coolmegan123: Their relationship with Isa has a ways to go still, but yeah, they're already starting to realize that they can't just keep treating him like Saix. Glad you liked the funny and fluffy parts! :)

Wings of Avalon: I'm glad you approved and that it was satisfying!

Jake Hallows: That is true. One of the many things in the game that doesn't really make much sense!

Hello hello! Welcome to the next chapter. Hope everyone has a nice weekend!

Chapter 14

Perspective – Riku

After a couple of days in Twilight Town – with, thankfully, no more sightings of Isa – it was back to traveling. This leg of the trip was going to be even longer than the first, since the list of worlds to visit was longer. We started from the east and worked our way west this time, hopping from world to world and never staying for more than a day.

Beast's Castle and its residents had changed drastically for the better since both Sora and I had been there last, but none of them had seen Meli. I was introduced to Peter Pan and the Lost Boys in Neverland, but still no Meli. In Halloween and Christmas Town I got turned into a werewolf and wore a Santa suit, respectively, and Sora was full of stories about how Meli had freaked out over her own transformations, but she wasn't there now in any form. Not even Santa – who, yes, was apparently real, a fact that Sora would not stop rubbing in my face for the next week – knew where she was, and he was supposedly supposed to know everything.

Land of Dragons held a certain amount of guilty reminders for me, since it was where Meli had been kidnapped right after I had left her alone, but we still dutifully searched both the mountains and the city for any sign of her. Wonderland was a pain to search, since everything in that world was a pain to accomplish, but we left fairly confident that she wasn't there. Pride Lands was relatively easy, once everyone but Sora got used to walking on four legs, since the sight of a human there would have certainly gotten everyone's attention.

Agrabah was the one world where I refused to leave the Gummiship. I debated hanging out in the market and the desert and leaving the other three to talk to Jasmine and Aladdin, but decided that the risk of someone recognizing me was too much. At least, that was the excuse I gave the others. The likelihood that I would be recognized was slim, and the chance that they would know what I had done to the princess even slimmer. The truth was, I wasn't ready to face the reminders of my time there. I trusted my friends to get done what needed to be done, and let me know if anything important happened.

The whole journey was bittersweet. Introducing me and Kairi to all of these worlds, or taking me back to ones I had already seen so we could actually experience them side by side, was something that Sora had been looking forward to for ages, something that Kairi and I had wanted, as well. We just never imagined it would be like this – speeding through, searching relentlessly, quizzing everyone we met, all with someone so important missing from our group. We should have, I guess. It's not like leisurely travel had ever been in the cards for us before.

It had its good moments, of course. For starters, Sora kept sighing about how nice it was not to have to fight Heartless at every turn. And it was enjoyable to see the places and meet the people we had heard so much about from him, even if we didn't get to savor them for very long. It was fun, too, seeing Kairi experience the places I had been to before for the first time, and watching Kaj periodically freak out about how 'weird' our universe was. Particularly when he was being transformed over and over again into a darker version of whatever I was – werewolf, lion, monster, didn't matter. Apparently the ship's magic had decided that he and I had to be twins everywhere we went, with only his black hair as a defining feature. That became a frequent joke among all of us, one of many things we let loose and laughed about.

But still, without Meli there, and with the constant worry of whether we would ever find her, it just wasn't what it should have been. "We'll come back," Sora kept saying. "We'll come back sometime, with Meli, and we'll take our time and see everything there is to see."

In the end, after all of those weeks of traveling and searching and worrying and searching some more, it turned out to be something of a fluke that brought the journey to an abrupt close. We still had a few more worlds on our list, but we were already starting to ponder what was next. Do we go back, and start over again? Do we try to find a way to search out new worlds that none of us have been to? DO we just give up, go home, and hope that she eventually finds her way to us?

We were hovering above Port Royal, readying to land and discussing how big of a world it was, when a call came through on Sora's Gummiphone. Fumbling it out of his pocket, he punched the green button.

"Hiya, Sora!" The tiny faces of Chip and Dale pressed up close to the screen.

"Oh, hey guys!" Sora smiled and waved as Kairi and I leaned over his shoulders to see better. "What's up?"

"Something just popped up on our map!" Chip gestured excitedly to something off-screen.

"Lots of darkness!" Dale shrieked.

"Probably Heartless!" Chip added.

Sora let out something between a groan and a sigh. "Really? Again?"

"The Heartless are always around," I reminded him. "They're just not usually congregated in one place unless something sinister is going on. This is bound to keep happening from time to time."

"Yeah, I know." He was still obviously not happy about it, though. "Okay, where are they?"

"A brand new world!"

"Wasn't on our map until now!"

"It's not too far away from you!"

"We'll send you the coordinates!"

"Thanks, guys. We'll let you know how it turns out." Sora ended the phone call, and almost immediately something on the ship's console pinged. Reaching forward, I tapped the navigation system, and a bright, pulsing dot appeared on our map.

"Well, is everybody okay with taking a detour?" I knew Sora wouldn't turn down a world in trouble, as much as he might complain, so I looked to the other two for an answer.

"Yeah, of course." Kairi nodded. "I mean, they obviously need us, and besides, Meli could be there just as easily as she could be here. If not, we can come right back when we're done."

Kaj threw one hand up in the air. "Honestly, at this point, I'm kind of itching to fight something. I've never actually encountered the Heartless, but if I can take out a few of my frustrations on them..."

I gave a wry smirk. "Valid point. Alright, captain, let's go check it out."

"Alright, here we go."

We happened to approach the new world above a massive expanse of forest. Sora decided that parking the Gummiship in the middle of it, in a clearing just barely big enough for us to fit in, was a good way to keep it hidden. He had a good point. Unfortunately, that meant we had a long trek through the woods before we found any civilization. Also unfortunately, we didn't have that long of a trek before we ran into our first bunch of Heartless.

They weren't just Shadows, either, which wasn't a problem for most of us, of course, but wasn't ideal for Kaj's first fight against them. The majority were kinds I had never seen before, including quite a few that wielded bows and arrows. There was a smattering of Nocturnes and Rhapsodies, though, as well as a couple of Large Bodies.

Sora and Kairi took on the floating Heartless first, since they responded the best to magic, leaving Kaj and me to pick off the ones on the ground. Ducking and rolling underneath the arrows that flew at me, I made my way to the first archer and took it out in a few swift swings. Something that looked a bit like a Soldier, but larger and more humanoid, was coming at me from the left, and I shot Blizzaga its way before leaping over and physically attacking. When it was gone, I glanced over my shoulder to check on Kaj. He was taking on a Large Body, or at least attempting to.

"Kaj!" I shouted. "Attack it from the back!"

Jumping up off the ground from where he had been knocked, he shook himself before darting under the monster's swinging arms to get behind it. His daggers flew, then were immediately re-summoned to his hands as the Large Body spun to face him. He repeated his earlier action of darting to the back, and I turned my attention to the next Heartless, satisfied that he would be okay.

A minute later, as I was working on yet another archer, Kaj appeared at my shoulder. "Wanna switch? I can handle these guys from a distance, even without magic." He threw a dagger into the Heartless as if to prove his point. "Seems like your weapon would be more effective against those big guys, though."

"Be my guest. These guys are a pain...literally." I motioned to the slice across my arm where an arrow had grazed it moments before. Casting one more Firaga for good measure, I left him to it and got to work on the other Large Bodies. Sora and Kairi had finished up with the Nocturnes and Rhapsodies and were taking care of the various other Heartless dotting the clearing, mostly using physical combbat now to let their magic recharge.

It didn't take long after that to clear the rest out. I let the end of my Keyblade drop to the ground with a huff, suddenly realizing just how long it had been since I had done any real training. "Boy, I am out of shape."

"Ugh, me, too!" Kairi nearly dragged her Keyblade as she crossed to where I was standing. "I need to get back to training, like, yesterday."

"Didn't feel that bad to me," Sora shrugged, dismissing his weapon.

I shot him a look. "That's because you're used to starting out after a year asleep, or after having all your power sucked out of you."

He started to protest, but scrunched up his face instead. "I guess that's true."

"Well...I got my first battle wound."

We all snapped our heads around to see Kaj limping toward us, a thin line of red streaming down from a hole in his jeans. He winced a little as he came to a stop, holding his foot just off the ground. "One of those stupid archer things got me."

"Here, let me take care of that for you," Kairi offered quickly, casting Cure over him. I did the same to myself in the meantime, stitching up the wound on my arm.

"Thanks," Kaj sighed. "I kept trying to learn that myself, but I just haven't gotten the hang of it yet."

Sora scratched the back of his head. "Guess we should have stocked up on potions, huh."

"I brought a couple." Kairi patted her pocket. "But we didn't really think we were going to be doing any fighting on this trip."

"But hey, first battle wound!" Sora grinned at Kaj. "It was a pretty cool one, too! I mean, you wouldn't want it to be something lame, like a Heartless stepped on your toe or something. Getting to say you were shot with an arrow is a much better story."

Before Kaj could respond to that, there was a slight rustling of leaves, and a new voice broke into the conversation. "That's an interesting way of looking at it, but I wouldn't want to have a repeat of that story if I were you."

I spun around to locate the source, and found what looked like a fox in a green tunic, standing just behind Sora with none other than a bow and arrow trained on his back. The point must have been touching his back, in fact, because Sora was frozen in place with his hands out by his sides, eyes wide. I brought my Keyblade up immediately, and saw Kairi do the same out of the corner of my eye, but the fox tsked and shook his head.

"Oh, no no no, none of that, now. Put those away."

At his words, something pricked the back of my shoulder, not hard enough to pierce clothing or skin, but enough that I could tell it was there. Turning my head slowly, I took in the large brown bear, also with a bow and arrow, that was looming behind Kaj, and reluctantly let go of my weapon. Kairi's disappeared with a flash of light at the same moment. She was the only one who didn't have an arrow trained on her, but since she had ended up pretty much in the middle of us all when she stepped forward to heal Kaj, there was not much she could do.

The fox hummed with interest as he watched the Keyblades go. "Now then, strangers, there are not many who traverse this forest. Those who do are required to pay us a toll."

Great. Bandits.

"However," he continued, "you four have sparked a special interest. Up until now we have not seen any others who fight the Heartless, or who use...magic, or whatever you may call it."

Kairi furrowed her brow. "How did you know what they were called?"

"That's not important. It seems to me that, since the Heartless appear to be bad, and you appear to be getting rid of them, you must be good. But you see, my comrades tend to be a bit suspicious. So before we go any further, we need to know: where did you come from, and are you friend, or foe?"

"Friend," I replied quickly. I still couldn't see who was behind me, but I looked to the bear, including him in the explanation. "You're right, the Heartless are bad. It's our job to get rid of them. We all...or at least most of us, have special weapons to do just that. We travel around to...wherever the Heartless are, and fight them."

There was a pause as the fox seemed to consider this. "What do you think, Little John?"

The bear merely grunted in response, not sounding or looking fully convinced.

"What about you, Lady M?"

Since I couldn't look back, I ended up staring straight at Kairi in front of me. Which means I saw her lean a bit to the side to see past me, and I saw the moment that her face went white as a sheet.

"Meli?"

A/N: *deep breath* Eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee