King Mickey to the Rescue

Come now, guys! We haven't forgotten about Sora in all this have we?! I know, I'm sorry. I've given Sora and his two best followers a bit part. Don't worry---it'll be better in the sequel that's coming up!!

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Sora groaned as Donald revealed yet another empty coconut. Its rotted insides gleamed in the moonlight. He hadn't had a decent meal in two days. None of them had. The island that Jack had abandoned them on was a miserable stretch of land, little more than a sandbaron a desolate patch of ocean. It was about twenty miles long, and while it mercifully had trees, it didn't have much in the way of food. Now, on the night of the third day, his hope that Jack might have been playing some ugly, ugly joke had disappeared and he realized that they might just die here. It would gruesomely ironic: he had been born on an island, and he would die on one.

"Well, I had a little more luck" said Goofy. He had managed to catch a few scrawny fish in the sea on the beach. "Gwarsh, there isn't enough food here."

"At least we have water" Sora said. They had melted ice from Donald's blizzard spells for fresh water. Sora didn't know where it came from, but he was willing to do anything to avoid the horrifying death of dehydration.

"We've got to think of a way out of here" Sora said. "If only…Donald! Can you teleport us out of here! Like when Merlin teleported from Radiant Garden to Disney Castle!"

"I don't know" said the duck. "I don't know that kind of magic yet."

Sora sighed. "Well, if we don't get out of here soon, I think we really might die here." In a sudden burst of rage, Sora picked up the sword that Jack had given him and hurled it across the beach. It stuck with a rubbery thwong! sound in a palm tree far away.

"I hate you!" Sora shouted to the sky, as if Jack could hear all the way…well, all the way wherever he was.

"Sora, we can't give up!" Goofy said, putting a white gloved hand on Sora's shoulder. "We'll get outta this somehow."

"I know" Sora said. "It's just that…we've been here for three days! What's going to change?"

"I can tell you what's going to change in a few minutes" said a horribly familiar voice near the area where Sora had thrown his sword. A Dark Corridor formed near there. Larxene walked out of it, her boots kicking up sand as she walked toward them.

"What are you doing here?" Sora asked. He found that he was so tired and hungry that he really didn't care to hear the answer.

"Weeeeelllllll," Larxene said, "looks like you were telling the truth after all, brat. That experiment was in Twilight Town until a day ago."

"What?" Donald said. "Tine's in Twilight Town?"

"Not now" Larxene said. "She was kidnapped by that jerk Xavier and his stupid gang. They're working for that witch, What's-Her-Name."

"Alright" said Sora. "Go ahead, fight it out. I wonder who'll win."

Larxene bristled with anger. "Go ahead and laugh Keyblade Master. You're going to love why I'm here."

"Why are you here?" Sora asked.

"I still have to repay you for back on the ship" Larxene said. "That remark about not having any emotions because I don't have a heart, right?"

"You don't have a heart!" Goofy said.

"Right my dog-like friend" said Larxene as she began to move closer to them. "But by the time I get through with you, you won't have any hearts either---because I'll rip them out!" she lunged toward them. The group scattered before her wrath. "Don't think you'll get too far!" the Savage Nymph called. She opened her hands and a flood of lightning bolts crashed down from the sky, blowing huge chunks out of the ground.

"Blizzard!" cried Donald. A ball of ice flew at Larxene---and missed. The Organization member calmly kicked Donald out of the way. "Get out of the way duck" Larxene said. "I wanna kill the brat first. I'll roast and eat you later." Larxene then gave a light little hiccup and it was then that Sora realized something that gave him a little hope. The Savage Nymph was drunk! Perhaps a little too much pirate's rum or something like that. It gave them an advantage over their opponent. He dodged a flurry of daggers that Larxene hurled at his face.

Goofy smashed her in the side with his shield. While it didn't inflict much damage, it knocked Larxene even more off balance. She staggered forward and fell into the sea.

"Aaaaaahhgggghhhhh!" she screamed as she was hit by the water. "Nooooooooo! I can't get wet! If I get wet then…then…aaaaahhhhhh!" there was an explosion of electrical energy. When it cleared, a very burned and singed Organization member was left glaring at them. "I" she said. "Will kill you." and then she left. Sora and the others stood there for a moment, transfixed by what had just happened.

"That was weird" Sora said. "I wonder what's going on?" he asked. "We have to tell King Mickey about the Organization and we have to---"

"That's all right Sora" said a small voice near him. "I already know about the Organization's return." They saw King Mickey step out of a glowing white portal that opened near the same stand of palm trees that Larxene had come from.

"Your Majesty!" Donald and Goofy raised shaky salutes.

"At ease" Mickey said.

"Why do people keep coming from that one area?" Sora asked.

"The space between the Dark Realm and reality is very thin there" the King explained. "Just like at Master Yen Sid's tower. A Dark Corridor can be erected anywhere, but it's particularly easy here."

"Thank God!" Sora said, jumping up and down. "Now we can get out of here!"

"You know about the Organization?!" Donald squawked.

"Yes, and I know how they returned as well" said the King. "But that's for another time. Currently there are more important matters for me to address. Sora, we will need your Keyblade powers in the battle to come."

Sora dropped his eyes and blushed, tears stinging his sight. He stubbornly blinked them away. "T-the Keyblade your Majesty…" he tried to say, but then all the anger and hurt that he had felt since Jack Sparrow had stolen his Keyblade came gushing out in a huge liquid sob. Mickey looked confused for a minute…and then he understood.

"Oh, Sora" he said. "The Keyblade fled you because you were full of pride" he said, when Sora explained what happened. "You were overconfident in the face of someone else's trouble. I'm not saying that what Jack did was right, and the fact that he allied himself with Organization XIII is quite disturbing" the King said as Sora started to protest. "But I will say that the Keyblade has its own rules and it changes them for no one, not even its master. I can lend you mine, but we need to leave now."

"What happened? What's going on?" Sora asked.

"I'll explain on the way back" King Mickey said. "But time is of the essence. If we keep moving, we may be able to stay one step ahead of our foes!"

At that moment another Dark Corridor opened. This time a man with a long gray and black ponytail stepped out. An eye patch covered one eye and a long scar ravaged one cheek. Xibar pointed his crossbows at the group. "Well, if it isn't the little pigeons from before" he said. "I liked to think that Larxene was right, and you died on some rock in the middle of the sea. But, seeing as she ran off somewhere after raiding my beer supply, I thought I should follow. Guess it was a good idea."

"Your Majesty! Sora! Run!" Goofy said. He put himself between the Nobody and Sora and the King.

"We can handle him!" Sora said. He picked up a piece of driftwood from the beach. "You don't scare us!"

Another Dark Corridor appeared, and Larxene stepped back out. Apparently she had treated herself to some potions, because she showed no signs of the hammering she had taken at the hands of the Old Man of the Sea. "Now what are you going to do?" she demanded. She gave a girlish little giggle. "Once we kill you, there won't be anyone left wielding one of those annoying Keyblades."

"The Keyblades, and the Light will never die! I will never allow such a thing to happen" King Mickey shouted.

"Oh yeah, pipsqueak?" Larxene said. "I should warn you that we, as an Organization. are all in an EXTREMELY foul mood. So it wouldn't be wise to pick a fight with us today. But" she said as the King raised his Keyblade, and Donald and Goofy readied staff and shield, "I guess that you Disney Castle folks never were big on brains, were you?"

"Wait!" Sora said. "Don't do this! You'll just be throwing your lives away!"

"We do what our hearts command" said King Mickey. A Dark Corridor opened in the clearing. "Sora, if anything should happen to me, this Keyblade will find you" said the King. "And if we make it through this battle, then I will give it to you myself." Then he gestured to the portal. "Run!"

"I'm not going to let that happen!" Larxene said in a singsong voice that let all of them know that she was still a little tipsy. She teleported directly in front of Sora.

"Get out of my way!" Sora snapped at her. He raised the pieced of driftwood like a weapon.

"Puh-lease" Larxene said. She vaporized the wooden weapon with a blast of lightning. "You are sooooo pathetic" she said. "You were back then, and you still are now. I don't know how you troop of idiots managed to defeat me before, but it ends now" she was interrupted by the fist slamming into her jaw. The force of it sent the Savage Nymph flying four feet. Sora looked to see who had saved him. He saw a young woman dressed in black step out of the Corridor.

"Jeez, I hate those things, they're so friggin' cold!" the woman said. She held out her hand to Sora. "Come on! Let's get out of here, before hag face recovers!" something about the woman was very familiar…

"I'll KILL you for that, and it won't be quick!" Larxene snarled. She began to stamp toward them. Once again Sora was glad that she was drunk. Otherwise she would have probably killed them already. The mysterious woman stepped in front of Sora.

"I thought my fists told you nicely…to GET LOST!!" the woman fired a huge blast of blue energy from her hands. It caught number twelve in the Organization in the chest and sent her flying into a group of trees, which promptly exploded into flames. "How about my Seventh Heaven?" the woman said.

"Tifa!" Sora cried. "Thanks a lot!" He dove headfirst into the Dark Corridor. It was like diving into a cold shower. When he fell out, he was in the same room that he had been in earlier, talking to the leaders of the different Guilds in Radiant Garden.

"Sora! Are you alright?" asked Nexumair as he helped Sora to his feet.

"Donald, Goofy and the King were fighting there!" Sora cried.

"Who were they fighting?" Merlin asked.

"It was Organization XIII. They attacked us and they stayed behind to cover me. We have to go back there and help them fight. They can't take two members at the same time!"

"Two members?" Nexumair asked.

"Yes!" Sora said. "Tifa went out there to help them, but I've got to go back too!"

"No" said Leon. "I won't allow it. Sora, Tifa, Donald, Goofy, and the King can handle themselves in battle. They'll send those Organization members packing---if they don't kill them!"

At that moment, the King, Donald, Tifa, and Goofy walked out of the portal. It shut behind them. "It's alright everyone" said King Mickey. "We managed to hold them off long enough to get to the gate." They were all a little injured. King Mickey's clothes were rumpled, Donald's hat was ripped off at the top and Goofy's shield was dented in. Tifa had a small cut on her cheek which bled freely.

"Here" Aerith said, "I'll heal you all and we can begin to explain why we dragged you three here."

"You're alive!" Sora said to Donald and Goofy. He felt his eyes fill with tears as he found that his two friends, friends who had become as dear to him as Riku and Kairi, were still alive.

"Things are bad, kid" said Cid. "Now let's explain what's going on."

As they sat, Merlin cleared his throat. "Now to explain the events as they are, after you defeated Tine, she fled to Twilight Town. There, she met and befriended three children known as Hayner, Pence, and Ollette. After this, they encountered Kairi and Riku," Merlin said. He continued. "I suspect that the three were protective of their new friend, especially considering the state they found her in. Riku attacked and beat her. After this they were attacked by a member of Organization XIII."

"What?" Sora asked. "What happened then?"

"I was getting to that" Merlin said. "After that, Kairi with the help of Hayner, Pence and Ollette beat that Nobody back. He fled and so did Tine. She was captured by a group known as Xavier's Flyers. A group that is based in Radiant Garden."

"That's where you come in, Sora" Nexumair said. "I suggested that this would be the perfect time for you to use your Keyblade powers."

"But I don't get it" said Sora. "You warned me to stay away from Xavier's group. Why did you volunteer me?"

Nexumair sighed. "You won't be alone. I will be following with a group of Bastion Knights. This is the time to eliminate Xavier's flyers once and for all."

Once again, Sora was amazed at the seriousness of the young boy's voice. He sounded much older than he actually was. It was strange.

"You, Donald, and Goofy will go into the Villain's Vale where Xavier has made his lair. I will back you up with a battalion and we will charge."

"O-okay" Sora said shakily. He didn't know if he liked the idea of storming a bandit's nest with a borrowed Keyblade. He wasn't sure he'd do it if he had is old one. It was a bit dangerous. But then again, so was Tine and Maleficent. Not to mention Organization XIII. They all had to be stopped, no matter what the cost.

"So you agree to it?" Nexumair asked, his green eyes gazing at Sora's.

"Yeah, I'll do it."

"Excellent!" Nexumair laughed and clapped Sora on the back.

"Jeez!" Sora said, "for someone so short, you're sure strong!"

"As many people have found out" said the Captain of the Bastion Knights with a smile.

Sora readied his weapon. He had King Mickey's gold and white Keyblade. It felt odd in his hands. It was like putting on a familiar shirt that is unexpectedly damp. He knew that this Keyblade was tolerating him. It didn't like him, but it was willing to stay with him, because its master had told it that this was the best course of action.

"I'm going to provide support as well" said Tifa.

"Did you join the Bastion Knights?" asked Donald.

"Yeah, I'm an assistant captain, under the kid" Tifa said. "Nexumair's cool enough…he's just a little strange."

"Well, let's find Tine" said Goofy. "As long as we're together, nothing'll happen to us!"

"Right" said Sora. They looked down at Villain's Vale. "Xavier" Sora said, as they ran down the Ravine Trail. "Here we come!!"

Well, here ends another chapter. By the way, this is the second to last one before I make the sequel. Please review! I can't say enough how much they mean to me!