Well this update took much longer than it should have. I was on a roll and then writer's block had to sneak up on me. This chapter is all about getting our heroes back on track. While also finding out a bit more about that riddle-loving cat. This should be interesting. :)
Enjoy.
Chapter Twenty Eight
Jack had gone back to check on his ship - a habit he had picked up over the years to make sure no one else made off with his precious Pearl. It had happened to him one-too many times in the past. Thankfully, everything was still ship-shape and between him and Vincent, the two got it anchored into a better area, far away from the claws of Hades or any heartless.
When they returned they saw everything just as they had left it. Tifa, Zack and Aladdin were still sitting outside of the large coliseum gates just shooting the breeze. Sparrow was the first to point out the obvious. "So, any chance of waking the sword-swinging chap so we can get back to doin' what we do best?"
"And what would that be?" asked Zack.
"Fighting heartless and protecting the worlds from Maleficent, of course," Aladdin replied.
"And let's not forget our sleeping friend's mission," added Jack.
Zack shook his head, "Boy, you guys sure keep him on his toes, no wonder he's so out of it. Maybe what Hades did really wasn't all that brutal after all."
"Times are tough right now," Tifa informed him, "The resistance is stretched thin and it's not easy finding more members since we don't have a key bearer."
"But, doesn't Riku have a keyblade?" asked Aladdin.
"He does," Tifa replied, "But Master Yen Sid believes that this is Sora's test. Something he has to deal with and rise to meet the challenge. Personally, I think he's trying to get his confidence back."
"Aye, the lad sure seemed a bit down on 'is luck when he woke up, poor kid." Aladdin knew it had to be bad if even Jack Sparrow felt honestly sorry for him.
Zack just scratched his head, "Boy I'm totally out of the loop. I thought Ven, Aqua and Terra were the only ones who had keyblades,"
The other four gave him strange looks making him feel uncomfortable. "What?"
"You know of more key bearers?" asked Aladdin.
"Well, yeah, but it was years ago, in fact, it was right before I left the coliseum the first time and joined the SOLDIER program and that's where I met Cloud. Boy was he one clumsy cadet," he chuckled, but got serious again when they were still giving him strange looks. "I don't know what happened to those three after they left, but that was the only time I ever saw them. I kinda miss them, they were pretty good guys, especially Ven. Now that I think about it, he looked a little bit like Cloud, maybe that's why me and him hit if off so well,..."
The group had stopped listening after that as Zack kept rambling on and between Tifa, Aladdin and Jack they knew it was something to bring to the master's attention when they got back.
~*~StL~*~
He was relaxed, lost in a dreamless sleep. It was nice for a change. No nightmares, no haunting memories, nothing. Maybe he was just too exhausted to dream. He didn't even remember falling asleep. One moment he was walking through the large double doors shaking his head at a overly excited Zack Fair who had just won his freedom and the next darkness. It was very comforting and he could have slept like this for days. Sadly, he seemed eternally cursed with bad luck.
Something was brushing against his nose. He tried swatting at it a few times and even turned over onto his side, but it was unrelenting and felt like a feather duster. Slowly Cloud opened his eyes only to glare at the face staring back at him with drowsy eyes. The swordsman wasn't sure if he was still dreaming. After all, cats normally weren't purple and pink.
"Ohh good, you've finally rejoined the living. I was starting to worry you had checked out of the game. that would have been a terrible piece to lose," it purred.
Cloud slowly sat up and blinked at the cat. "A purple cat that talks? Am I still dreaming?"
The cat shrugged, "Who can say? Dreams are funny like that. Someone's reality could be another person's dream and someone's dream could be another person's nightmare. The real question you should be asking is, which to chase? The dream, the reality or the nightmare?"
"You're not making any sense," the swordsman replied with a yawn.
The cat just smiled, "Perhaps not, but at least Sora is trying."
That woke the swordsman up, "You know where he is?"
The cat giggled at the swordsman's concern. "A little wet behind the ears perhaps, but he's making some progress."
Cloud felt a little better hearing that. He didn't admit it to anyone, but seeing the kid so broken up back at the master's house bothered him as equally as it had the others.
"Speaking of progress," the cat added, "Your feathered nightmare is making progress as well. Better make sure that bike of yours can reach top speed otherwise you may lose your key." With that the cat vanished.
As Zack was telling was telling the group of the time he had pulled a hilarious stunt by trapping Genesis' favorite copy of Loveless in a giant bowl of jello Cloud stormed out of the double doors.
He looked around, trying to find his friend and a way off this world when, "Cloud!" He turned to see Tifa running towards him. He was a little surprised to see her, but still glad.
"What are you doing here?" he asked.
"They came to save ya when they found out Hades took you from another world," Zack replied.
Tifa nodded in reply and Cloud looked right behind her to see Vincent. "Thanks for the rescue, but I have to get back to Fenrir and continue with my mission."
"What mission?" asked Zack.
"We can explain on the way," Tifa replied as she followed Vincent and Jack as they headed towards the Black Pearl. It didn't take very long to board the ship and the pirate vessel was soon sailing away from the Coliseum. Zack felt a bit strange leaving that world behind after all this time. Cloud just hoped he'd never have to see it again.
A little while later, down below deck in the captain's large dining room Zack was in full rant.
"That's low man! I knew Sephiroth had sunk pretty low, but THAT has to be a new record for bad guys. I mean, I get why he's got a bone to pick with Cloud, after the time he beat him an' all, but to go after a little kid? That's just...WRONG!"
Tifa sighed, "The worst part is, we still don't know why he's targeting Sora. So far, he's only gone after Cloud all this time, so why now?"
"I think I may know." All eyes turned to Cloud.
"The last time we fought, I went to meet him at the edge of the Great Maw, but when I got there, he was in the middle of fighting Sora." The swordsman slowly shook his head, "The kid came to me in the square and told me Sephiroth wanted to settle things, I can only assume he went back to relay my message, but I never expected him to fight Sephiroth. What I don't know is if he was attacked, or if Sora challenged him."
"Well, we all know how Sora can get, especially when it concerns his friends," added Aladdin.
"True," Tifa said, "if Sephirtoh said anything that seemed like a threat, Sora would get defensive and probably threatened him somehow, Sephiroth didn't like that and attacked."
"That kid is either really tough or just plain crazy, sounds like a fun person to hang around with!" Zack commented with a smile.
Cloud huffed, "You two would probably hit it off no problem."
At this Zack beamed, "Aw yeah! Now I really can't wait to meet 'im!"
. . .
The Cheshire Cat appeared in a room that was very plain. It was a circular room with one throne placed right in the center. sitting in the throne was a boy with blonde hair spiked to the side as if blown that way by a strong gust of wind. There was a girl sitting on the floor in front of the boy drawing something into her sketchbook.
"Must you be so cruel with your clues? I think you got carried away with your warning to the swordsman," she scolded him.
"Perhaps, but it got him moving, didn't it? You yourself said time is not on our side."
The girl set down her pencil as she glanced over at him, "Tell me, which side are you on?"
"What ever do you mean?" asked the cat.
"You seem to be playing both sides - giving clues to the witch."
"Ah, and which witch are you referring to? The evil fairy or yourself?" the cat purred.
"Sometimes, I think you have too much fun with word play," she replied.
The cat just laughed, "Well it certainly wouldn't be any fun if I didn't play with my words, now would it? It'd be too easy then, besides the important pieces seem to understand well enough, just look at our delivery boy, it didn't take him long at all to figure out he needed to start moving."
It was then that the Cheshire Cat became curious as he floated over to see what she was drawing. "What are you working on, my dear?"
But before he could really look at it she had hugged the sketch pad to her, "Don't you have someone else to pester with your cryptic messages?"
The cat shook his head in defeat as he faded, "You nobodies are no fun at all."
The girl smiled after he left as she looked back at what she had been drawing and then back up at the sleeping boy, "We know that's not true, don't we, Ventus? Or,...should I say, Roxas?"
She looked down at the picture she had been working on of Ventus and a friend he had met in the Coliseum, "Don't worry Zack, you'll see your friend again. Just be patient for a little longer."
~*~StL~*~
"Achoo!"
Cloud looked over at his friend as Zack rubbed his nose. "Homesick already?"
Zack gave him a look, "Funny."
Cloud still couldn't believe that after all this time he finally had his best friend back. What was even better was that it felt like nothing had changed. Zack was still a little kid at heart and a person who would give his life all over again to protect those around him - one of the things he had always admired about the First Class.
Zack noticed his friend's odd behavior. "You okay?"
"For once, yeah."
And cue the laughter, "D'aww, did you really miss me that much? Haha! Well you certainly learned a few new tricks and that sword is pretty awesome. How many different swords does it turn into?"
"There's seven blades total," Cloud replied.
Hidden behind the door Tifa watched the two with Aladdin also listening in, "Wow, Cloud's a lot different now than he was before, you don't think Hades did something to him, do you?"
But Tifa only smiled and shook her head, "No, it's all Zack's doing. Before Zack disappeared, Cloud was a lot more open and cheerful. I know he doesn't like it when I compare him to Sora, but he acted very similar."
"What happened?" asked Aladdin.
"I don't know, something bad happened and Cloud was never the same. We never saw Zack again until now." Tifa turned away from the door and motioned for Aladdin to follow. "Come on, we'll let them have first watch while we get some rest." Aladdin nodded and followed behind.
Zack slowly nodded as he glanced at the door from the corner of his eye. "I think our eavesdroppers have finally left." He leaned over the rail and looked out at the emptiness of space. "So, how dangerous is this witch?"
"She once kidnapped the seven princesses of light in order to unlock a door to unleash a world of darkness. I don't know the full details, Leon and Aerith would know more. I just know that Maleficent nearly succeeded."
"Dang," Zack shook his head, "How'd she get beat that time?"
"Sora," Cloud simply answered, "he used his keyblade to seal the door. There was someone else he had to fight, but the hearts of each world that was lost was released and the door to Kingdom Hearts was once again sealed. After that all of the worlds became separated again. I ended up back in Hollow Bastion."
"Whoa, so wait, if this kid is so strong that he can free all of the worlds then how come he's having trouble now? How can she have gotten so strong in such a short time?"
"No one knows," Cloud replied, "We rescued the kid, but the damage had already been done. Sora doesn't have any fight left in him."
"That's awful, and you don't know where he is now?" asked Zack.
"No, my mission is to find him and help him fight whatever demons that are haunting him."
"Man, sounds though, but from what the others have told me, you had your share of fighting demons."
"That's changed," And it had. Cloud had been getting better over the years, though to the outside observer it was hard to see, but to those closest to him, the change was obvious. Now a heavy weight had bene lifted and he no longer felt the guilt of losing his best friend. His heart felt lighter then it had in a very long time.
~*~StL~*~
He fell, crashing hard onto the balcony. He had been circling a dark and gloomy castle, hoping to catch sight of his prey when he felt a surge of pain and his strength faltered. Getting back to his feet, The one-winged angel tested his wing by stretching it out and giving it a few test flaps to make sure it wasn't broken.
That was strange, what had caused him to lose his strength like that? He wasn't too late, was he? No, there was still a darkness there, but it seemed dimmer somehow. He had to find his target and fast.
Rising to the sky once again he flew out over the castle once more. One last fly over confirmed it. His prey wasn't here. Another dead end, but he still had a few other worlds to search. After all, there were only so many places someone could hide a light that bright. With that in mind he took off into the night, leaving Beast's Castle far behind.
Belle had come out of her room and stood on the same balcony that the man had landed on. She had seen everything. The man's crash-landing having startled her, but she had kept calm and didn't panic. This was something Beast and the other Resistance members had to know.
Something's unfolding in Castle Oblivion, but what exactly it is is a total mystery. Hmm, seems something's up with a certain silver-haired villain. Perhaps he should give up his quest, but we know he's too stubborn for that. Maybe our heroes can use this to their advantage? We'll just have to wait and see.
