Inverted Sky: KH Chain of Memories

Chapter 7: Castle Oblivion part VII

Upon leaving the memory of Destiny Islands, Riku and Mickey came to the next floor. Though, the silver-haired boy couldn't help but look down in thought and narrow his gaze. 'I don't know why...but I felt as though I was being watched the whole time I was there.' he mused to himself, glancing around briefly.

'Although...that feeling still hasn't fully vanished.' he continued, his eyes shifting from one side of the room, to the other.

"Are you alright Riku?" Mickey questioned in a worried tone, tilting his head to the side slightly.

In hearing his voice, the teen turned to the mouse with a quick nod of his head. "Yeah...I'm just really suspicious of what these guys are trying to do with us. And whether or not someone is also going after Kairi and the others." he answered while tilting his head down slowly.

"Gosh...it's very likely, but we'll just have to have faith that they'll be able to handle it." Mickey claimed with an encouraging smile and tone.

Riku looked to the king silently for a moment, to which he slowly nodding his head in agreement. Despite his worries, the mouse always seemed to know just what to say to help. "Yeah." he hummed out silently.

However, their attention quickly turned toward the next door as Lexaeus appeared in front of it. Both of them immediately summoning their weapons, and readying them to their sides. "You have survived the first floor, it seems you have some worth after all." the large man began with a slow nod.

"I suspect you might be able to handle yourselves going forward, however..." Lexaeus continued before summoning his own weapon, it being a large red and black axe-sword.

"...I wish to test that for myself." he finished firmly, just as a large amount of dark energy flared around him.

This creating a powerful wind through the hall that almost started pushing the other two backward. Them holding their blades in front of them, trying to block this strong whirlwind, as well as keep their guard up. Yet the man's next actions shocked the two, as he instantly appeared in front of Riku with a wide swing of his weapon. But while the teen had his blade up, the sheer force of the blow made it almost pointless.

The axe-sword impacted the Keyblade and smashed it into his chest, which sent the boy flying into the wall behind him with a heavy thud. The air instantly left his lungs as he crumpled to the floor, whilst Mickey called out to him in a gasp. Yet as the king engaged Lexaeus, Riku's vision started going dark. The clanging of metal echoing through his ears as his consciousness rapidly slipped away. "Mic...key..." he whispered out before everything went black

In the midst of this darkness however, Riku could still hear the battle raging and even the mouse calling out to him. Despite his unconscious mind trying to force itself to awaken in order to join the fight, he couldn't summon the strength to do so. "Dang it...I have to help the King." he claimed, frustrated in himself for not being able to withstand even a single blow from that man.

"Help him?" a dark, yet all too familiar voice spoke up from somewhere within this blackness.

Riku immediately began to look around this dark space, before noticing a pair of golden eyes pierce through the shadows. This being followed by a sudden ripple through the air, which then revealed the source of the voice. "Ansem..." Riku growled out silently with a narrowed gaze.

"You were destroyed...how can you be here?" he demanded while taking a defensive stance, despite not having a weapon in hand.

"Perhaps...but it doesn't mean the fragment of me still left in your heart has vanished." Ansem declared in a chuckle, crossing his arms slowly.

"Tch! So what do you want?" Riku questioned in a highly untrusting manner.

"You're not taking control of me this time." he added quickly, his eyes narrowing heavily.

Ansem merely chuckled softly while gazing to the teen; "We'll see about that." he started in a clear showing that this was indeed his 'end game' intention.

"But for now...go ahead and use my power, it'll make short work of this one. He did say that you'd need Darkness to progress after all, right?" he stated with a gesture behind Riku.

Whom instinctively turned his gaze, yet found himself staring at Lexaeus as the man and Mickey continued their fight. Riku blinked a few times in surprise as he not only woke up, but was also standing back to his feet. As he rubbed his chest, the soreness he was expecting to feel was not there. This made him let out a sigh before narrowing both eyes on the large man fighting the mouse less than a quarter his size. "Fine...but I'll be using my own power and strength after this." he whispered to himself in a determined tone, both eyes shining gold for a split second.

In this same moment, he seemed to vanished and appear on the opposite side of Lexaeus, whom gasped a bit and staggered. Him looking over to Riku as the boy had a dark aura that slowly faded, to which his eyes narrowed. "It seems you're the Superior's..." he started, yet quickly went silent as he stood a bit more firmly on his feet, despite holding his right arm.

"Very well...you've proven your worth to me, you may proceed." the man stated before vanishing in a corridor of darkness, leaving behind another blue card in his wake.

As Riku watched him leave, his now normal eyes narrowed slowly before he turned his attention toward his hands. The teen feeling a large surge of power flowing through him, yet he shook his head and closed both eyes. Slowly but surely, the energy rapidly depleted, as he sealed the darkness within him once more. At the same time, Mickey rushed to Riku's side with a tilt of his head and small smile. "That was amazing Riku, how did you do it?" he questioned curiously, to which the boy offered a smile of his own.

"I guess it was just a lucky hit...you had him pretty distracted after all." Riku responded, him trying to hide his nervousness and concern about Ansem somehow still being inside his heart.

However, the mouse was a very insightful individual, allowing him to figure out that the teen was trying to cover something up. Yet he simply offered a quick wave and nod of his head; "Well...we should probably keep going, Sora might need our help if all these guys as 'this' strong." he claimed, to which Riku immediately nodded his head in agreement.

"Yeah, I can't imagine her being able to handle people like this on her own." he added as the two then picked up the card on the floor, before rushing through the next set of doors.

A few levels above all this activity, Kairi laughed softly as Donald and Goofy shared another one of their stories about Sora. The group having just reached the next level after their trek through the memory of Traverse Town. "Let me guess, she let out that squeaky yelp of hers?" the girl questioned with a wide smile.

"Yep." Goofy hummed out in a happy chuckle.

"She thinks we don't notice it, but we always do." Donald claimed while laughing a bit as well.

"Yeah...she finds it really embarrassing, but I just think it's really cute." the auburn-haired teen said softly, tilting her head up slowly as they walked on toward the next set of doors.

Before they even got halfway however, a swirl of darkness apparated in front of them. The group immediately going on the defensive with their weapons drawn, to which they saw Axel appear. Him having a small grin on his features while looking to each of the three; "Well well...you used the card after all." he started, nodding his head as his gaze shifted from one to the next.

"We did...so will you explain something to us?" Kairi questioned as her eyes narrowed slightly on the man.

Whom tilted his head to her before shrugging; "I guess it all depends on what you want me to explain." he claimed while crossing his arms.

"I figure you guys are trying to use Sora for something, and now that we're here...you're possibly looking to do the same to us. But my big question is...who are you people?" she asked in a somewhat confused, yet still quite determined tone.

Something of which Axel noticed as he arched a brow, him then uncrossing his arms and placing both hands to his hips. "Huh...Sora never really asked that question, but I guess she figured none of us would tell her." he muttered silently while looking up in silence for a moment.

"But...I guess if we're going to be seeing a lot of each other from now on...I suppose I could tell you." the red-haired man continued, taking on another grin upon his features.

As he said this, the other three took an unconscious step forward, obviously wanting to listen to what he was about to tell them. "Or maybe not." he stated, causing the trio to almost fall over from the anticlimactic response.

Seeing this caused Axel to laugh lightly while looking over the annoyed and frustrated expressions they group had. Yet he simply waved a hand while taking a few steps forward of his own; " We're a group known as: Organization XIII." he started in a somewhat low and serious tone.

"I can't tell you our goal here, but if you really want to help Sora...you'll need to catch up to her soon. Otherwise..." the red-haired man continued as he eventually stopped once he was within arm's reach of the three.

"...she might not be who you once knew." he finished, just before actually handing a blue card to Kairi.

Whom took it slowly from the man, upon which she saw the depiction of a town she never seen before. It had a setting sun and what looked to be a clock tower, yet it made her just blink a few times in confusion. As she looked to Axel once more for a possible explanation, the man was already gone. This lead for her to glance toward Donald and Goofy, whom both gaze a gaze that showed neither of them knew what world this was.

With a brief nod in understanding this, Kairi then titled her head up in thought as she mused over the information Axel gave them. Yet she soon huffed silently and shook her head in disappointment in herself; "Even if we know their group's name...it's not like we can ask anyone about it. I guess it was a bit of a dumb idea to ask." she said in a regretful tone.

The other two glanced to one another briefly, before immediately patting the girl on the shoulders. As she turned to gaze to the pair, they offered her encouraging smiles. "We don't know much about any of these folks, so any little bit helps." Goofy stated in a confident manner.

"True...and once we get out of here, we can start our search into who they actually are." Donald added, his own tone being filled with conviction.

Though Kairi still seemed a bit down, she gave a nod and smile in return. "Yeah, you're right." she hummed out softly.

"Alright...lets keep moving, we should try and reach Sora as soon as we can." the teen continued, to which the trio rushed to and through the next set of doors.

After all of these events however, Sora was just blinking to Vexen. Said man standing in front of her with a smug expression, after having just introduced himself. "So your group has an 'evil scientist-type' too, huh? Neat." she commented silently while shrugging.


Again, trying to give Riku and Kairi their own stories in this part as I really wanted more development for them. But ended up scrapping the idea because I wasn't sure about how. Anyway, I hope you enjoy this one as well. Until next time.