"We followed the readings to the mansion in the woods," Pence said.
They were all sat inside the Usual Spot; Kairi and Sora having rushed there to check on their friends.
"So there hasn't been any heartless in the town?" Sora asked.
Olette shook her head. "No, nothing. There's been less recently anyway. But the readings on Pence's device went off and the lights in town flickered for a minute or so."
"Huh." Sora flopped down onto the arm of the chair Kairi was sat on. "We'll need to check it out anyway, I suppose. Things have gone quiet and we don't know when the Organisation will strike next."
Hayner threw them both an ice cream.
"There's time for one of these on the way over, right?" he asked.
Kairi laughed. "There is always time for ice cream."
Kairi was wary of the mansion, even though she knew it's rooms and how long Naminé had called it home.
It felt… off. As though the secrets and work done within had left a mark on the place, one deeper than the vandalism.
The seven of them made it down to the basement and discovered a different set of computers than Kairi saw last time.
Pence and Olette worked on them as they, and Hayner had a look around the rest of it.
"Can you feel the dark magic?" Donald asked.
"Yeah," Kairi told him. "But it's not… it feels like the portal Axel brought me through when I was on my way to Sora."
"Hmmmm." Donald ran scan spells around the rooms but Kairi closed her eyes and followed a faint echo of light to a chair in front of a second set of computers.
"Namine?"
"Everything okay?" Pence asked.
Kairi answered but kept her eyes closed. "I think one of my friends was here." She reached over, and followed her instincts with the keyboard.
"I think," she said. "If I press this, it will open something."
"You're right," Pence agreed. "The readings over here match what you're saying… but I don't think this matches the readings we saw."
"Do it," Sora said. He met Kairi's eyes when she opened them. "If it was Naminé then it might lead us to Riku, or the Organisation."
She nodded. "Stand back."
Kairi pressed the key command and in the corner of the room a portal formed.
Pence was right. It wasn't the same as the spike of dark that had followed them, but it was a doorway to somewhere the darkness resided.
"That doesn't exactly look safe," Hayner commented as he looked at the portal.
"It isn't," Kairi told him. "Which is why we need you to stay here whilst we go through."
"Should we close it?" Olette asked.
"If we come back through we'll throw munny first. Anything else? Close it." She showed Pence how to do so as she spoke.
"Do you guy know how to fight?" Sora asked, though he looked wary of asking anyone else to pick up a weapon.
"I'm a struggle match champion," Hayner told them proudly. Olette rolled her eyes behind him.
"I'm on the school archery team," she said. "But even if I had my things with me, this isn't exactly a large enough room."
"First sign of trouble then, close the portal and get out." Sora advised and passed them Hi-potions.
Kairi looked over and smiled at him. Sora was a brilliant fighter, but she knew it was this he was fighting for - friends, people, life. He'd joined in the play fighting with Riku because Riku enjoyed it. Kairi, who could run laps around them on the track, preferred swimming growing up.
That didn't mean she hadn't taken to her keyblade, nor did she ever want to be without the magic she'd unlocked inside herself.
"There's something else," she said. Naminé had left no sign of this but she felt it in her heart, an eventuality she'd been hoping for on their journey.
And, if Axel and Roxas really had helped Tron and Yori, then maybe they'd be headed here too.
"If our mutual friends show up, tell them were we are."
Sora, looked at her with the same perplexed expression she'd seen a lot on this journey.
"Axel and Roxas," she told Sora.
"We'll be sure to send them through," Hayner reassured her.
"Okay then." She stood, hugged her friends and took her place at Sora's side.
He slid his fingers into hers and held her hand tight.
Despite what she had said, she didn't think there would be a way for them to come back through here.
If they did at all.
"Twilight Town... Twilight Mansion... now it's fading to something else."
"Blurred?" Axel asked as they run down from the train station, neither even sparing a second to glance up at their clock tower.
"No. It says unknown location."
"Shit. Okay."
Roxas stowed the book and they each grabbed a skateboard and raced through the square, past the trams and only stopped at the crumbled entrance to the forest in front of the mansion.
They'd elected to bring their coats along, but weren't wearing them.
Amongst Axel's crafting projects and keyblade making, he'd found a way to sew the protective elements of their coats into other clothes so that they'd be safe within the dark corridors.
Roxas had been proud of him, even as he'd joked that Axel really, really needed to stop sewing and painting flames onto his clothes. He'd tapped Roxas' chequered wrist band and raised his eyebrows.
That had been that.
The forest was devoid of heartless and nobodies - a good sign that they were right behind the others.
The mansion was still looming, but it always seemed to be such a sad place.
They entered and headed downstairs, grateful that the complicated puzzles they came across hadn't reset themselves since whoever had been here first had unlocked them; there wasn't time.
They were greeted by an unexpected friendly face at the bottom of the library staircase.
"Olette!" Roxas said, smiling as she came forward and hugged him.
"Hello, Roxas, Axel. It's good to see you. Follow me." She hugged Axel briefly and lead them through a couple of rooms until they met with the others.
Hayner had a bat with nails crudely sticking out of it and was stood in front of a portal.
Pence was busy on the terminal.
"Axel, Roxas, great to see you but there isn't time to talk. Kairi, Sora and the others went through there a few minutes ago, but the readings look... strange."
"Alright. Do you know where it leads?" Axel asked, though Roxas was sure they both knew.
"No. But Kairi knew how to open it. She said the name Naminé."
Blues eyes met green.
"We should go."
"Close it behind us," Axel told them. "We know another way back."
Then, with another look between them, they stepped through.
Kairi was exhausted, the others too. Despite her inherent protection, the heartless still came and swarmed them. Wave after wave after wave. Either drawn by the keyblades or their hearts, she couldn't tell. But she did know they weren't making any progress.
A wave of fire to her right caught her attention, and after destroying another group of heartless, she turned to see Axel and Roxas, already joining the fight.
Their enemies lulled for a moment and they ran towards each other, as Donald cast healing spells on them all.
"Kairi," Axel said. "It's good to see you again."
Sora waved at them both, happy to see reinforcement, but Kairi could tell he was nervous.
"You too." She smiled. "How did you find us?"
"We found a really unusual book," Roxas said, taking a look around. "This is Betwixt and Between. Why did Naminé leave this route for you?"
"I don't know. Maybe because it was the only one? Could have been left by DiZ." She said with a shrug.
"Maybe. But this isn't a good place to be."
The hoards were swarming again.
Axel looked like he was calculating something. Roxas looked worried, he turned to Kairi.
"We should split up. And right now I don't know how good an idea it is to be close to Sora, no offence."
"None taken," he reassured him as his keyblade flew to life in his hand.
Roxas pulled Axel to the side. "Don't try anything stupid, Axel." He pulled him down by his sleeve and kissed him. "I love you too much to lose you, understand?"
Kairi smiled as she watched them from the corner of her eye.
"I understand, Rox. Love you too." He held Roxas' hand and kissed his knuckles.
A flare of light lit between their palms and when Roxas stepped over to join Kairi, he was looking down at his keyblade in astonishment.
Axel winked.
"Let's go." Sora announced, the six of them splitting into pairs.
Roxas and Kairi quickly learned that their styles matched each other's, he aligned with light too and between a combination of spells and three keyblades, they'd taken a lot of them down.
"Bring them towards us!" Roxas shouted as they stepped back towards the centre.
"We know what we're doing," Kairi reassured a worried looking Axel.
She threw ice, fire and Holy in quick succession, her keyblade flying right after them.
"Ready?" She asked Roxas.
"Yeah." He had one keyblade floating next to his hand and the other gripped tightly. She'd seen Sora do something similar but never for more than a few seconds at a time.
They spun face-to-face and shouted, with the same sort of power Kairi had used with Sora;
"Radiant Destruction!"
Light shot out all around them, arcing through the air. Kairi and Roxas flew out after it, slicing though the enemy as light tore others apart. All she knew then was the grace of her blade in her hand and the resonant magic from Roxas and herself.
When it was over they both collapsed, the others rushing over to them.
"We're fine," Roxas shouted, too loud in the silence but both he and Kairi's ears were ringing.
"Kairi!" Sora skidded on the floor to be at her side, a Hi-Potion used before she could reach to her pocket to get her own.
"That was awesome," Axel told them, helping Roxas to stand.
"So was my new Keyblade."
"That wasn't planned."
"Really?"
Kairi cleared her throat. "That sometimes happens. We've seen it on our travels." She explained, though she'd chosen to keep Destiny's Embrace and power it up rather than switch it, for the most part.
"Good timing." Sora beamed.
"Yeah." Roxas looked at Axel as he said it.
"We should get out of here before they come back." Sora looked around nervously.
"Want to take a short cut?" Axel asked, opening his hand and making a portal. "They won't notice this one if it's made from inside here."
"Serendipitous Duo," Roxas said, sat next to Axel in the room they'd secured inside the safest building they could find. Neither of them wanted to relay what they had used this room for previously.
It was clean and out of the way. It was also sound proof and layered with protection spells... but again, they didn't need to know why.
"You're sure?"
Roxas nodded. "I'm sure. That's what it's called."
"More you than me, this time," Axel remarked, squeezing his arm around Roxas tighter.
"Maybe, pretty sure the spikes are because of you."
On the other side of the room Kairi and Sora looked over the book that they'd brought with them, they'd explained how and where they'd found it. In return Kairi and Sora had caught them up on the important things they'd found on their journey.
Kairi had been delighted at the mention of Aqua and had spent several long minutes looking at her page and taking it in.
Roxas and Axel had been disheartened when they'd heard about Demyx. And they thank the others for trying to help their friend at his end.
In the morning the'd set out towards the Castle, hopefully find Riku and Naminé, and wait for Aqua as long as the could.
Roxas placed his hand over the wayfinder in his pocket. Their enemy had been Ven's as well. And he owed it as much to himself as to him.
"That reminds me," Roxas said.
He dismissed his new keyblade and reached into his pockets. He pulled out the two keychains inside.
"Kairi? Sora?"
They looked up.
"I don't know how I have these, but I don't need them anymore, I'd like to give them back."
Kairi accepted the thassal-shell-Sora and Sora accepted the black crown on a chain.
"I did wonder," she said. "Where it was, but this makes sense now."
"Thank you," Sora told them, his fingers stroking the edges.
Roxas wasn't sure if she should ask about Riku or not, but guessed it was a subject forefront in their friends minds. The missing piece of their trinity, loved but elusive.
"We know what you did for Radiant Garden," Kairi explained a little while later, the group of them sat around a table with blankets wrapped around them as the cold of the night settled in. "Was that what made you come here?"
Axel shook his head. "The book said you'd moved, and things for us had gone about as far as they could in the castle."
"We knew we had to join you at some point. I have my answers and now we know we have to fight," Roxas added.
"Even though you were part of the Organisation?" Sora asked.
"Yeah." Axel signed. "Saix was my best friend growing up, we were Lea and Isa back then, and we were friends here for a while too... but he... he wouldn't choose anything other than Xemnas now. He despised my relationship with Roxas, and hated friendship with Demyx."
"See, that's what I don't understand," Kairi remarked. "How can they hate so much? That's an emotion."
Axel raised his eyebrows at the 'They' comment.
"I don't know," Roxas told her. "I know I've always had part of a heart, and not Sora's either... and now I have more of it. But the others? I'm not sure they know. Demyx always loved his music and we'd both seen him cry."
"Maybe it's like a Pixie."
Everyone's eyes went to Sora.
"What?" Donald asked.
"Pixies can only handle one emotion at a time. Maybe it's something like that for them. It's just a theory."
Axel smiled at him. "It's a good one. But none of us really know. And we don't think this was ever what Xehanort wanted."
"No, I agree. What you've told us makes sense," Kairi said. "But it's odd. You've never seemed anything but real to me. Master Yen Sid wasn't happy when I questioned him about it the last time we saw him."
"He might not know. Nobodies were both an accident and an unexpected development, we think," Axel added. "Almost all of this leads to Xehanort."
"And we need to stop him," Sora agreed. "I'm glad we have you guys."
"So are we," Roxas agreed. Sharing a smile with the boy who's history linked with his, just not at all the way they'd originally thought they did.
"This place is..."
"Bleak?" Roxas suggested to Sora.
"Yeah. Does anyone actually live here?"
Axel shrugged. "Don't know. It could be the remains of another world, but there aren't any belongings anywhere. Just houses and buildings and giant screens."
They'd fought their way through the streets and alleys to the main square and beyond. Roxas and Axel passed on as much as they could from Aqua in the short time they had.
Kairi found it easier to adapt to than Sora, because she hadn't been fighting for so long, but he got the hang of it enough that after a few hours practice, they had a few new tactics and spells learnt.
"Should we wear our coats?" Axel asked as they reached the activation switch for the walkway.
"Depends if you want them to know we're coming or not," Roxas said
"KAIRI! Kairi!"
They all looked up to see Naminé, who rushed through the air to land in front of her and take her hand. "There isn't much time, please, come with me."
Their eyes met for less than a second before Kairi nodded, turned as if to speak to the others, but disappeared inside a portal before she could finish.
Sora cried out and fell to the ground, clutching his heart.
"Sora!" Donald and Goofy rushed to his side.
Roxas knelt down in front of him, relieved not to feel a pull from his heart to Sora's, even though seeing him in pain was awful.
"We need to get him to Kairi," Axel said.
"What?"
"Rox, we're not the only ones sharing a heart. It's how Kairi woke him up, remember?"
"We have to get into the Castle."
"Please," Naminé begged, dragging Kairi behind her and up a very tall and very narrow staircase.
"I didn't know he was planning to do this, we were supposed to activate it together... but Riku... he... Kairi, I think he'll listen to you. He didn't know I was there and I heard him... Kairi..."
"Alright," She agreed, her heart pounding with more than the exertion. The walls were white with an odd blue pulsing through it, reminiscent of Space Paranoids but... colder, somehow. "I'll do what I can."
Riku felt the false wind of the not-world blow around him. His hood was down and he closed his eyes, trying to remember the smell of salt and hot sand, Sora's laugh and Kairi's giggle. Naminé's face in the sunset at twilight.
It hurt and it burned; memories of light he didn't deserve. This was his purpose, this, take down this Kingdom Hearts. Stop the Organisation before anyone else could be hurt.
"Riku!"
The distressed call snapped him out of it and he turned, braced to call his keyblade.
"Riku!" It was Kairi, when he opened his eyes he saw her there, real and red face from running, and angry.
He looked to the floor again. But she ran until she smacked into his chest with her arms around him.
"Don't you dare, don't you dare. We've finally made it here after all this time, Sora's here too and you... Naminé said you were planning on... Please stay, please."
He knew she was crying against his coat, he could even feel the heat of her hands against his back but it still didn't feel real to him.
When he opened his eyes again, he closed his arms around her, felt her realness, heard her angry tears. And when he looked up he saw Naminé.
Lovely, quietly brave Naminé. He met her eyes over that of one of his best friends in all the worlds, who he'd loved for years. And wondered how she stayed so strong and capable despite her fears, wondered if he could learn that for himself.
He held Kairi tight against him with one hand and held out the other to Naminé before he lost his nerve. Her fingers were cool in his.
"Our coats would have been useless anyway," Axel remarked. "Even if they can't know that we're here, Sora is a beacon all of his own."
"So we'll protect him," Roxas said firmly.
"Of course we will," Axel agreed, his chacrams spinning to life in his hands as nobodies moved toward them.
