Big cities have always been known for their feral creatures. From stray cats and dogs chasing around scraps and pigeons in the surface, to entire societies of rats and insects living in the sewage and piping, it is fair to say that a city can be classified as its own ecosystem. This reality doesn't change in this particular city, though its creatures were painted with many, many more colors. Relatively normal looking pigeons flew in the cloudy night sky with eyeless blue bats, while on the towering skyscrapers office workers and the like walked besides purple poodle-cats and brown-with-black schnauzer-things, while giant pieces of cotton with eyes floated through shops and restaurants.
Though not as whimsical, in a forgotten side street of the city, with its exposed and worn red-bricked walls and hanging wires, one such creature was scuttling by on a narrow, dark, and junk filled alleyway. It was a fist-sized spider looking thing, though with only half the usual number of eyes and legs. It had yellow spiky hair covering its entire body, and its four eyes- two big and oval, the other round, small, and firmly in the center of its forehead- where a cute light blue, the same color as the little stubs it had at the end of its legs.
And the relatively-little spider wasn't looking too good. Its fur was dusty and its tiny little mandibles made tired chirping noises, as it slowly scuttled along the drooping cables. Scuttle by scuttle, it made its way along until it reached a broken fuse box, and settled in an open fuse for the night, absorbing what little electricity coursed through the old and forgotten thing. Then, a blinding light filled up the alley!
In its shock and blindness, the bug's first instinct was to scurry up the wall with surprising speed, only turning around once it reached a perch in a broken windowsill. There, blinking off dark splotches and charging up some meager static for defense, it was greeted by a rather… odd sight. Three humans were bumbling around in the alleyway, stumbling through the junk and yelping when something scraped against exposed metal.
"So, this is the same as in the kitchen?", said a white clothed human, with a pair of white wings on his back.
"Pretty much.", said a more normal looking human, as he dusted his dark clothes and looked around.
Sigh. "Guess it really is going to be this way."
"Mmph.", went the grunt from a pile of soggy cardboard. One of the humans seemingly didn't bother with equilibrium on appearance, and so was now being helped up by the other two.
As the third human stood upright, the bug felt its fur stick on end. Because, even from that height, it could sense it. Sweet, sweet static electricity was practically sparking off the spiky hair of the human. It was a feast to its depleted soul, after so, so long of having to hide from so many random birds and pets. And so, as the humans below resumed their conversation, the bug made its choice.; it leaped. No hesitation, just straight up did a leap of faith aimed straight at the girl's hair.
As soon as it landed with a muted thump, it quickly shuffled between the hair spikes and hid itself.
Courtesy of her porcelain skin and augmented strength, Anysia didn't feel much beyond a sudden itch, so she ignored it and continued listening to Sora's briefing.
"Remember, the most we know about Ella's location is the haze that was outside of the elevator's doors, so we need to stick to that image if we want to continue quickly. Got it?"
Twin nods followed, spit standing at attention while Anysia had a slight slouch. But as he looked them over, Sora noticed a few problems. Namely, the incredibly obvious white wings, pair of curved swords strapped to the belt, and the definitely not civilian-friendly clothing.
"Oh yeah, one more thing." With a flick of the wrist, Kingdom Key was back, and lifting it up, it went tap-tap on the head of both Pit (Hey!) and Anysia (she swatted at it). A moment later, a white flash of light enveloped them for a split second, before vanishing with a plink. The pair blinked, looked themselves up and down, and found really nothing different.
"It's just a small bit of magic that Donald taught me.", Sora said as he dismissed his Keyblade. "Now people will only see what they think is normal, as long as you don't draw too much attention."
Though why didn't he ever let me learn the cool transformations?!
Lamenting internally, Sora turned around and started walking out of the alley, towards were most of the noise seemed to come from.
Pit, standing second in line, quipped as he looked up the walls. "You mean because of the 'world order' thing, right? You didn't really seem to care in those stories you told."
Scratching his cheek, Sora let out an embarrassed laugh. "Well, I always try, but…"
Memories of Heartless and Nobodies and black-hooded weirdos (oh my!) flashed through his head.
"… It never really works."
A yawn from behind interrupted them. "Where we going?", Anysia said as she kicked the trash out of the way.
"Well," Pit answered, maneuvering his wings through some rusted steel, as his blades clinked at every turn. "It looked rather dark and damp outside the elevator, kind of like this alley."
"Then that's what we'll look for. Remember: stick together, ask around, and we should be done pretty… quickly…"
Sora's words quickly died on his throat as he fully stepped outside, drowned by a roar of noise and dazzled by an incredible sight.
Yeah, Sora had heard of the word 'city'. Had even gone to quite a few big and modern ones. But this… this was something else. Skyscrapers galore blocked the horizon, with a thousand lights blinking all around as a sea of people passed them by on the street. Banners and announcements of all colors and sizes waved and lighted up all around them, as incredible smells came out of oh so many different restaurants and kiosks up and down the streets. And finally, multicolored creatures seemed to mingle around the crowd, of so many shapes and sizes that they were instantly recognizable even among everything else.
The trio's jaws had immediately hit the floor at the sight, though for slightly different reasons. For Sora, it was the sheer shock of a small-town boy seeing the big city. For Anysia, it was the stupidly big amount of novel stimulus all around, and all those lights had so, so much energy circulating through them, her entire skin tingled.
As for Pit, well…
"WOO-HOO!" He bolted into the street as he frantically looked up and down, side to side, with stars in his eyes and a very wide smile. "So this is the Pokémon world! Oh man, I've always wanted to visit!"
Rambling to himself, Pit kept walking down the street, bumping against people and slowly but surely getting mixed up with the crowd. The sound of Pit's excited voice knocked Sora out of his shock, just in time to see the tips of Pit's hair disappear into the crowd.
"Pit, wait up!" Grabbing hold of Anysia's arm, he took off after Pit, lightly shoving annoyed pedestrians out of the way. "We can't get separated!"
Unfortunately, the message was lost on his companion. One particularly hard shove knocked Sora's grip off of the still completely sensory-overloaded synth. With a pretty heavy mind fog clouding her, she followed on automatic the flow of the people, still gazing all around in absolute wonder.
By the time Sora realized he was no longer holding her, he was standing in the entrance of one of the skyscrapers, looking all around as people came and went.
Completely alone.
"Uh oh."
P°P°P°P°P
Standing beside an ice cream kiosk, selling absolutely delicious-smelling "casteliacones", Pit was hopping up and down, still riding high on the new world. Before he jumped on the line, he remembered something rather important.
"Hey Sora! Can I borrow some mu-?" Turning around, he froze, having just realized his mistake.
"Uh oh."
A°A°A°A°A
The flow of people had eventually petered out, leaving Anysia in a rather beautiful location: the harbor.
After the lights and bustle of the main district, the gentle crashing of waves against the docked boats, combined with a gentle half moon illuminating the lonely pier, was a soothing balm for her poor mind. There, she sat beside a very old and rusting lamppost, with her hand clutching a couple of exposed wires. As the light flickered on and off, she began to doze off for a quick nap. But then, she heard something strange.
It was a sort of chirping, very high-pitched, and coming from somewhere above her. Looking up, all she could see were stars. All around her, there was nothing but dark boats. And then, as sparks flew from the cables as they began to overheat, the chirping grew louder, and she felt a small itch on her head.
Shaking her head round around incredibly quickly, whatever was up there went flying out with an indignant squiii, landing about a meter away. There, she saw how a yellow spider-looking thing, flail around, as it had landed off its back. With a nudge of her boot, the thing was back upright, and the little thing looked back at her.
Stare~.
With a tilt of her head, and very wide eyes, Anysia slowly stretched out the hand not clutching the wires. Though wary, the little one quickly scuttled up, and ended up fitting snugly in her hand. Though she could feel a small amount of energy being sucked by the thing, as she saw it tuck its little legs underneath its fuzzy body, she felt something weird form up in her stomach.
As a little smile tugged at her lips, she slowly lifted her hand, to show off her new thing to Sora.
Her only audience was the lonely pier.
"Uh oh."
A°A°A°A°A
"Oh, YES! Now this is what Pyrrhon is talking about!"
Floating atop the tallest skyscraper in Castelia, our favorite dynamic dark duo were gazing down on the city. Pyrrhon was rubbing his hands together, greedily seeing potential appetizers wherever he looked. The Shadow, perched on Pyrrhon's shoulder mostly focused on one particular street, with his crooked smile filled to the brim with mischief ready and aimed at the wielder.
"This world may be as annoyingly bright as Palutena's halo, but oh-ho-ho! If it isn't ripe for the pickings!"
"fun!",the Shadow hissed as it hopped excitedly in place. "chaos! stampedes! fun!"
Pyrrhon, looked over his shoulder, annoyance marked clearly in his squint. He quickly grabbed the Shadow by the neck, and brought him right in front of his face, with is purple flames washing all over his constant pest.
"Now, let's set some ground rules here, you fun-size Guttler. First of all, the great and magnanimous Pyrrhon here is only letting you around my flaming glow because that guy told us to work under him."
They both lightly shivered at the memory.
"But Pyrrhon won't tolerate any more scuttling and pulling and whispering around! Capisci?"
The Shadow gave him a thumbs up, though the squint in his eyes and the glow of his smile slightly undermined the gesture. Growling, a thought crossed Pyrrhon's mind.
"Now, what should Pyrrhon call you? It gets rather annoying just yelling you all the time. It's just not personal!" As he tossed the Shadow like a plush from hand to hand (to his mild annoyance), Pyrrhon had slow and dusty wheels turn in his head. "You're called a Shadow, right? And Shadows are… dark?"
Once bringing it to eye level, Pyrrhon flicked one of the Shadow's antenna. "And you look like a really, really dumb ant…"
A few seconds later, Pyrrhon released an elated "Ha!", and as he tossed the Shadow over his shoulder and into open air, he proclaimed an idea which he was really, really proud of. "Dant! Perfect!"
Satisfied with his naming abilities, he looked down once more, and cackling like mad, vanished in a flash of purple fire, ready to get some snacks.
The Shadow, still falling at terminal velocity, mulled the name over for a moment. As he nearly reached the ground, he simply shrugged and vanished as well.
It wasn't like he had anything better in mind, so whatever.