Author's Note: So... I just posted a blog post about the LAST chapter to Posterous like... ten minutes ago. Currently, Posterous is showing me that the post doesn't exist. But, I know it does. It'll show up. In other news, here's this chapter!


"Hopefully, there is food after this."

xx

"Master Eraqus!" Terra shouted, chasing after the bit of light in his heart that he knew to be his former Master. "Master! Please!" he pleaded. "Wait!"

However, the sliver of light did not wait. It kept moving.

Terra continued running after the sliver. He couldn't lose it…

He was being blocked by a gruesome Keyblade. He knew that Keyblade… he had wielded it when Xehanort had possessed him…

"You!" he spat, staring up at the face of Xehanort.

Xehanort's yellow eyes glinted with malice.

Terra drew his own Keyblade.

"That will do you no good, boy; you won't reach your dying Master."

"Master Eraqus!" Terra shouted once again.

Xehanort laughed.

"Terra!" Master Eraqus called.

"Master Eraqus!"

"Terra!"

"Master…"

"Terra!"

It was Aqua shouting.

Terra sat bolt up.

"Aqua…"

"You were dreaming…" she said softly.

"It was more of a nightmare," Terra groaned, rubbing his head.

Almost on instinct, the two of them looked over to where Ven was, still curled up in a ball in the grass.

"Sometimes I feel that this isn't fair to him," Terra said. "Sleeping on the ground and all. I mean, he's still just a kid."

"He wouldn't let us leave him behind," Aqua pointed out, smiling a tad.

Terra nodded in agreement.

"Do you want to talk about it?" Aqua asked.

"Hmm?"

"Your nightmare?"

Terra sighed. He didn't really want to talk about it. But he probably should.

"I was chasing after Master Eraqus," Terra said. "But then Xehanort was keeping me from getting to him… I drew my Keyblade against Xehanort, but there wasn't anything I could do. We hadn't even started fighting and I had the feeling that there wasn't anything I could do."

"Xehanort is not still in your heart, Terra," Aqua said.

"How did you know I was thinking that?"

"It's the most logical thing for you to be thinking. But he can't hurt you Terra. You or Master Eraqus."

"How can you be sure?"

"He's dead, Terra."

"At the risk of sounding redundant…" Terra began.

"How do I know that, Terra?" Aqua asked, a grim smile creeping onto her face. "Because I helped end him myself."

"Xehanort is persistent."

"I know," Aqua said. "I know the man that he turned into when he…" She tripped on her words. "When he got a hold of you."

Terra grimaced.

"He tried to kill me…" she whispered, for the first time admitting that event out loud.

"I know," Terra said. "I was still awake."

Aqua's eyes widened.

"I tried to fight him, even then…"

"Stop," Aqua said. "Do you remember what I said?"

"Hmm?" Terra asked.

"Do you remember what I swore to Xehanort?"

"You said a lot of things," Terra said.

Aqua rolled her eyes.

"I told him that he would have to give back my friend's heart, or pay the price."

"Ah."

"I know Xehanort is dead because I personally helped end him and there was no way I was going to let him live after everything he did."

"And you saved me."

"That was the plan," Aqua said.

They were quiet for a minute, listening to the sounds of the birds slowly waking up in the morning light. They had camped out in the woods nearby the town that was now ruled by Cinderella and her Prince. They had yet to go searching for the Keyhole.

Out of habit, Terra summoned his Keyblade. He liked seeing how much it had repaired itself. Nearly all the cracks had disappeared, save for one that ran from the hilt to the tip. And even it had taken on a less jagged appearance.

"How does yours look?" he asked, looking at Aqua.

She summoned hers. It had few tiny cracks here and there from disuse. The cracks had nothing to do with the state of her heart.

"They're almost all gone," she said. "But they've looked like that for a while."

"Hmm," Terra mused. "I wonder why that is."

"I think they're waiting for yours to finish mending," she said.

"Why do you say that?" Terra asked.

Because, in my heart, I know that you'll feel better about the crack in your Keyblade if there are cracks in mine as well, Aqua thought to herself. She dared not say that out loud, however. She didn't think Terra would like that as an answer very much.

Terra frowned at her immediate lack of response.

"Are our hearts that connected, do you think?" he asked, trying to prompt her into any sort of answer.

She shrugged. "Perhaps. Maybe it's Master Eraqus."

Terra sighed. "I think he's nearly gone."

"What makes you say that?"

"My dream. He was just a sliver. Before, when I would see him in my dreams, he had more of a presence."

"Are you sure that's not just the fact that Xehanort was in your dream as well?"

Terra shrugged.

"King Mickey said that Master Eraqus' heart would fade over time," Aqua said.

"I know that," Terra said. "I'm just, I'm sad to let him go. I owe him my life…"

Aqua sighed. "I think maybe we all do."

"He was like a father to me," Terra said. "He even said I was like a son to him."

Aqua smiled. "Then isn't it appropriate that his heart bound to yours?"

"I suppose it is. I just wish it could have lasted longer."

Aqua grimaced. "If you think about it…"

"Yeah," Terra said. "I know. It lasted quite a long time."

"As long as Ven's heart was in Sora, really. Give or take a couple of days…"

"Hours," Terra corrected. "It couldn't have been more than hours either way."

Aqua almost laughed at Terra's insistence on the timetable.

"Ven's heart wasn't damaged at least," Terra mused, looking over at their sleeping friend.

Ven hadn't died… Aqua found herself thinking. His heart had a body to go back to. It's a miracle Master Eraqus' heart did what it did…

"The heart is a funny thing," she found herself saying aloud.

"Yes, yes it is."

The sun was peeking through the trees now. The three of them really should get moving, but neither Aqua nor Terra had the heart to wake Ven up just yet. Aqua had just been saying the other day that a growing boy needs his sleep. To which Ven had complained that he wasn't really growing anymore—not that he could tell at least. Terra and Aqua had laughed, teasing him about how he might actually want to get to be the same height as Terra. Ven had only shrugged that off, slipping into complaints about not being tired.

How their life had changed. In some ways, it was exactly the same as it had been back at the Land of Departure. The three of them teased each other, they trained with Keyblades together, they worked as a team, they never left each other's side except for the few moments of privacy that Aqua seemed to require—but they ate together, slept alongside each other, moved with each other.

Yet, in other ways, so much had changed. The lack of Master Eraqus was only one way. Terra and Aqua had turned into the primary caretakers for Ven, who was slowly becoming old enough to walk even with them and not need a caretaker. In fact, if it wasn't for Aqua, he probably would have forgone any form of caretaking whatsoever. He would argue that Sora hasn't had someone looking after him for the past two years…

If nothing else, the three of them had gotten what they had wanted: a life together, spent under the same sky; the same stars.

Eventually though, this mission would end. Then what?

No one had bothered to think about that just yet.

Ven began to stir.

"Aw," he said, looking up at the sky. "I missed another sunrise!"

He scrambled to a sitting position, trying to see exactly how much of the sunrise he had missed, which was pretty much all of the good part. He sighed, frowning.

"We weren't aware you had wanted to see one," Aqua said, a smile playing on her lips.

Ven nodded emphatically, turning around to look at the two of them. "I think they're cool!"

"You think everything is cool, Ven," Terra teased.

"Not everything," Ven argued. "Heartless are not cool."

"Technically," Aqua said. "They are cold, as in an absence of warmth and all…"

"I know what cold means, Aqua," Ven said, his eyes narrowing.

She shrugged, laughing a little.

Ven sighed.

"Can you wake me for tomorrow's sunrise?" Ven said.

"Assuming there's a sunrise wherever we are tomorrow morning," Terra said.

This only made Ven frown more.

"How about this," Aqua said. "Next sunrise we see that you're missing, we'll wake you for. Deal?"

Ven grinned from nearly ear to ear. "Deal!"

He and Aqua shook on it.

"Should we get moving, then?" Terra said. "We have no leads on this Keyhole."

"I think we should ask the Princess," Ven said. "They always seem to have some special connection to the Keyhole."

"It's the best thing we've got so far," Terra said.

"I'm not saying anything against it," Aqua said. "Let's go."

The three of them gathered up their things and started heading into town.

"So," Ven began. "Do you think I'll get a new Keyblade anytime soon?"

"A new Keyblade?" Aqua asked. "What do you mean by that?"

"You know," Ven said. "Like a new design or something."

"Ven," Terra said. "Keyblades take on a representation of the Wielder's heart. You don't get to choose what they look like, the Keyblade decides for itself what form it's going to take."

"Oh," Ven said. "It's just, both you guys have different ones now from the ones you started with."

"Yours will undoubtedly take on a new form eventually," Aqua said. "Everyone's heart grows and their Keyblade will change to reflect that."

"If it really bothers you, just attach some gear or something," Terra said.

"I want it to truly change though," Ven said.

"Then there's nothing you can do but wait," Aqua replied. "It'll happen. Trust me."

"Just," Terra began. "Be prepared for what it's going to take for your heart to grow."

Ven winced. "Right."

"Don't worry him," Aqua chided.

Before Terra had a chance to respond, they made it into the town. It was just coming alive for the morning.

"Let's find something for breakfast first," Terra said.

"Good idea!" Ven agreed. "I'm starving!"

"We should probably buy potions and whatnot first," Aqua said. "Just in case."

Ven and Terra both sighed quite audibly.

"We need to keep an eye on our munny stock," she argued.

They sighed again.

"We should just go someplace and find a whole ton of Heartless that drop munny," Ven said. "That way we won't have to worry about this."

"Don't start talking about Heartless in a place like this," Terra said. "We'll start running into them. And that's exactly what we don't want."

"Excellent," Aqua said. "There's the item shop." She pointed to a little shop on their left with potion bottles in the window. "Let's go!"

"Hopefully there's food after this," Ven mumbled. To which Terra laughed.