Xehanort stumbled. Vanitas blinked over to his side. "Go on." he said to Aqua. "Heal your friends. I'm a quick study; I'll do the same for him."
Aqua glared at them both, but said nothing.
"That's right. I didn't forget you were there." Vanitas continued. Xehanort straightened up, sneering out of Terra's face. "You're just not worth the half a second it'd take to take you out."
"Besides, we have another use for you." Xehanort crossed his arms, and a moment later, the dark guardian appeared behind him. A shadowy orb hovered above its left hand, and within it...
Aqua gasped. "The Master's Keyblade!"
"You were foolish to allow such a blade to slip from your fingers. Perhaps you didn't truly believe yourself worthy." The guardian maneuvered around Xehanort. It came to rest between the two sides, holding forth its hand as if offering the orb to her. "Yet you still could be. Take his Keyblade. Return the Land of Departure. Then, you and I will duel once more. The winner claims the heart of Ventus."
"Don't listen to him, Aqua!" Sora shouted. "Guys like him never play fair!"
She knew this, yet still she hesitated. She still hates that hesitation, as much as she hates herself for not being strong enough to stand with the two boys.
"You claim you know so much. You talk about being worthy. But you let Ventus slip from YOUR fingers. And I will never let you have him again!"
He almost looked disappointed. "So be it." The guardian moved to withdraw, but Riku suddenly shot out his arm and the orb shuddered . "What?!" Xehanort snarled. The guardian latched onto it with both hands, forcing Riku to use both his arms as well.
Vanitas rocketed forward, his Keyblade raised to slice off Riku's head. Sora intercepted it with his own blade, calling out to Aqua, "That Keyblade is important to you! Try and dispel the darkness!"
Aqua panicked. "I can't! I'm still tainted by it!"
"You're not tainted." Riku said through gritted teeth. "It's...a part of you. Part of everyone." Xehanort took a step towards them, his yellow eyes ablaze with effort and rage. "You don't have...to be perfect. To live...in the light...all the time. Just...do the right thing as...as often...as you can..."
Something about Riku's words lodged inside her, stirring the darkness that she thought had been put to sleep by her defeat a short time earlier. Why shouldn't she be angry? Xehanort had done so much to her. It was his fault she'd been in the Realm of Darkness for so long.
With a snarl that rivaled Xehanort's, she extended her hand and willed the orb of darkness containing the Master's Defender to her. Riku and the guardian reeled as it broke free from their struggle and finally returned to Aqua. Her elation at being reunited with the Keyblade that had seen her through so much hardship quickly faded as the orb continued to travel up her arm and into her heart.
Another snarl escaped her lips, this one tinged with something other than human. Xehanort smiled once again.
"Aqua!" Sora shouted. Seizing an opportunity, Vanitas hit him squarely in the chest with a burst of dark fire, sending Sora flying back to land at Riku's feet.
Vanitas twirled his Keyblade, visibly anxious to continue the fight.
"Wait." Xehanort intoned. The dark guardian slunk slowly back to him, as if ashamed of its failure. Xehanort's smile broadened as Aqua clutched at her chest, wisps of shadow rising from her. "Her anger is a river, about to break forth from the dam. Who will she turn on first, the man with the face of her friend, or the two would-have-been-heroes who left her to rot?"
Riku helped Sora to his feet, eyeing Aqua, Vanitas and Xehanort in turn. "Keep fighting it Aqua. You've come so far; don't let it overtake you." he urges.
Fight? Embrace? Which?
Both.
She looked up. Her eyes brimmed with a black liquid. "I'm sorry." she whispered.
She thrust the Master's Defender forward into the Keyhole and began the unlocking sequence just as her anger billowed out of control...
It was like a dream, Sora would recall later. Things happened for no reason other than that they did. Aqua seemed to be developing a Heartless that was still joined to her regular body: a creature with dark blue skin and blackened hands with red fingertips that protruded out of her at horrible angles. Aqua herself was firing wild bursts of magic at anyone who approached the building, which shifted back and forth between Castle Oblivion and a much grander and less chaotic-looking structure at a pace that made his head hurt, crumbling and reforming over and over again.
Aqua's Keyblade spoke to him. The reformation could not be complete until the Keyhole inside the throne room was activated.
"That's funny." he said back to it. "That's where my heart was telling me to go anyway."
Behind him, Vanitas was trapped within a Slow spell. Even his dark magic wasn't able to break him free in time to avoid being struck by Aqua's Heartless, which forcefully enlarged its hand and swatted him away.
Aqua's Keyblade told Sora that it would be able to keep him safe from most of Castle Oblivion's magic, but only him. He would have to venture in alone.
"I can't just leave Riku-"
Riku landed next to him, having shielded himself from an explosion in midair. "Who are you talking to?"
"The Keyblade. Can't you hear it?"
Riku gave him a weird look. "No. What's it say?"
Xehanort and his dark guardian began to brawl with Aqua and her Heartless. Her Heartless occasionally seemed to puppet her body, making it bend in ways that people really shouldn't bend. At least it was allowing her to hold her ground.
"It says I have to go to the throne room. But it has to be just me. It only has enough power to shield one person from the castle's magic."
Riku considered it. "Are you sure it's actually-"
"Of course I'm sure!"
"Okay okay. Get a move on already." He readied his Keyblade again.
"You gonna be okay?" Sora asked. Suddenly he stopped. "Wait, where'd Vanitas go?"
"He might be going for the throne room as well. Hurry!"
Without even a glance behind him, Sora took off for the front door. Riku, in return, didn't even glance in his direction. They'd both come a long way since Destiny Islands.
He regarded Aqua and her Heartless cautiously. As if sensing it despite their overpowering anger, they turned f eatureless yellow eyes upon him. "I don't want to hurt you." he said. Despite his calm tone, a chill ran down his spine as Aqua's Heartless created a club of solid ice and began to drag both itself and Aqua towards him.
The dreamlike atmosphere was even stronger inside the building. He drifted from fight to fight, relying on muscle memory alone to see him through. Once whatever creatures of darkness blocked his path had been freed from their torment, he found himself pulled towards Aqua's Keyblade and they continued their journey. Every room looked the same, yet he still knew he was getting closer.
As he rounded a corner, he saw a familiar face. She shouldn't be here; she'd rejoined with Kairi; but somehow it made perfect sense. " Naminé!" he cried. She looked up from her sketchbook. "What are you doing here?" he asked, coming to a halt in front of her.
"Naminé..." She spoke her name slowly, as if she was tasting it. "You...know me?"
"Of course I know you! We're friends!"
A spasm crossed her face. Her eyes hardened. "Friends? If only." It wasn't her voice any more. It was the voice of the pink-haired man he'd met in Corona.
He took a step back. "Huh? What's going on?"
Another spasm, and Naminé's eyes turned green. "You hear that? He remembers the brat, but he doesn't remember us!"
Her eyes turned blue again. "It's probably something to do with my power." she said, and it was her this time. Wasn't it?
Back to green. "Oh, of course! Doesn't count that you were a damsel in distress! Knights in shining armor, all the same!"
"Let her go!" he demanded of the two people he couldn't see.
Cold blue. "Let her go? In this place, we are all one. Different petals upon the same rose."
His hands, clenched into fists, began to relax. "But- She's not-" Suddenly it all fell into place. "I get it! You're not Naminé! And neither is she! You're just pieces left behind from when they were here!"
"Pieces." Green.
"Chains." Cold blue.
"Memories." Plain blue. Pleading. Asking to be made whole.
He couldn't help but oblige.
After the amalgam had been laid to rest, he took a moment for some rest of his own. To his surprise, the wall he chose to lean against swung away from him and he fell flat on his back. He thought about how nice it would be to just stop here for a while. Forever, maybe. Eternal sleep didn't sound so bad after all he'd been through.
And yet, as always, his heart willed him on. He got to his feet and staggered towards the only thing in the room: a boy who looked an awful lot like Roxas. Somehow he knew it wasn't Roxas, though. "This must be Aqua's friend Ventus." he said, half-expecting the boy to move or give some sign of life. He did neither of those. "Ventus! Ven! It's time to wake up!" Ventus still didn't move.
Aqua's Keyblade floated in front of him, as if to draw his attention, then floated behind the throne Ventus was sleeping on. The other boy, who couldn't even remember his name by now, followed it. There, on the back of the throne, was the Keyhole. "It's been a long time since I've seen one of these in the waking worlds." the boy mused. "I hope I remember how to lock them." He reached out for Aqua's Keyblade, but his hand passed right through it. "Huh?" He tried again. The same thing happened. "I know you're there. Why'd you bring me all this way if you still won't let me touch you?"
A physical connection is not what is required.
The boy started. "That's the first time you've actually spoken to me in words. But... I don't recognize your voice."
I am but a memory of Aqua's master. Quickly. We do not have much time.
The boy looked inside himself for th at bubbling wellspring of magic. Without exactly knowing how, he dipped his hands into the spring and offered what he could of it to Aqua's Keyblade. The Keyblade flared, flooding the room with even more blinding white light.
When Sora's eyes cleared some time later, he found himself in a much grander room. A hall, even, not just a hallway like the ones he'd passed through. There would be time to admire the opulence later. He ran around to the front of the throne, which was now flanked by two more thrones on either side, and shook Ventus by the shoulder. "Ventus! C'mon! You gotta get up!" There's a stirring in his heart, but Ventus's body remains motionless. "Ven! Aqua needs you!"
That did the trick. Ventus's heart woke up and broke free from Sora's before disappearing into Ventus's chest, and his eyelids fluttered.
Sora gave him one more shake, just to be sure. "Ven!"
"Uhhh." Ventus said eloquently. He looked up. Eyes that hadn't opened in more than a decade beheld...himself? "Is this real...?"
"Yup. You're awake!" Sora said.
"But...you look like me. Are you me?"
"Nope." Sora took a moment to consider. "Well, your heart was part of my heart for a long time. We might've rubbed off on each other. And then there's Roxas, and-"
There's a clatter from someplace not far away.
"Huh?" Sora turned to look.
Ventus's eyes widened. "You again!" He leapt down off his throne.
Behind them, Vanitas had collapsed to one knee, Keyblade on the ground next to him. "How-" he rasped. "How did-" Sora and Ventus advanced, Keyblades at the ready. "You didn't know. You couldn't know." He lifted his masked face up towards them. "Who are you, really?"
"Why can't you guys ever talk straight for once?" Sora demanded.
"I know, right? Who's he even talking to?" Ventus said.
Vanitas reached down with a trembling hand to pick up his Keyblade. He stood up straight, but made no move to attack them. His head tilted to the side, as if hearing something they could not. He staggered backwards and toppled over the balcony.
Sora and Ventus were hot on his tail.
Outside, in the sunlight, Riku was trying not to scream, which wasn't hard, considering how little air he had left. The dark guardian had him in a bearhug, and it was only a matter of time before either his back gave out or his internal organs did.
Xehanort wasn't even bothering to watch. Instead he made sure Aqua and her Heartless were kept busy. Even her seemingly endless supply of magic had run out, and their wild swings were getting slower and more desperate.
Suddenly Vanitas was at his side. "He's awake. We gotta go."
A similar voice rang out from the front of the castle. "Aqua!"
Aqua froze. Her Heartless tried in vain to get the other body to move, but her limbs had turned to lead. Gritting his teeth, Xehanort dispatched the Heartless with a swing of his Keyblade and the wayward Master finally collapsed. That fool boy's heart was trying to rebel again. The dark guardian let Riku fall to the ground as well, and he hastily recalled it. It would not do to give him two potential vessels to cause mischief with.
Sora shouted his friend's name . At least Xehanort thought he did; it was hard to tell over the blood pounding in his ears. (Although that may have been the boy pounding against the many walls that separated him from what had once been his body.) Both of the other boys were running up to their fallen compatriots' sides. Ventus hadn't even noticed who stood before him.
As if reading Xehanort's mind, Vanitas said, "Come on! There's something all of us have to hear."
Satisfied that his friend would live for now, Ventus finally looked up. "Ter...ra?" His voice, at first excited, grew hesitant as he beheld the changes that Xehanort had bestowed on his new body.
Xehanort merely looked down on him dispassionately. Then he turned and left.