AN: we're rapidly approaching the climax of the book, and then you'll get some more stuff that follows the war. I've done some rearranging of Keyblades lately as some of the lore I came up with for this has changed, so Ixion is wielding a new Keyblade, and none of the Replicas had the Keyblade I said they did. please enjoy. I followed close behind Terra as he carried Ven up the last flight of stairs before we'd reach the observation tower. Ven had been unconscious and groaning about someone named Oni ever sense the incident back at the army of Nobodies, and no amount of healing from either Namine or Kairi helped. "How do you know that this Replica Ixion is going to be up there?" Terra asked, looking over his shoulder. "Because she'll be looking for the highest place she can find," Lea answered from my left, his right arm bandaged from a cut he'd gotten in the previous battle. "Why would she be doing that?" Mickey asked from his perch on Riku's back. "None of the other Replicas did that." "That's because those Replicas stole their power from somebody else," Riku answered, looking at the King over his shoulder. "Replicas are made from memory, and she's made from Vens," I added, smirking a bit. "And if I know Ven, he'd be looking for the highest place to use his wind magic possible." "You're probably right, but if they're so much like the people they copy, why don't they look like them?" Terra asked, almost tripping over a step before he regained his balance. "Because they don't actually have a face, and if they start to look like the person they come from, They'll begin to become that person," Namine answered, a somber look on her face. "It's a default in the way Vexen made them," Lea said, looking away from the group and at the white walls. "They take the most important memories out of people, and use them to take their power, but they can't take too much." "Otherwise, it's game over," Rikue finished, all of the people with knowledge of the Replica looking away at this point. "I have a question too," Kairi said, walking up so she was closer to the group. "You said we fought three so far, and the first one we fought was five, so where's number one?" I was about to tell Kairi it didn't matter when we arrived at the top of the tower and a deep voice answered instead. "He's right here!" A tall man in an Organization XII coat said, flinging Terra across the tower and into an invisible wall where his hands and feet were wrapped in Oblivion Vines, and I was forced to catch Ven before the others were sent flying as well, only Riku remaining on the ground before Ixion swept him off his feet. "Nice to see you again Roxitas, Ventus," she said, standing up and summoning a contrasted Keyblade Ven's. "We've been waiting for you, well, one of you." "Don't pester the poor amalgamation 2, it's not nice," the man said, summoning Darker than Dark into his left hand. "After all, we're here to help his, presently dominant side." I sent out a group of floods only to have them each cut down by Oblivion Vines, a sharp pain in my chest suddenly taking all of my attention. I layer there for a while, entirely unaware of my surroundings as the pain engulfed my entire body before I snapped out of it to see that I was in a cage barely wide enough to fit me, and equally tall. "Ah, you're finally awake," the man said, standing up from sitting on what appeared to be an invisible chair. "we've been waiting for you to get over those pains you get from your pets dying before we started." "Shall I begin?" Ixion asked, looking at the hooded man who nodded once very slowly before sitting back in his invisible chair. Ixion pushed her hand through the bars of the cage and onto my chest before it passed through my cloak, and shirt, and finally my skin before she began pulling half of my heart out. I began thrashing around the cage, the sound of metal banging agains skin ringing through my ears as I screamed to the roof of my cage when the pain suddenly stopped. when I looked back down Sora was standing there in what looked like his limit form, but with all the straps except the ones around his wrist turned blue, all the markings gone from his shoulder and pants, his necklace was replaced with the X shaped straps Ven had except blue and with his crown on it, and Keyblade armor attached to his left shoulder pad, and of course he was glowing an amazing shade of gold. As he pulled me out of the cage and laid me down I felt a strange numbness spreading from my chest to my left arm. "Take a brighter, Oni and I will handle this for a bit." *** ? Oni began to pluck at the keys of the piano and then she started singing. "Forgotten days, a fading memory. Lost and no longer seeking one another. Desperately still, you're reaching toward him. Hopelessly certain, you can mend the broken. Longing for a light lost in time, so distant. Pleading with fate, to be forgiving. Allow the shattered Hearts to be regathered. Fighting for love, to have a meaning. Without a promise, to embrace the Darkness. Hoping for a Dream lost in Light, so distant. Reasons ignored, no longer caring. How long it may take, just to mend the heart break. Lost and unsure the boy is fading a distant fragment of nobody important. Wishing for a day lost in memories distant." She stops, her hands moving away from the piano, and she looks up with a big smile on her face. "It's good to see you again." I dropped to my knees, tears in my eyes as I looked at two of my closest friends, standing there so close that I could almost touch them. That's when everything went black.