Author's Notes: The first major traces of shounen-ai start here.
Chapter VI: First Contact
"Sora!" the young Kairi yelled at him, holding back the majority of her saddened and upset mood, "Why now? Why do you have to go now, of all times?" Her violet-blue eyes held back the tears that were developing within her even as she spoke with Sora on the beach where their raft had been sitting before the fateful storm of the Heartless. In the raft's place, the Excalibur, a gummi ship that was merely an upgraded version of the Kingdom-class from the beginning of Sora's original adventure, was active and ready for take-off, though pilotless. Riku leaned against the vessel, while Sora stood before Kairi, trying to comfort her in their last moments before he left her once again on a journey.
"Kairi..." Sora began, but no words followed. What more could he say than what he had already told her?
Her eyes broke contact with his almost instantly when she repeated, as if she had heard the same thing a million times over, "I know... You have to go. People are depending on you."
"You make it sound like I'm going off to die, Kairi!" he said to her in a tone that resembled disbelief. "I'm coming back in one piece." He then reached into his pocket and pulled out a certain key chain in the shape of a star. "After all, I'll have this with me, Kairi. As long as I have it, I'll come back to give it to you. Remember the promise?"
Speechless, Kairi nodded in agreement as she began to rub her eyes.
"There's no need for tears, Kairi," he told her softly as he grasped her hand gently, "Just trust me. I'll come back to you. I promise."
The brown-haired girl looked up at Sora, and to complete the feeling of déjà vu that both of them felt, Kairi spoke under her breath the same words that she had spoken to him an eternity before.
"I know you will."
—————
The Third District was no better off than any other location within Traverse Town. Lights in lampposts were barely functioning, the ground was littered with dust and debris from structures in disrepair, and not one person was within sight as Tracy, Felicity, and Vivi made their entrance into it after a night of rest. Though Traverse Town was always in a state of nighttime, Tracy's internal clock told him that it was indeed morning. Tracy's old friend was clearly shocked at the ruined state of the city, while Tracy, expecting such a mess, was still slightly excited to even be there. Of the party, Vivi was the calmest, having no reason for surprise or excitement. The kids were armed at Zidane's behest; Vivi had his staff, Tracy carried his stick, and Felicity held a borrowed dagger in spite of Tracy's reservation for giving her a sharp, shiny weapon.
I've got a bad feeling about this, thought the boy from Madison.
"Wow!" exclaimed Felicity as she ran into the Third District from the Second, "We're really in another world, Tracy! We're really in Traverse Town!"
Chuckling happily, he sent back to her, "And I couldn't have asked for better company."
"Hey!" the teenage girl half-shouted, "It's the house where Leon and the others set up headquarters! Wonder if anyone's—"
"Felicity?" asked Vivi, "How do you and Tracy know so much about this town and us?"
Damn, Tracy cursed silently, I wasn't looking forward to this...
Felicity began to stutter an answer, "W-well, umm... I, uh, w-we..."
It struck Tracy as powerfully a Behemoth's meteors. Taking a few moments to fabricate his falsehood further, the boy told Vivi, "Mythology."
"What?" Felicity and Vivi both answered.
"Yeah, Felicity," he began, subtle as he could to keep Vivi believing, "Zidane, Freya, this town, the Heartless — they're all myths on our world, stories told for our entertainment."
Vivi began to challenge, "But we're—"
"—real?" finished the other. "Before the Heartless came, we didn't even try to believe that the stories could be true. Obviously' they are true, and since Felicity and I," he grinned playfully between himself and Felicity, "immersed ourselves in the stories, we know enough to survive here."
The girl added onto his explanation, "I hope."
Vivi's glowing yellow eyes looked between the otherworldly pair thoughtfully. "So we're just stories?" he asked dejectedly.
"Aw, Vivi!" encouraged Tracy as he put a hand on the little guy's shoulder, "Don't put it like that! You, my friend, are just as real as I am, like any other flesh-and-blood person."
"C'mon, guys!" directed the giddy girl, "Let's get goin'!"
Reluctantly, Vivi and Tracy walked further into the Third District, turning right and stepping down a staircase following the anxious Felicity. Starlight continued as they strolled, "Besides, we wouldn't be having this nice chat if either of us weren't real, would we?"
"I... guess so." Vivi slowly made his way down the stairs, but halfway along the way, the child-like magician tripped and fell the rest of the way, knocking Felicity down in the process.
"Ow!" both of them screamed as they slowly started to recover. Vivi climbed to a standing position, straightened out his pointy hat, and brushed himself off while Felicity also stood up. For a fraction of a second, a hint of anger crossed her face, but it was immediately extinguished when she saw Vivi stare at her.
"S-sorry, Felicity," he instantly apologized with all the bright-eyed innocence of a child at play, "I'll try to be more careful."
At a loss for words, the girl said, "It's... ah, never mind."
Tracy caught up with the duo shortly, asking them, "Y'all okay?"
"I-I'm fine," Vivi returned.
"Nothin' broken!" replied Felicity.
"Good to hear, fellas," he grinned, "So let's go."
The trio, led by Tracy, walked into a wide area where flashbacks to the first Guard Armor entered the minds of Felicity and Tracy. Fortunately for them, there was no sign of the Heartless as they traveled along the high wall closest to the exit of the Second District, though they didn't want to take any chances.
"So, where're we goin'?" queried Vivi after a moment of silence.
"I wanna see if Merlin's home," Tracy told him honestly as he neared the peculiar doorway with a picture of a flame on it, "If he's here, then maybe he'll be able to help us."
Felicity placed a forceful hand on Starlight's shoulder and stepped in front of him, telling the boy, "I thought we were looking for Sora!"
Confident in his logic, Tracy said only two words to her, "Gummi ship." While Felicity began to comprehend at last, he turned to Vivi and told him, gesturing to the fire-marked entrance, "We'll need your magic to get in. A little Fire spell should do it."
"Sure thing, Tracy," he complied gladly as he whirled his staff a few times. Following that, Vivi waved it towards the door, and a decent-sized fireball emerged from the magic rod and hit the door. A moment later, the entryway slid open swiftly.
A bright smile on his lips, Tracy looked down to Vivi, patted his back, and told him genuinely, "This looks like the start of a beautiful friendship."
—————
"Hello?" called out Vivi as he and his friends walked around Merlin's house towards where Tracy knew the entrance was located. "Anyone home?"
Tracy spoke up, pointing to a cloth hanging over a hole in the wall, "The entrance."
"We get to meet Merlin!" Felicity exclaimed loudly, effectively demonstrating her excitement at the situation, "Cool!"
"'Cool'?" asked the little mage, obviously confused at the term.
"It's slang where we come from," Tracy revealed to him, "It basically means that she can't wait to meet Merlin."
"What're we waiting for?" the girl blurted out as she flung the curtain-like cloth away from the entryway and burst into the house. Immediately, Vivi and Tracy followed after her, hoping that her sudden intrusion into the household wasn't seen as troublesome by Merlin. Troubling the sorcerer, however, seemed to be the least of their troubles when the threesome fully entered the house to discover the worst thing they could possibly imagine in their situation except a horde of Heartless: nothing. There was no lighting, no tables, no books, no chairs, and no hope of finding Merlin. In the blink of an eye, they were knocked violently back to square one.
"Uhm," whispered Felicity jokingly, "This seems like a big waste of time to me."
"Too bad," Vivi said to them.
Tracy looked around the chamber repeatedly, muttering to himself, aware of present company, "Aw, darn! I guess Merlin went back to his world." Tracy stepped further into the empty room, walking slowly and deliberately to match his mixed saddened and angered mood. Don't take it too hard, Tracy, he told himself, You knew that he might've not been home. At least you tried...
"And where," inquired Tracy's old ally, "does that leave us?"
The boy thought on the possibilities before him, numbering to be none. Leaping onto the central stone platform where Merlin's table and chair once resided, he turned to Vivi and Felicity, telling the pair, "It leaves us without anywhere to turn to. If we can't get in contact with anyone we know, then we're not gonna be any help to anyone." With the thought voiced, he jumped — higher than he ever jumped before — over his allies and landed near the exit. Giving it a brief second thought, he waved to the door before making his exit, "Let's get outta here, ya?"
As her friend from Madison left the room, Felicity muttered at him, "You shouldn't talk like that. It's bad for your health."
"Hey, guys?" asked Tracy as Vivi and Felicity exited the house, "You mind goin' back to the house? I wanna have some time to myself."
—————
"Well, here it is," Tracy spoke to himself as he stood in the middle of the Third District, "Finally free of that town, that reality, that whatever you wanna call it..." He gazed towards the starry sky, brushing away the hair that hung before his right eye. "But how many people had to die, how many lives were ruined to get me here?" Realizing something important, he shook his head, "No. They didn't die to get me here... They simply died, and I happened to live through it. Pathetic, really, that of anyone to live, Felicity and I survive."
A stray thought occurred. "Dammit!" he cursed quietly, "No pencil, no paper... The experience of a lifetime, and I can't write about it!" He pondered over the circumstances. He had left his current work, Observations of a Deviant, back home, and there was no going back for it. Tracy could've added so much to the observations now that he knew so much more. He figured that he could write an entire chapter on the nature of the Heartless alone.
He began to move onward, making his way towards the doorway to the First District as he explained to himself, "Creatures of darkness, born of darkness — where do they fit into this scheme? There are creatures of the dark, but none of the light. I wonder why that is?"
Tracy finally arrived at the doorway and pushed it open as he continued his conversation, taking a different topic, "Why aren't the Heartless in this town? You'd th—"
Tracy's wandering eyes met those of a handsome, silver-haired teenager with piercing blue eyes wearing blue jeans and a dominantly yellow shirt with two blue stripes overlapping over his chest. The sight of such a vision of beauty, regardless of its familiarity, caused the heart of young Tracy Tobias Starlight to skip a beat or two. So transfixed on the fifteen-year-old boy, the star-struck Tracy forgot to stop walking, eventually tripping over a fallen lamppost and hitting the dirty ground with a thud and sending dirt into the air. Dazed for the moment, Tracy brought his arms to use, supporting his torso slightly above the ground with his left hand and right elbow as he coughed in reaction to the airborne dust.
"Hey, man," the familiar, concerned voice spoke to him from above, "You okay?"
Looking up to his right, Tracy's eyes beheld the elegant form of Riku towering over his downed self. Noticing his awkward position, the displaced youth began to laugh at both himself for his clumsiness and his situation.
He must've looked quite insane judging from the look on Riku's face when he asked Tracy again, this time far more troubled, "You okay?"
The other's mouth tried to move, but no words left his lips as he could only stare up at Riku.
After another moment, the standing kid offered his hand to Tracy. "C'mon. Get up, man." Tracy wordlessly took Riku's hand, and he was soon to his own two feet. "So, you gotta name to go with those graceful feet of yours?"
His lips twitched momentarily before he answered, "T-Tracy." He held back what he was thinking: You gotta name to go with those pretty eyes of yours?
"Tracy, eh?" Riku repeated, probably hearing the name for the first time ever. "I'm Riku," he grinned at the bedazzled boy, "You should probably watch your step."
A third voice joined their conversation, if it could be called a conversation, "Who are you talking to, Riku?"
Sora? Sora! Well, what d'ya know?
"His name's Tracy," Riku told Sora matter-of-factly, "He lives here, I—"
"No!" cut off Tracy in a flash. When he gained the stares of both Riku and Sora, he knew that he had to give an explanation, and he started with, "My world was called Madison, but it's gone, destroyed by the Heartless."
"The Heartless?" both of the friends almost yelled.
"A-anyway, guys," Tracy pressed on, "Follow m-me and we'll t-talk about th-this. We'll need your help to stop them."
If they can be stopped, he added to himself.
