Author's Note: If you haven't noticed by now... I POV swap a lot. But it gives you a more well-rounded story in my opinion. Enjoy!
The World that Never Was: Roxas
They still had a bit to go before the gummi ship. But they'd gotten what they'd came for. Roxas had also gotten in a good battle against Larxene. Now he was hungry and looking forward to a nice chair in the gummi ship. Like Axel, he'd sort of been hoping that they could've stayed in the Grey Area for a bit. But there was no way that was going to happen given Larxene and Marluxia's presence—not without getting rid of them. And Riku said they weren't worth the time at the moment.
Then, to everyone's dismay, a Xehanort Remnant appeared outside of the ship, effectively blocking their path to it.
"Are you serious right now?" Sora growled.
Roxas summoned his Keyblade.
And so did everyone else. (Well, okay, Axel summoned his chakrams and Roxas wasn't sure what Namine did. She might have pulled out her knife, but Roxas doubted it considering it was useless against the Remnant.)
The Remnant looked smug. Roxas wondered if it had another emotion.
"For a moment, I thought I was going to have to interfere with your search," he said. "But it would appear that some of my former members have done that job for me."
Roxas tried to keep his face straight, not wanting to let on that Xion and Kairi had still managed their intended search. What was odd, was that he knew. Then again, it wasn't really that odd, this was Xehanort they were talking about and he tended to know everything.
"Not that it really matters," the Remnant continued. "The thing you seek is behind a door that not even the Keyblade can get through."
Roxas frowned now, not liking the sound of that.
"Now, for other matters of business."
He summoned a ridiculous amount of Neoshadows.
Roxas scoffed. Was that all?
He held a hand out to Xion, who rolled her eyes, but handed him her Keyblade without any questions.
"Show off," she muttered.
Roxas smirked.
He leapt up into the air, getting rid of a couple of Neoshadows even then. This would be easy so long as it was just Neoshadows. He could take care of this himself in under ten minutes provided no more showed up.
Though, he noticed out of the corner of his eye that Riku was helping out. Well, that would make it go all the quicker.
As he was mid-jump, slicing through Neoshadows like they were butter, he felt something tug on his heart. He ignored it and kept fighting. But then there was another tug, a bigger one. This one brought him crashing to the ground, he barely managed to use the Keyblades to break his fall.
"What's… happening…?"
"Fight it!" Riku shouted.
Another tug brought him to his hands and knees, not even the Keyblades could keep him propped up.
"Summoning my Keyblade back," Xion warned.
He grunted.
Her Keyblade disappeared from his left hand. Not that it mattered. It probably would have disappeared from his hand anyway.
He clutched his hand to his chest, not liking this feeling in the slightest. He tried to do what Riku said and fight it. But how?
The tugging stopped. Roxas looked up at the Remnant, trying to figure out why. Xion was currently attacking him. He wasn't blocking with any weapon, just with blasts of Dark Firaga and Dark Blizzaga. Roxas took his distraction as an opportunity to stand up and try to gain his bearings again.
"Riku!" Namine shouted.
But her cry was not a cry for help, it was a heads-up. She eliminated all of the Heartless in between where Riku was standing and the gummi ship. Riku didn't need any more prodding than that. He took off running. Xion and Sora both were dealing with the Remnant at that point.
Namine's steps faltered. But then in a flash of light, she disappeared. Kairi began glowing with soft light. She opened her eyes, which were completely white, and smirked. She raised her hand and a dozen creatures made of light appeared out of the ground. She set them on the Remnant.
Axel came up behind Roxas and put a hand on his shoulder to steady him.
"Did he just go after my heart?" Roxas asked.
"Yeah," Axel said. "Very rude of him, don't you think?"
Roxas swallowed.
"And dumb, he should know you've got too much light in you." At this, Axel elbowed Roxas in the gut. Roxas frowned. He was already sick to his stomach enough.
The light forms had reached the Remnant and were clearly causing problems. Riku had started up the gummi ship and gotten it into the sky. The flight pattern was rocky looking, but that was probably because Riku wasn't trying to go very far. He hovered over Roxas and Axel and dropped the rope ladder.
"After you," Axel said.
Roxas took a grip of the rungs. He started climbing. He felt Axel start up behind him. Before climbing into the gummi ship, Roxas got a clear look at the Remnant's face. He looked positively livid.
"Axel, control the ladder," Riku said. "We'll need to get the others. Roxas, just brace yourself."
Roxas nodded and took a seat by the window so he could still see what was going on.
There were now three birds made out of light pestering the Remnant. A falcon, an owl, and a hawk. The birds had enabled Sora and Xion to back off of the Remnant, which gave Riku a clear path to get them up into the ship.
"Good, now I won't have to yell at them," Riku muttered.
"That attack of Kairi and Namine's…" Axel began.
"Is quite amazing," Riku finished.
Kairi had not moved from the spot she was standing at. She was aiming her Keyblade at the Remnant. A lion came pounding out and charged at him.
Xion came and stood behind Roxas.
"We'll have to wait for that attack to finish!" Sora said, pulling himself onto the ship.
"I know that," Riku snapped. "How much energy do you think they've got?"
"They feed off of us," Sora said. "Not our energy, but our presence. If that weren't a Xehanort Remnant, I'd say Kairi and Namine would finish him off."
"But because it's a Remnant?" Roxas prodded.
"No actual clue." Sora shrugged.
After the lion came a wolf.
The Xehanort Remnant summoned some of the Shadow Creepers that it had been fond of at Disney Castle. They distracted the lion, the wolf, and the hawk, but the falcon and the owl would not leave him alone.
Then Kairi summoned a panther, followed by a fox. They began helping the lion, the wolf, and the hawk with the Shadow Creepers.
"Isn't each one of those animals a representation of us?" Xion asked.
"Yeah," Sora replied. "I'm the lion."
"I'm the wolf," Riku said.
"I want to say I'm the hawk," Xion said.
"Hundred munny says I'm the fox," Axel said.
Roxas looked at the panther. Probably. It would make sense.
The falcon and the owl returned to Kairi's Keyblade. The other five light forms continued fighting the Shadow Creepers. The Remnant now seemed set on getting to her.
"We need to get her," Sora said, his voice tense.
"Them," Riku corrected, his voice equally tense.
The Shadow Creepers parted to let the Remnant through, the lion and the wolf immediately tried to intercept him.
Kairi's eyes stopped glowing and Namine reappeared beside her. Namine fumbled in her pocket for a bit, probably looking for an ether.
"Swing low," Axel said. "I'm just going to pick one of them up. Sora, can you…?"
"Xion, drive," Riku said, already running out of his seat.
"That works too," Axel said.
They hauled the ladder back in as Xion maneuvered them right above Kairi and Namine. The other light forms had disappeared, Kairi and Namine having run out of power. There was nothing standing in the way of the Xehanort Remnant and them.
Roxas turned around in his seat to see if Axel or Riku might need help. But from the looks of things, they'd braced themselves all right. Axel caught ahold of Namine and Riku got Kairi. The two girls were lugged onto the ship.
"All clear?" Xion asked.
"Go!" Riku replied.
Xion took off before the Remnant could interfere.
"Everyone okay?" Riku asked.
Namine tossed up an ether. She and Kairi exchanged glances.
"Yeah, we're good," Kairi said.
"Roxas?" Riku asked.
"Uh, I think I'm okay," he said. "Should I be worried? I've never had this happen before."
"Just be careful. He may have tempered your darkness to make you a more viable vessel."
"You can't be nearly as messed up as me," Axel said, shrugging. "Though, if you find yourself being able to summon a dark corridor or maybe bring some Samurais to your aid…"
"Well, I don't want to test it now," Roxas said.
"Can someone else drive?" Xion asked.
"Here," Sora said, standing up. "I'll set it to autopilot."
"To where?" Riku asked.
"A place where we can chill for a bit, probably," Sora said. "We've got a lot of stuff to sift through, right?"
"We only managed to get four journals," Kairi said. "Every other one was either missing, or behind a door we couldn't get to."
Sora replaced Xion and Xion came over next to Roxas. She slid her hand into his. He felt a little better.
"There, we're set to go to Olympus Coliseum," Sora said. "The path looks clear. I can always change course later."
"I suppose we should read through what we've got though," Riku said. "Even if there are only four journals."
Kairi nodded and pulled the four out of her bag. "We've got Xigbar's, Xaldin's, Demyx's, and Luxord's."
"We also got everyone more cloaks," Xion said.
She let go of Roxas' hand in order to pull cloaks out of her bag. Kairi did the same. They'd really gotten everyone more cloaks, which was good.
"Excellent!" Axel said.
"Everyone take a journal?" Sora said. "Well, ish."
Namine grabbed the journal on top—Xigbar's.
"Here, hand me Xaldin's," Xion said. "Roxas and I can look through that."
"Sounds good to me," Roxas said, glad to have another pair of eyes.
"I'll work with Namine," Riku said.
"I've still got a bit of Saix's journal to read through," Axel said. "I suppose now's a good a time as ever."
"Here," Kairi said, handing Sora Demyx's journal, keeping Luxord's for herself.
"Does anyone need to keep an eye on the autopilot?" Xion asked, her eyes looking towards the control panel as she asked.
"We should be fine, barring any gummi Heartless," Sora said.
"Oh don't say that," Riku said.
"It's cool, we'll know if we've got trouble," Sora said.
"Right, so we keep an eye on the autopilot," Xion said.
"Also, we should sleep somewhere in there," Riku said.
"I've put off reading this long enough," Axel said. "If I don't finish it now, I don't think I'll ever finish it."
"We'll sleep when we're done," Xion said.
"Yeah," Namine agreed.
So they all settled into seats, a person or two to every journal. Roxas was glad Xion had picked Xaldin's, not wanting to have to try and figure out what Demyx had been writing about. No offense to Demyx, but his condolences went out to Sora.
"You okay?" Xion whispered.
"I… I think so," Roxas said. "But I can't be sure."
She took his hand. She looked like she was about to say something, but the words never did come out of her mouth. Instead, she just squeezed his hand and laid Xaldin's journal over her lap. Roxas leaned over to read as well. He was glad for something else to focus on, no longer wanting to think about the Xehanort Remnant.