Chapter 36
~ The Key ~

For the first time in quite a while, Roxas had returned to the meditation techniques that Xaldin and Marluxia had taught him when he had first become aware of Xion's presence lingering within him. He sat quietly on the flat rock where Otonashi usually spent his time fishing, legs crossed; his cloak had been removed and was now underneath the boy, serving as padding between him and the solid rock. Though the air was getting rather chilly by this time of year, his shirt was also absent—his chest was bare aside from a few strips of bandaging material, covering up the handful of wounds he had accumulated during his most recent battle.

Though weeks out of practice, Roxas quickly achieved the state he was attempting to reach, slipping peacefully away into his own inner world once again…

The peaceful feeling didn't last. As soon as he had taken his first glimpse of his surroundings, the shock nearly returned him to the outside world.

Everything had changed since his last visit.

The island that he had stood upon before, with its drooping palm trees and sandy beaches, was completely gone. What remained was a circular platform of grayish stone, decorated with pillars of the same stone that seemed to be shaped like the thrones in the Organization's meeting room. The ocean around him was still present, but its waters were no longer a clear blue, more resembling the darker and rougher waters surrounding the Organization's base. The sky was no longer blue and sunny, but pale gray from a layer of clouds. The bridge leading over to Xion's room was still present; aside from that, the only things that had remained unchanged were the other two islands on the horizon, though the smaller one almost seemed to be closer now than it had been before.

Roxas glanced down for a moment. Even his clothes had changed since the last time—no longer was he wearing the red shorts that the Organization had first found him wearing. Instead, he was suited up in the black uniform that all new Organization members must wear before they are issued a cloak upon their first successful demonstration of control over either their weapons or powers.

The sound of seagulls in the distance was gone. The sound of wind rushing through the island foliage was gone. Only the sound of waves, crashing up against the stone platform as if trying to erode even that away, remained.

"What… happened here?"

"I don't know," a familiar voice said, "But… I can tell you when it happened."

Roxas turned toward the direction of the voice—toward the rickety old bridge, leading across to the other island (this one still looked like an island) which would always shift shape into Xion's room the moment he crossed over a certain point. Xion, still wearing the school uniform she had always appeared in while in this inner world, was walking across the bridge toward him.

"Something happened to you while we were trapped in the Internet," she continued, stepping onto the platform and shivering slightly as her bare feet touched the cold gray stone. "The days all blurred together in there, so I'm not really sure, but it seemed like… one day the old island was still around, and the next it changed into this."

She walked further toward the center of the platform, passing over the massive Organization XIII symbol etched into the central stone, and then kept going until she was nearly standing on the opposite edge. Xion stared out across the choppy ocean, feeling the wind pick up slightly as she her gaze passed over the large island off in the distance.

"There's a couple other islands over there," Roxas said, causing her to blink and turn toward him with a confused look on her face. "I don't know what they are or if it's possible to get to them, but… I wonder why they didn't change into something like this, too."

"Roxas," Xion said, "There's… only one other island out there."

"Huh?"

Roxas walked over to the edge alongside the girl who seemed to have become a permanent resident within him, pointing to a spot in the distance where the second, smaller island could be seen. To Roxas, it looked a lot like the island that had been replaced by the stone platform he now stood on; to Xion, it looked like nothing but open ocean as far as the eye could see.

"It's right there," he said, "I think I spotted it out there before, but… it almost seems like it's closer now."

Xion shook her head and closed her eyes for a moment, then reopened them, staring intently at the spot where Roxas had been pointing. There was quite clearly nothing there. For a moment, she was worried; then, a thought crossed her mind. She reached over and grasped Roxas' other hand, causing a faint aura of light to flare up around both of them as the two connected their energies, the same way they had done many times before in battle. She blinked again. Sure enough, a second island began to appear—a hazy image off on the horizon at first, then gradually becoming clearer as Roxas and Xion's shared power circulated back and forth between the two of them, allowing her to see through his eyes as well.

"Do you see it now?"

Xion nodded slightly, still a bit surprised by the other island's sudden appearance.

"Yes, but… it wasn't there just a minute ago. Before we linked our powers… I couldn't see a thing out there."

She let go of his hand and the glow around the two of them faded—and, along with it, the image of the other island vanished from her eyes.

"Another island on the horizon that only you can see," she mumbled, sitting down on the edge of the gray stone. "I wonder… what could it mean?"

Before either of them could continue their conversation, Roxas was alerted to a voice calling his name somewhere on the outside. This did not immediately disrupt his meditation, as it would have before; instead, he had just enough time to turn to Xion and wave goodbye before he was once again brought back to the rock by the sea where his body had been sitting the whole time.

Naminé blinked slightly as Roxas suddenly opened his eyes and exhaled deeply, hunching over slightly forward before turning to face her.

"Oh! Hey Naminé," he said, waving slightly and smiling. "What brings you all the way down here?"

The little girl in the white dress (this time wearing her cloak overtop of it in an attempt to block out some of the cold) sat down next to him, reaching over afterward to pick up a small package that had been on the rock nearby. Partially unwrapping it, she handed it over to the boy before speaking.

"Marluxia mentioned that you'd been down here for a while," she said, "So I thought you might like a snack."

Roxas continued the process of unwrapping the package, eventually getting the plain brown paper from the outside off and reaching the box within. Upon opening it up and seeing two pale blue ice cream bars, his eyes widened slightly. Something about them looked strangely familiar, and he felt almost excited to see them… and yet, somehow, he couldn't recall having ever seen this variety of ice cream before in his life. Once again he grew dizzy for a moment; if he had not been sitting down he probably would have risked toppling over into the ocean below.

"I'm sorry," she said, not entirely sure how to interpret his reaction. "Do… you not like that kind?"

Roxas shrugged off the wave of dizziness and reached into the package, removing one of the two ice cream bars before passing the other back to Naminé.

"No, it's not that at all, I just…"

She caught a glance of his eyes and gasped. Instead of memories related to this ice cream, which Marluxia had assured her was the same kind Roxas had repeatedly mentioned as his favorite in his earliest days among the Organization's ranks, she found herself staring into emptiness.

"You can't remember them."

Roxas blinked and turned back toward her.

"Yeah… but it's weird. I almost feel like I should, somehow."

Naminé looked into his eyes again. Immediately, she thought back to the day when the Organization's base was transformed into a high school—when she had noticed that Roxas' memory was unlike everyone else's in that it had been altered more than once. His memory was no different now than it had been then, aside from the absence of the false memories of his previous year at Thirteenth District High that the Fangirls had inserted—all memory of his life prior to the day he had joined the Organization was completely blank. It wasn't fragmented and twisted by Fangirlish meddling, nor was it faded and only barely readable like those forgotten memories of the past that tended to get lost in the shuffle as new ones were added in on top of them. It was simply a space where all memory was… gone.

Roxas took a tentative first bite of his ice cream and then smiled, immediately taking a second bite. It even tasted familiar—but he was sure this was the first time he had ever tasted such a thing.

"These… are actually pretty good," he said, taking another bite between words. "It feels a little weird to be eating ice cream in November... but thanks for bringing them down here."

Naminé just smiled and took a bite of her own ice cream.

An entire table of Vexen's lab had been cleared of its usual contents, replaced with the two Keyblades that had been brought back to the base after the previous Fangirl-extermination mission. Or, more accurately, one of the two Keyblades—the other one had been almost completely disassembled, lying in pieces scattered across the table with various notes in dry-erase marker jotted directly onto the table's surfaces to keep the components organized as well as document their purpose. Estera stood nearby, scribbling away at a furious pace to copy these diagrams in her own notebook before they were inevitably removed.

"This 'Keyblade'… quite an ingenious device," he said, turning to face Zexion and Michiko as the two younger members entered the lab. "If he truly was able to invent such a thing himself, and even develop a way to mass-produce them… then I suppose old Ansem hasn't gone senile just yet after all."

Zexion smiled slightly, then summoned his book and flipped it open to an empty page, preparing to write down any new information that the Organization's scientist had managed to dig up from his inspection of the captured Keyblades.

"So… have you managed to figure out how they work?"

Vexen nodded.

"Indeed," he said, "I have been able to determine the function of most of these parts… the only difficulty, of course, being the fact that neither of my samples is currently functioning."

He paced over to the other end of the table, picking up the Keyblade that was still in one piece and grasping it by the handle much like its actual wielders would have done.

"The handle is, in fact, the core of the weapon. Contained within it are a radio transmitter and receiver, the buttons that control various functions, and most importantly… a battery."

He pointed to a small strip of slightly different-looking material in the handle of the Keyblade he held.

"This, of course, is the indicator of that battery's remaining power," he continued. "But that is not its only purpose. Through connections that extend throughout every piece of this Keyblade, this strip is also set up in such a way that it would allow a Keyblade's wielder to recharge the battery by absorbing energy from some external source."

He motioned for Michiko to step forward, offering the Keyblade to her. She was hesitant at first, but upon Zexion's nod of approval she nodded back and grasped the weapon much like she would her own sword.

"And this… is why I asked you to bring Michiko along."

"Hmm," Zexion said, "So you're going to try and recharge that Keyblade… using her power."

Vexen nodded.

"Correct. Michiko, your power does allow you to infuse energy into a weapon, does it not?"

"Yeah," she said, staring at the Keyblade. "But… I'm not really that good at controlling it…"

"Then be as careful as possible," Vexen continued. "I'm not sure exactly what the capacity of the Keyblades' batteries are as of yet. Try to only infuse a small amount of your power into the battery."

Michiko nodded again, then grasped the Keyblade tightly in both hands, shifting into a battle stance and closing her eyes for a few seconds to concentrate. When she opened them again, a pale greenish aura began to swirl up around her before slowly draining away into the Keyblade instead, surrounding the entire weapon before fading away. And, just as Vexen suspected, the battery indicator flashed to life, blinking red for a few moments before gradually filling up to just about a third of its full capacity. Almost instantly, she felt her strength increase just a bit, as if she had pumped her energy into her own body rather than using it to fill the Keyblade's battery.

"Very good," the scientist said, holding out his hand for Michiko to pass the Keyblade back over to him. She relaxed her grip on the weapon and handed it over, her strength returning to its normal state once again as soon as the Keyblade left her hands.

"Now, as I'm sure you've already observed… it seems that a portion of the energy stored in this battery is somehow used to enhance its wielder's strength," he continued. "I myself only experience a very slight change in physical strength from this effect… however, reports of the Keybearers' performance in battle suggest that this is not the case for those who do not already have powers of their own."

He pressed one of the buttons on the handle, causing a crackle of radio static to echo throughout the room for a moment. He made a point of releasing this button before continuing, not wanting to risk potentially-hostile elements among the Keybearers overhearing any of this.

"That, of course, is the button that activates the Keyblade's radio transmitter when held down. And this one…"

He pressed the other button, and immediately the parts that made up the weapon's shaft and hand-guards began to miniaturize to the point where they almost seemed to vanish, automatically returning to tiny compartments built into the handle just like every other vital component had been.

"This one… allows a Keyblade to be deactivated and carried in an inconspicuous form."

"Interesting," Zexion said, speaking up before Vexen could begin the inevitable rant about how brilliant a design the Keyblade's miniaturizing feature was. "But I'm more curious about how the battery works. According to reports from previous encounters, the Keybearer you fought seemed shocked that his battery would run low, as if such a thing had never happened before…"

He flipped back through his book's records, finding the notes he had written down after reading over the reports of the Organization's first clash with the Keybearers. He paused for a moment, re-reading what he had written, and then continued.

"If they need to be replaced or manually recharged in some way, then running out after an extended fight shouldn't have come as such a surprise," he said. "And Michiko's power seemed to be compatible with the battery, at least in small doses… but they're clearly not calibrated to absorb our powers automatically, or it would have been impossible for either your opponent or Zagan to have run out of power when they did."

Vexen paused for a moment, glancing at the Keyblade handle that he was still holding onto, and then nodded slightly.

"Yes… that is one mystery of the Keyblade I haven't been able to decipher as of yet," he said, setting the weapon back down on the table in exactly the same spot it had rested before. "Even the slightest traces of any possible energy source were completely absent from the batteries of these two Keyblades when we found them… so it's difficult to say what sort of power supply they usually operate on."

Meanwhile, in the deepest of the hidden basement levels beneath the home base of the Keybearers, Zagan paced back and forth beside one of the heavy metal tables in the Keyblade manufactory in an attempt to answer that exact question for his own purposes. Ansem had never quite explained the important details of the weapons' functions to the rest of the Keybearers, simply describing their strength-enhancing properties and various other features without going into any detail about things like where their power supply comes from. But after having his new-and-improved Keyblade suddenly run out of power mid-battle, Zagan had to know.

Ansem's only words on the batteries' operation was that running out of power was something that should be expected to happen very rarely, and mainly in extended training sessions or situations where the weapon's transforming capabilities were overused. The base did have an emergency generator into which Keyblades could be plugged in to recharge them if they did run out of power, but this was so rarely used that many of the lower-ranking Keybearers were unable to remember how to connect their Keyblades to it in the first place. Aside from the incidents recently with Ignis' Keyblade and his own running out of power when pitted up against members of Organization XIII, Zagan had only heard of a few Keybearers who had ever pushed their Keyblades' batteries so far as to need to recharge in this way. Ignis was the first in the history of the Keybearers to ever run out mid-battle, and Zagan needed to know why.

This, of course, was what had brought him to the place where Keyblades were born. Ansem did not allow even the Keyblade Masters to watch the process of a new Keyblade being created all the way through; they were free to design their Keyblade's appearance, physical features, and transforming capabilities through the computer system near the entrance of the underground lab, but the rooms containing the machinery that constructed the Keyblades was off limits to all but Ansem himself. Fortunately for Zagan, it seemed that the old man relied entirely on the obedience of his followers to keep them out, rather than actually putting forth the effort to install a security system.

"Now, let's see," he muttered to himself, passing by another few tables and glancing up at the complicated mechanical arms and tubes dangling from the roof overhead. "Where do the batteries come in?"

He adjusted his glasses slightly, peering up between the currently-inactive machines. Finally, he spotted a dispenser opening next to one of the smaller mechanical arms, just the right size for a Keyblade battery to emerge from—going by the size of the battery in his own Keyblade, of course, as one of the first things he had done after receiving it was disassemble the thing entirely and put it back together piece by piece.

Raising one hand, Zagan let a glob of dull orange fungal goop droop down for a second before flicking his wrist and sending it sailing up to the ceiling, stopping only when it made contact with the battery-sized dispenser. He then snapped his fingers and the blob slipped into the hole, rapidly oozing into the inner workings of the machine. He heard clicking and clanking sounds from up above as his gooey creation pushed aside locks and valves until finally it had reached its destination—the storage receptacle for new Keyblade batteries, which Zagan knew were already fully charged before they were placed inside the weapons' handles. Seconds (and a few more clanking sounds) later, the blob of fungus slid back down, now with a single tiny Keyblade battery in tow. The blob dissipated into energy before fading away entirely, and the battery fell to the metal table below…

And struck with such force that its surface cracked, sending a few sparks of green light into the air around where it had fallen. An even larger flash and a loud crack followed as the battery became unstable and burst open entirely, illuminating the entire subterranean workroom for several seconds before fading slowly away. Somewhere up above, the emergency Fangirl alarm that Zagan himself had programmed into the Keybearers' new Fangirl Detection System began to blare.

Guarded from the sudden flash thanks to his reflective glasses, Zagan's eyes widened.

"That same neon green… just like a dying Fangirl," he mumbled to himself. "So the secret behind the Keyblade's mysterious power source… it was dead Fangirls all along."