Disclaimer: I own nothing.
To answer a few questions mainly, Where are the heartless and Where is Ventus. The heartless will show up soon enough. And as for Ventus, his heart resides in Shantae's but his body still in castle oblivion. However, I am changing up certain events from the kingdom hearts franchise for something you won't see in a while. Just stay tuned and enjoy.
Chapter 4: Spiderweb Island, Run Run Rottytops and the Spider's Den.
Risky's ship pulled up next to the dock of the next forbidden isle, Risky getting off of the ship with Shantae after weighing anchor.
"This is Spiderweb Island, I want you to locate the next Den of Evil, and report back." Risky ordered her.
"Risky, I've been wondering... how do you know so much about the pirate master?" Shantae asked, curious.
"Because he was my mentor." Risky said, a bit reluctantly. "I sailed under his command for some tike as first mate. He taught me everything I know."
"You were part of his pirate crew?" Shantae asked in shock, albeit not too surprised.
"That's right. When the genies finally defeated him, I claimed his men and weapons as my own." Risky stated matter of factly.
"You stole his stuff after he died?" The purple haired hero asked.
"Call it payment for my services, which were long overdue." The pirate woman stated, "That flintlock pistol was once his." She pointed to the pistol.
"Oh... then I guess you should have it back." Shantae said as she tried to give it back.
"Hold onto it, you're going to need it to survive in this place." Risky said, pushing the pistol back towards Shantae.
"You're not coming?" Shantae asked.
"Trust me, you wouldn't want me for company. Best I stay with the ship." Risky answered with a huff, walking back on board the ship.
"Okey dokey, well, I'm Ret-2-go!" Shantae exclaimed as she headed into the forest. This island was chock full of undead, the non-sentient kind as well. Shantae had to cut through several of them, finding a cacklebat inside of a pit which she accidentally fell into.
But, something was strange about this cacklebat, a dark aura surrounded it once again and it grew larger, hands grew at the end of it's wings and it's hind legs extended as it roared, a dark heart symbol with a cross through it appeared on it's chest. After this happened a group of small impish creatures appeared.
They had golden yellow eyes and completely black bodies, like they were made of shadows. Shantae didn't know if this was the pirate master's doing, but it felt wrong.
She battled with the creatures, hitting them with her keyblade made them fade away in an instant. Whatever these creatures were, they're bodies hated the keyblade. When it came down to defeat the cacklebat, she had to bait and attack it since it would stay in the air above.
Once the battle was over Shantae resumed her trek, eventually she would run into a large spiderweb with a large spider hovering over a familiar presence. It was her friend, Rottytops, a sentient zombie who much like her brothers Abner and Poe enjoy a good cup of coffee more than brains.
"Rottytops!" Shantae exclaimed seeing her stuck in the web. "GET AWAY FROM HER YOU MONSTER!" She yelled, shooting a fireball at the giant arachnid's face, scaring it away.
"That was close! You were almost a meal for that thing!" Shantae exclaimed at Rottytops once the spider was gone. "What are you doing here anyway?" She asked.
"I live here." The green skinned girl answered as she struggled against the webs. "I heard this island had monster web coverage, so I--" she began joking before she was interrupted.
"STOP WITH THE WEB JOKES!" Shantae exclaimed, having been through these puns far too many times.
"Sorry." Rottytops sighed before she huffed. "Well? Are you going to help me down or not?" Rottytops asked.
"Not a chance!" The former half genie denied. "For all I know this is another scheme so you can eat my brain!" She accused the sentient undead of her usual tomfoolery.
"I oughtta leave you here to rot!" She exclaimed.
"But I'm already rotting!" The zombie girl replied, making Shantae Jeer from the pun.
"Fine!" Shantae said before helping Rottytops down from the web. "Well? What have you got to say for yourself?" She asked after helping her down.
"I think you owe me an apology after all the trouble you've caused." She said with an annoyed huff.
"I... I'm sorry but... Ooohh. My legs..." Rottytops said, her legs shaking as she nearly fell over. "They're going numb."
"Oh no! That spider bit you, didn't it?" Shantae asked, worried.
"Forget about it... I'm a bad girl." Rotty said, pretending to not want Shantae's help. "Just... just leave me here..."
"No way! I can't abandon you in the woods!" The purple haired hero exclaimed. "That would be much too grim!"
"My house is through the forest. If you can get me to my brothers in time." Rotty grimaced.
"Just hold on Rottytops! I'll save you!" Shantae exclaimed, picking up Rottytops. She then started running ahead through the forest. She had to dodge disembodied hands that grabbed at her and Rotty, avoid monsters with tongues that excreted an acidic saliva, giant barbed spikes, and a variety of other monsters.
The forest was like a maze in of it's own, one that Shantae was definitely not keen on traveling through again. The run through the forest took a good 20 minutes and carrying an undead body was surprisingly a good work out, not that she'd admit it out loud.
She ran past what looked to be the next den of evil, another cacklebat just outside of it, she had to jump over the cacklebat for now. Dropping down a somewhat short ledge, she ran all the way to a hut made of a large tree stump that was 4 times the height of herself.
Inside the hut was a rather cozy living space, and standing inside was Rotty's older brother Abner, a shirtless undead man with a surprisingly good figure. Shantae set Rottytops down in a rocking chair with a sigh.
"Just in time." Shantae said in relief, not realizing she's been duped.
"My hero!" Rottytops said with a giggle.
"Yo sis. What's with the peeled shrimp?" Abner asked. "Unless she's here for dinner she should turn tail and hit the bricks." He threatened as he glared at Shantae.
"Abner! Some big brother you are! Can't you see she's injured?" Shantae asked in annoyance.
"Looks fine to me." Abner said after inspecting his sister for any wounds.
"Wha-?" Shantae asked.
"Hee hee! What a ride!" Rottytops exclaimed with excitement.
"Rottytops! You dirty, double-crossing.." The purple haired girl said after her own examination of her friend, finding her uninjured.
"Hey!" Abner said, spooking her. "Shantae is it? I got somethin' I been meaning to say. I ain't too good at making friends. But you've been good to me and Poe and my sis here." He began.
"It's just that pirate gal has a real way of getting into yer head and making you hear what you wanna hear. Guess I'm tryin' to apologize for some bad calls in the past." He explained, sighing deeply as he scratched the back of his head.
"Teamin' up with that Risky Boots, dumbest thingI ever did." He added.
"Oh... well, that's ok." Shantae replied, accepting the apology.
"Poe and little Rotters here are all's I got left of whatever life I once had. I can't remember much else. But you always make her smile, and I gotta be grateful for that." He further explained, kind of awkwardly.
"Wow, I don't know what to say." Shantae said, thankful for hearing this.
"Forget it. We're square." Abner sighed. "Where the devil's Poe? He ain't been back in a while." He asked.
"He was supposed to fix my wagon so we could skip that creepy forest." Rottytops explained.
"Well if either of ya sees 'im, tell him to check in or I'm gonna get peeved." Abner sighed. Shantae left the hut afterwards and went back to the cliff face, finding a hole in it she moved some rubble and saw Poe nearby. She walked up to him and greeted him.
"Poe!" She said with a smile, and he turned around with his own goofy smile. Poe was hunchbacked, had tiny bat wings, and he wore yellow tinted glasses along with a light purple turtleneck, a golden suit jacket, and light purple dress pants and nice leather shoes. He was a simple man but he sure knew how to dress snazzy.
"Hey, you're that coffee banshee! I remember you!" He said, remembering when she gave him and his family a neat coffee machine.
"Genie, half-genie. Well, former half-genie." Shantae corrected him.
"Thanks! Whatever you are!" Poe said with a chuckle. "I was scavenging for wagon parts when I got stuck here. You like to help people in need, right? How about taking a look at it?" He asked.
"I'm no mechanic, but sure I guess." Shantae agreed.
"Follow me. The wagon's this way." He said before leading her to the wagon, which had a skeleton horse in the front and two broken wheels.
"This is all that's left of our wagon." Poe sighed, "These wheels I can repair no problem, but that axle will never run smoothly again without some squid oil." He added. "And this island doesn't seem to have any Squids on it."
"Actually.. here." Shantae said, handing him the can of oil she got from Squid baron.
"Excellent! Ever since we split off from the Zombie Caravan we've been in short supply." Poe exclaimed. "I can have this fixed in a jiffy!" He added before getting to work, the wheels being fixed in no time.
He then gave her a ride back through the shortcut so she could continue her travels, he also gave her a small shriveled head as thanks for the help, which she took reluctantly.
She then went back up to the area where the next den of evil was, fighting two cacklebats, one of which was hiding in a tree she had to climb, the other just outside the caged off den.
The den's upon closer inspection was covered in spiderwebs, it must've been the home of that giant spider from earlier. She got closer and heard a voice after some sniffing noises.
"Oldie moldy leftovers?" The raspy voice asked, smelling the shriveled head that Shantae had.
"Hungry... feed us shriveled thing!" The voice demanded and Shantae reluctantly put her hand through the bars with the shriveled head, which was taken from her hand and she pulled her hand back quickly.
After some chewing noises the voice spoke again. "More! Bring more delicious thing inside!" It demanded as scuttling was heard and the bars fell from the entrance, allowing Shantae to enter into a dilapidated catacombs-like tower.
The tower was full of skeletons and puzzles, as well as other enemies, some being plant like, others were vampiric women who wore strange armored clothing that did barely anything to cover their torsos and posteriors.
She got through the puzzles, finding Risky's hat which billowed out when a strong wind was blown through it, allowing for some limited but much more easy to control aerial movements.
Once again the keyblade made getting through the labyrinth much easier thanks to it's unlocking capabilities, but something made the entire tower strange. There were much more of the black impish creatures, and they were accompanied by different monsters she never seen before.
There were soldier-like creatures, and flying multicolored creatures that shot out magic, all of them bearing the same emblem as the further corrupted cacklebat from earlier.
The battles were slowly getting more and more difficult when it came to these monsters, but Shantae's training was definitely paying off. After a while she made it to the top of the tower where the spider's den was.
She had to dodge its attacks, jump over flames it somehow spewed from it's mouth, and destroy eggs it laid during the battle. This one was actually easier than the battle with that cyclops plant.
After defeating the large spider and she made her way out of the labyrinth she came across another tinkerbat which dropped a new map. One that Shantae took with her on her way back to Risky's ship.
"Your'e back." Risky stated.
"Not without incident, I found the den of evil, destroyed the source of evil there and found a map along with your hat." Shantae explained showing Risky her hat which she looked unamused by.
"I thought you'd be excited." Shantae sighed.
"I've been thinking about my men. And the curse that controls them." Risky said. "We all sailed together under the Pirate Master's command."
"The pirate master is clever, he'd expect me to go after my pistol and hat." She stated. "That's why he brought the, here... to infuse the, with his evil. He's been using them to lure me in." She continued.
"He plans to trigger the curse, and put me back under his control!" She explained "I can't believe I almost fell for such an obvious ruse!"
"Is that why you won't come with me?" Shantae asked. "Because you're under the same curse as your men?"
"I'm not afraid of him!" Risky replied with an annoyed huff.
"I didn't say you were!" Shantae tried to calm her down.
"I despise him!" The pirate gal exclaimed. "I'd like to see him return just so I can crush him myself!"
"I didn't mean to get you all worked up." The former half-genie sighed. "But hey, at least we're finally talking, right? It's good to get these things off your chest." She said, leaving Risky in a slightly stunned silence.
"I'll wait for you on board." She added as she walked onto the ship. "We have to go to the next island after all!"
Risky sighed to herself and followed after the girl after she thought for a good minute. They then began their journey to the next island, Shantae taking another bath after the recent trek, wanting to keep clean as best as she could during the adventure.
Meanwhile Risky sat in her quarters, examining a strange object she found in Shantae's room, it shouldn't have been there, she felt like it shouldn't have.
It was a star shaped object, made of metal and strange green gems with a blocky heart in the middle, the heart had three spikes coming out of a diamond shape just where the point of the heart should be.
"Just what is this thing?" She sighed and after a few minutes Shantae walked in dressed in her white pajamas.
"Risky, what is that?" She asked as she walked over. "Hey! This is that star charm I found years ago, it showed up randomly one day." Shantae exclaimed as she picked up the charm.
"Why did you keep such a trinket?" Risky asked, causing Shantae to think.
"I don't really know.. when I found it, I just felt warm when I picked it up, like part of me was drawn to it. I was six at the time and always imagined that an invisible friend of mine gave it to me to hold onto for him." Shantae explained after a minute.
"Great, an imaginary friend, I don't suppose it was the same boy you've been dreaming about lately." Risky teased.
"Actually.. now that you say it, I always imagined him looking exactly like the boy in that dream, but he had his eyes opened back then, they looked heavy like he was trying to force himself awake" the former half-genie sighed.
"It's time for shut eye, Brat. Get to bed before I knock you out." Risky sighed, not wanting to listen to her ramblings, it was making her feel to close to Shantae.
The former half-genie laughed softly and went to bed for the night, leaving Risky alone with the strange star-shaped trinket.
"I wonder who that boy must be. If he even truly exists." Risky sighed.
Chapter end. I apologize for the rushed battle descriptions, I will try to make longer descriptions but I am not the best at it.
