The mood in the gummi ship was turning a little sour since leaving Traverse Town. Without making any stops, we were flying passed the previously visited worlds and straight to whatever else was out there. It was boring more than anything. Although, Donald and Goofy had their time filled with operating the gummi ship.

It was Sora and I who were dying from the boredom of sitting around. We had nothing to do, except for watching the asteroids drifting by. There was also the teams of Heartless ships flying around trying to hit us with lasers and missiles. The usual. Although, it did seem like we were running into more Heartless ships than usual.

"So bored," Sora muttered. I sighed and admired the curtain of reds and blues that appeared over the stars. "Donald... Isn't there anything we can do?"

"No," Donald said shortly.

"Aw, but didn't you say you were gonna show them how to fly the gummi ship?" Feeling sympathetic towards us, Goofy inquired about something with Donald.

My ears perked and I stopped slouching in my chair. Did I hear that right?

"Grrr, I don't know what you're talking about," Donald fumed.

He was mumbling and grumbling something to himself, but we were all completely out of the loop. But, clearly, it was just him being annoyed by our desire to better understand flying the gummi ship. Donald did mention something about teaching us how to operate the controls, I was absolutely positive.

I sighed and slumped back in my seat again. This is a bummer.

At least, that was what was running through my head at the time while the gummi ship weaved through space. Maybe 20 minutes passed by since Donald refused to teach us anything more about the ship. Sometime after that, when I was slipping into a nap in the chair, we abruptly slowed down. My head nearly fell out of the palm of my hand, and I looked around to see what the problem was.

The gummi ship was flying slowly around a giant, green... ball of something rotating in place. I rubbed the sleepiness from my eyes and blinked a few times to adjust my vision to focus. "Hey, that looks like a world," I said, standing up. My arm rested on the top of Goofy's seat as I studied it. Yeah, that's a world. I don't know how I should feel about it, though.

This world we observed from afar had an abundance of green vegetation. A forest... Jungle, rather, existing in its own unique way. I was kind of amazed by it, because there was nothing but trees. But, judging by the looks of it, it'd be real easy getting lost.

"Hey, Donald, think King Mickey's down there?" Goofy asked, pointing at the world.

"In a backwater place like that?" Donald growled. He was still sounding a little agitated from before. "No way! We're moving on."

"What?" I glared at Donald and folded my arms. "We can't just pass a world by. What if there're people down there getting attacked by the Heartless? Or worse?!"

"Yeah!" Sora nodded in agreement. "Hey, Riku and Kairi might be down there, too. Let's just check it out for a little bit."

"Forget it! We're on an important mission to find the king," Donald yelled at the top of his lungs and moved the ship's controls to turn it around.

"Hey, that's not fair!"

Sora jumped from the back seat to stop Donald; he thrust his hands to the controls and pushed back against Donald's attempts to steer us the other way. The jolt to the handlebars forced the gummi ship back on course for the mysterious jungle. At the same time, all of us inside were knocked to the side and almost lost our bearings.

I was holding onto the Goofy's arm to steady myself and glared harshly at the both of them, "Can we just land this thing before something breaks?"

"Just land!" Sora shouted.

"No!" protested Donald, initiating a brutal argument and struggle for control over where we were to go.

"Come on!"

"Aw, phooey! I said no."

"We're landing!" Sora, finally taking control of the gummi ship's piloting system, put it back on course for the jungle world.

Well, we thought he had taken control...

Donald was yelling at Sora and demanding that he stopped touching the buttons. The ship rocked to the right and then to the left. Clearly, that hardheaded boy who was my best friend had no idea what he was doing. "Uh... Hold on to something!" was the last thing I heard when the gummi ship started spiraling out of control.

Everyone was screaming and latched onto something inside the cockpit. I was gripping onto the seat for dear life, but I could feel my body being torn away from it by the force of gravity. I can't hold on anymore! Gritting my teeth, I struggled to stay grounded. Something struck my chest as we sped down to the world. It hurt and knocked the wind out of me. I lost my grip.

"Waaaah!"

...

...

"Are we lost?"

Three little children- two boys and a girl- huddled together at the base of a tree. The darkness was creeping upon them as the night drew closer. A chilly breeze blowing through the shrubs and trees brought shivers to the shoulders of the trio. In an attempt to warm each other up, they practically glued themselves together for a source of heat.

Strange sounds came from somewhere behind the shrubbery of the island. A monster was lurking near their playing grounds, so Sora had claimed. The boy was eager to go out and find it to prove to his friends that it really was there. He was holding onto them tightly, now. His bright blue eyes were clamped shut as he whimpered quietly.

"We're not lost!" was what Riku told his friends when they took some path through the forested part of the island. He, more or less, unwittingly took the lead in their adventurous hunt for the 'monster'. Getting lost was not going to be a problem since he was in the lead, thought the two who walked behind him the whole way. He was confident that they were on the right track, too, but he and Sora bickered a bit when the latter tried to take over.

Somehow, they took a wrong turn and circled a few sets of trees. Nothing looked familiar to him after that, so he sat down with the others for a breather. A little while later, they tried again and ended up in the same place three times. Riku, annoyed, held onto his friends for a sense of security. "It's getting dark," he said. "Maybe we should camp out and wait until morning before heading back."

With the boys doing what they did best, Kara followed along and enjoyed spending time in the outdoors. It wasn't too much of a big deal that the three of them were lost. They had gotten lost before, on another part of the island. She simply followed along, even when they told her there was a dangerous monster on the island. In fact, hearing that made her giggle excitedly. It was so cold, though. Riku had an arm over her shoulder, she had an arm around him, Sora held onto her other arm, and she held onto his arm, too. They had some warmth since they were together.

"At least we have each other," Kara pointed out, her voice a tad bit shaky from the cold. She smiled at her two friends and giggled softly.

"Yeah." Riku nodded in agreement. "If we're going to get lost, it might as well be together."

"True," said Sora. He paused but opened his mouth again when something came back to his mind. "Hey... Won't the monster find us if we're out in the open? I don't wanna get eaten. I don't even taste good!"

"I don't think there's a monster out here," Riku stated, looking around them in case something was to pop out from the bushes. All he could hear was the rustling of leaves in the wind. Nothing else. "Besides, I don't think the monster would want to eat you. They like a lot of meat."

"What's that supposed to mean?" Sora asked, pouting.

But, before the two boys could start arguing, Kara stood up and pointed at something through the bushes. "Hey, do you see that?" she asked them. Sora and Riku stood up beside her and stared hard at the bushes. "It's a light."

She was right.

There was a small light in the near distance. It got bigger and bigger the longer they stared at it. The three of them felt relief when the light got closer. After wandering aimlessly in the dark, it seemed that the adults caught word of their absence from home.

"We're saved!" Sora cheered. "Now we won't be lost."

"Come on, you guys. Let's go home!" Riku motioned for Sora and Kara to follow him.

As her two friends ran off ahead of her, Kara walked forward as the terrain blended together. Everything looked the same. The light soon disappeared along with Riku and Sora, leaving Kara alone in the darkness. She stopped and glanced around blankly in hopes of seeing someone familiar.

"Sora?"

...

"Riku?"

...

...

...

"Huh? Who are you? I don't remember seeing you before. Can you tell me where the island is?"

...

...

"...Wake up..."

Sitting up in the deep green grass, I groaned and rubbed at a throbbing pain in my forehead. All around me were torn and broken vines. I let out another groan and looked up at the tightly packed tree branches above. There was one spot in the middle of the leaves that let in sunlight. That was where I had fallen through, apparently. And, of course, I saw the ripped vines hanging overhead. The fall explained the annoying ache in my back. It was a hard landing.

Looks like I ended up alone. I stood up and looked around for the others. There was no sign of them in the jungle, so they had to have ended up on the other side of the jungle. I hope they're doing okay.

"Gosh, I was getting a little worried when you didn't get up." Jiminy jumped out from behind one of the vines and climbed up onto my shoulder. He must have been hiding in one of my pockets before we all got thrown out of the gummi ship. It made me happy to have someone with me, even if he was only a few inches tall.

"A little?" I joked, raising a brow at the fancily dressed cricket.

"Guess we'll have to go out and look for everyone else ourselves," he said, pointing in a random direction. "Are you okay to walk?"

"Yeah, I'm just a little sore," I said. It really was no big deal. All there was to fix anything was move around and work out the pain. It was important that we caught up to Sora, Donald, and Goofy. Well, wherever those three ended up.

Roar!

I gulped. A howling animal? Of course there was something in this jungle that'd be a problem. What else would there be in a jungle? I just hoped that nothing would come after me or my friends. "So, what world is this, anyway?" I asked Jiminy as I walked down a muddy path through the trees.

"Let's see..." Jiminy took a moment to search through his journal. "Looks like we're in a world called the Deep Jungle. Gee, I wonder why that is."

"I wonder."