. "It is probably all spoiled by now." "Eeew!" Naomé squealed. "I did not want to hear that! Gross!"

Sora grimaced fiercely. "Eeyuck! KazeRyu, be it a Heartless, a Nobody, or somebody's appetite, you always know to kill it! Is there anything that you don't know how to kill?"

"I do not know, "KazeRyu replied, grinning. "I do not what is left to kill."

Sora groaned and rolled his eyes. He's too smart for his own good…

Twilight Town – Station Heights – Roxas's House – First Level

Roxas crashed through the front door of his house, stumbling over the threshold and into the dusty entry hall, clouds of dust swirling up into the air like a miniature blizzard and momentarily obscuring his vision. Coughing and choking on the dust, Roxas waved the suffocating cloud away with his hand, shoes catching on the edge of the floor rug and causing him to trip on his own feet, tumbling head over heels before slamming into the dusty carpet of the living room, his impact raising an even larger cloud of dust into the dead atmosphere.

Gagging as the dust got caught in his throat and nose, Roxas rubbed his burning eyes as he looked about the first level, getting to his feet and regaining his lost balance. "Mom? Dad? Are you there? It's me, Roxas! I'm home!"

Roxas's greeting was answered by the unearthly silence of the house, followed by a gentle wind blowing through the now open front door. The air was stagnant, smelling of mold, mildew and sour air that hadn't been able to circulate about in the last decade or more. The rest of the house was in shambles, furniture overturned, the screen to the TV shattered and his mother's beloved potted plants that she'd been so proud of lying dead on the floor amidst a pile of broken ceramic pots and a pile of bone-dry potting soil.

It's a good thing I didn't do that, Roxas thought. If I had, Mom would've killed me! Cautiously, Roxas stepped over the mess, being extra careful so as not to step in it and track it throughout the house. Well did he recall how many times he'd been guilty of that offense! He wriggled his way between the wall and his father's tattered old overstuffed leather armchair, the one his mother had always vowed to throw out someday. A whiff of his father's cologne wafted up from the aged material, bringing back memories he'd thought had faded beyond recall. His father had always been sitting there when he'd come home from school or hanging out with his friends, waiting to hear of the day's events, and he'd always been the delighted son to eagerly relate his day. Roxas suddenly found himself wondering where they were.

As he proceeded through the rest of the living room and into the kitchen area, Roxas discovered a bucket of laundry tossed about in the middle of the floor, the bucket off to one side of the hall. Curious, he picked up one of the various shirts and examined it, shocked to find out that it was his "lucky" shirt from his youth, the one Naminé had given him. He'd brought his shirt back to his mother to have her wash it for him, and he'd never seen it since then. Bringing it close to his nose, he gave it a tentative sniff. The fabric was long out of the dryer, but there was the ever-familiar smell of his mother's favorite laundry detergent on it, the one that was so strong with perfume that it almost made him sneeze. He'd almost forgotten that smell…

But why would Mom just drop perfectly clean laundry down on the floor? That just isn't her! And why would the house be in such a mess? If I'd left the house like this, both Mom and Dad would be on my case! What in the Hell is going on? Roxas thought, slinging his shirt over his shoulder. He found his socks, his favorite pants and his "lucky" jacket, all of them unfortunately too small for him. He discovered in his jacket pocket the two terry friendship rings that he'd always worn, one ivory white and the other jet-black. The black one matched the ones that Hayner, Pence and Olette wore all the time…I'd won them at the Carnival of Dreams long ago…and the white one…the white one was the one Naminé gave me…she was wearing the match…she called it her "promise ring"…

Roxas walked into the kitchen. The mop, which had landed crossways in the doorway, almost immediately attacked him and effectively blocked his entrance. With a sharp growl, Roxas snapped his leg in and out, and while out, he unleashed a kick so powerful that it split the mop in two. Stepping over the broken pieces, Roxas found his kitchen and dining room area to be a total disaster, the sink piled with dishes in sore need of cleaning, the refrigerator filled with spoiled food, the dining room table flipped over like one would erect a barricade in defense against attack. Evidence of a struggle was preserved in agonizing detail, layers of dust covering everything it could reach.

This place looks like a war zone for dust bunnies! What happened here? The house is a mess, everything's covered with dust, the chores aren't done…it almost makes me wonder where Mom and Dad are… Roxas swiped his fingers across the dusty dining room table, cutting through a layer of dust at least an inch thick like a knife to butter. He pulled his hand back, rubbing the pads of his fingers against one another to rid himself of the offending dust as he pondered why this house was so different than the warm home he recalled from his youth. Where is my family…?

"Roxas?" Sora's voice drifted throughout the house.

"Here!" Roxas called back as he studied the dining room further. "I'm in the dining room, guys!"

Sora walked into the kitchen with KazeRyu and Naomé at his sides. His eyes went wide as they took in the sight of the overturned house. "Holy…crap. What happened here?"

"Beats me," Roxas replied, righting the table and setting the dining room back to normal. He turned to his friends and gave them a winning smile. "Wanna help me out?"

Naomé had already set herself about the grim task of cleaning the kitchen. She'd pulled all the dirty dishes out of the sink, and was just about to fill it with hot, soapy water when she noticed something wrong…way wrong. "Roxas…the dishes at the bottom of the pile are clean!"

"What?" Roxas said, coming over to take a look. Pulling one of the dishes out, he noticed that aside from dust and an occasional food particle, the dish was indeed sparkling clean…just like he'd always been told to clean them. "That's odd…I thought that sink looked a little full for just two people. Mom was never one to leave dirty dishes around, and Dad was just as clean. I wondered why they would let things get so crazy." "Maybe they're on vacation," Sora offered.

"To where? Destiny Islands?" Roxas retorted, setting the dish on the counter.

Sora frowned angrily. "That's not funny."

KazeRyu, meanwhile, had taken to cleaning the living room. Using his impressive strength, he flipped over the overturned sofa by himself, righted the tipped over TV, and had restored a fallen bookcase to its original place. However, when he'd turned towards the back of the living room to right an upturned curio cabinet, he noticed a sudden change in the air. There was fresh air coming from upstairs…and another scent… one that he knew quite well…

Roxas almost didn't hear KazeRyu calling him. "What is it, KazeRyu?"

"Were you upstairs recently?"

"No. Why?"

KazeRyu came walking into the dining room from the entrance by the stairs. "Because I can smell fresh air coming from up there, and I think my nose is picking up on some other scents." He said, giving Roxas the I'm not kidding look that Naomé knew all too well. He'd already given her that look once today.

Roxas and Sora stopped cleaning the dining room, nearly dropping the dusting rags they held in their hands as they stared in startled surprise at KazeRyu. "What!"

"What kinds of scents?" Naomé questioned, giving KazeRyu a curious glance.

"Follow me and maybe you will find out," KazeRyu replied gruffly, turning on his heels and heading back into the living room. I do not want to freak them out, but… I think I smell blood…

Twilight Town – Station Heights – Roxas's House – Second Level

The second level of Roxas's house was just as messy as the first, covered in thick layers of dust, smelling of sour air and gray from age. Roxas's feet echoed as he stepped on the dust-ridden runners that went down the hallway, the carpet taken up long ago because his father had wanted to repair the floor boards underneath. The boards squeaked in protest at being trod upon, forcing the four friends to more than once leap aside for fear of falling through to the first floor below.

Sora suddenly stopped, his nose detecting an odd smell…and acrid smell that reminded him of rusty iron…he whipped his head around in the direction of the offending stench, his steps taking him towards the bathroom.

Naomé, too, picked up on an odd scent, one that made her nose hairs curl in horror. It smelled like…something decaying… She shuddered in an attempt to rid herself of the reeking smell, plugging her nose with her thumb and index finger of her left hand. "Geez! Something died up here!"

"Maybe it was an old cat," KazeRyu remarked offhandedly. "Cats always stink really bad when they die…so do rats and any kind of rodent. Anything that stinks that bad must be related to a type of vermin."

"Shut up," Roxas said irritably. "My family didn't own a cat. We didn't have a goldfish to keep in a bowl! The only pets we had were the strays that hung around here, and most of those got taken to the pound!"

Sora's sudden high-pitched yelp of fright sent everybody backtracking to the hall bathroom, where he was standing in the doorway leading into it, pale as death and eyes frozen wide in terror. Roxas and Naomé crowded around him while KazeRyu loomed over his head, all four adventurers aghast at what they saw.

The bathroom had been wrecked, tiles cracked and broken off the walls, pieces of them laying everywhere, turning the area into a disaster zone. The window above the shower was cracked like the tiles within, the missile that'd hit it leaving behind a ripple-shaped pattern in the otherwise normal glass pane. The shower curtains had been torn off the rings, hanging limply like pieces of string.

Roxas gasped when he caught something glistening in the bathroom sink. Pushing Sora and Naomé out of the way, he shoved his way into the bathroom and grabbed the mysterious object gleaming at him, turning it over and over in his hands. His eyes glazed over with unshed tears as he recognized the globe his beloved Naminé had given him years ago for their anniversary. Set atop the hand carved, hand polished base sat a beautiful orb of glass that had been created from the sands down at the beach by a local glassmaker. Called "Sunset Glass," it was said to be able to display all the colors of the beautiful sunsets that Twilight Town was famous for, from the lightest golden yellow to the darkest shades of crimson.

Naomé was about to ask Roxas what he was holding, when she suddenly caught something out of the corner of her eye. Squeezing her way into the bathroom, she edged over to the bathtub and began to analyze the shower curtains. Suddenly, with a horrified gasp, she pulled her hand back with the vinyl, shock making her freeze up. She just stared at the curtain, terrified.

"What is it, Naomé?" KazeRyu asked. "What is wrong?"

His friend responded by holding the vinyl sheet up for the Wind Dragon and the Keybearer to see. The fabric was covered in a dark reddish substance, a dried liquid that both men could easily recognize:

Blood.

Roxas swirled on his heels at hearing a slight gasp from Sora. When he caught sight of Naomé's hand, he almost dropped the crystal globe in his hands as he stared in horror at her. "Oh, my God! Naomé, are you hurt?"

"No, Roxas," Naomé replied. "However, I think you might want to take a look at the curtains." She held the curtain up for him to see. "They're covered in old blood."

Blood…! No…! Roxas felt his mind turn a somersault in his skull. There was blood all over the shower curtains, main and liner, dark red from age and crusted into the fabric like a dye. Mom! Dad! Does that old blood belong to one of you?

"Look," Sora said, pointing to the floor beneath his shoes. "There's a trail of it on the tile floor. It's leading out of the bathroom. Let's follow it and see where it goes."

"There wasn't any blood on the stairs," Naomé speculated. "So, I'm guessing that the trail must be leading towards another interior section of the house. But, what's left?"

Roxas felt sick. "There's my room, the master bedroom, master bathroom and the attic. Other than that, I don't think there could be anywhere else, since I, like Naomé, didn't see anything like dried blood anywhere downstairs or on the stairs when we were coming up."

KazeRyu sniffed the air carefully, recognizing the smell of musty, dusty air. However, he could still detect the smell of old blood in the air, and it was heading towards the end of the hall. When he looked down the hallway, he noticed that the door at the end of the hall was partially open. He pointed this out to his friends, who suddenly became especially piqued by his findings. The other thing about that door that caught their interest was that there were stains of old blood on the door itself!

Fear threatening to make him break down, Roxas pushed ahead of his friends and headed towards the door, boots carefully treading on the dusty old carpeting that has preserved the blood trail from the hall bathroom with almost supernatural accuracy. His eyes locked on the blood trail, tracing its path up to the white door ahead of him. His gaze shifted focus to the bloody handprint that was on one of the panels, along with the dried blood on the doorknob, terror making his heart race. Was that his mother's handprint?

Suddenly, Roxas felt himself being pushed aside. He grimaced fiercely as KazeRyu swept regally past him, reverently laying his hand on the door and pushing it open. He was about to reply with a hot retort when the sight of the room before him made his heart stop.

The master bedroom was in a state of horrible disarray, everything overturned and out of place, covered in layers of dust and illuminated by the dull light streaming in through a broken window. Furniture was cracked or broken, drawers from the dresser were ripped out off their tracks and scattered all over the place. Air thick with the scent of rain on its way permeated everything in the room, the carpets revealing years of water damage from precipitation coming in from outside. In the middle of the room, the master bed, mattress and all, was overturned and broken, sheets fluttering like ghosts.

Naomé stared in horror. "What in the name of Kingdom Hearts happened in here? This looks just as bad as downstairs! Something terrible must have gone on while you were gone, Roxas!"

Sora, holding his breath in fear, slowly entered the room alongside Roxas. He closely watched as his friend circled the room, eyes cast to the floor in speculation of the scene. However, as they drew closer to the entryway to the master bathroom, Sora's nostrils detect an acrid smell…the smell of rotting death. However, so as not to startle Roxas, he kept his mouth firmly shut and said nothing of it while he helped him search the rest of the room.

Glancing at KazeRyu, Naomé proceeded to the master bathroom, covering her nose and mouth with the sleeve of her jacket. She felt KazeRyu draw close to her back and heard his own slow, muffled breathing from behind his own sleeve as they entered the master bathroom before Roxas could get the chance to.

Like the bathroom in the hallway, the master bathroom was a total mess, except this one was covered in a great deal more blood. Blood had splattered on most of the fixtures in the room, the sink was stained a deep crimson hue, the mirror looked like a stained glass panel, and even the tiles had not been spared a new paint job.

"Gods," KazeRyu hissed. "Where did all this blood come from?"

"I don't think any of us want to know," Naomé whispered back, pointing to the walk-in shower, where rivulets of blood had long ago come seeping out along the grout lines in the tile and spilling out into the middle of the room like a miniature flood. "What do you want to bet it's inside that shower, KazeRyu?"

KazeRyu sucked in his breath. "I hardly want to do this, but better me than Roxas," He grumbled, heading over to the shower and peeking around the tiled corner. Almost instantly, his ears and body went so rigid Naomé would've sworn that their master had been turned into a statue. But, she was completely taken by surprise as he lunged backwards with frightening speed, rapidly darting past her and slamming the bathroom door shut. She heard the click! of the lock and immediately noticed how suffocating the stench had suddenly become. She coughed harshly to give him a clue, whereupon he promptly answered by opening the window.

"What'd you do that for?" Naomé snapped once she was able to breathe again.

"Don't tell Roxas what is in there," KazeRyu whispered, eyeing her sternly.

Naomé knew immediately what was inside that shower, and the horror of the tragedy made her stomach churn so horribly that she was compelled to vomit. She knew then and there that she could never have the stomach to tell Roxas that his parents had been murdered in their own house. But she did know that she could summon up at least a little courage to see the scene for herself. She bickered with KazeRyu until he was forced into letting her see what was in there.

The stench was stronger than anywhere on the second level, exponentially intensifying her urge to throw up. The shower walls and floor were covered in blood, tiles cracked and broken, and in the middle of the floor lay a grossly decomposed skeleton, holding a bar of soap and razor in its now bony fingers. A shower clock and radio, long dead from the batteries dying, hung from the shower caddy, the skeleton's other hand reaching out as though to change the station. But, what disturbed Naomé overall was what she saw caught in the drain trap: short, golden-brown-blonde hair…the exact same color as Roxas's.

"KazeRyu," Naomé whispered, tears in her eyes. "This was Roxas's father."

The celestial werewolf nodded. "That is why I said not to say anything."

"Yes, but…if that's his father, then where is his-"

"No!"

Roxas's scream exploded from the other side of the master bathroom door, startling Naomé and KazeRyu out of their pants. Thinking it was some type of enemy, they bolted for the door, hastily unlocked it, and almost literally threw it off its hinges. They rushed into the room, only to have a sickening sight greeting them.

Sora was standing with his back against the wall across from the master bathroom, completely dumbstruck with shock. His terrified expression caught Naomé's frightened glance, and when she soundlessly asked him what was wrong, he motioned towards the floor beside the bed with the motion of his eyes. What Naomé saw next made her heart shatter and her knees go so weak that she thought she was going to drop to the carpet out of grief and fear.

Roxas Avalon was crouched down next to the overturned bed, head in his hands, sobbing uncontrollably, body shaking with anguish. Right before him was a puddle of dried blood, and from underneath the mattress was a skeletal hand and forearm, laying outstretched in the middle of the puddle. Laying tucked underneath the arm was a teddy bear with curly brown-blonde hair and shiny black button eyes.

Naomé felt her heart leap into her throat. She collapsed next to her friend and gently touched him. She could see all the color had drained out of his face, making him look like a ghost. "Roxas, what…?"

Face stained with tears, Roxas turned and regarded his friend over his shoulder, unable to speak. Without a word he handed her a piece of blood-soaked notebook paper. He stared at Naomé with the most heartbroken expression she'd ever seen as she slowly unrolled the paper. Her heart stopped once more as she silently read the words written in black ballpoint pen:

Dear Mom and Dad:

My friend Sora and I are going to find Naminé and bring her back. I don't know how long I'm going to be gone, but however long it is, know that I will always love you. Please do not worry about me, for I am in capable hands. I promise you that when I find Naminé, regardless of her fate, I will come back home. Take care while I'm gone.

Love,

Roxas