Chapter 12: Body of Nekopolis
Feet sloshed through ankle-deep water once more. According to Bar and Molly, the "body" that the newly united Shikon needed to find was as close to the darkness as one could come. Without being consumed by it, that is. Two pairs of black shoes, one pair of white and purple shoes, and one pair of yellow shoes squished in varying degrees of pitch and noise.
Loudest of all was Criss. "Find a body, yeah, sure, why not? Close to the darkness, cool! Fight Yan, awesome. So why is it that I don't feel like celebrating?!"
Just behind her, Kairi and Sora shared a look. Riku sighed, putting a hand on her shoulder. "If we want to save the world, we've just got to do it, Criss."
"Save the world? Save the world, he says. Well, what happens if I don't want to save the world? Huh? I'm my own person, I'm not dictated by fatalism."
"You don't really mean that, do you?" Sora looked at her. "I mean, you really don't want to save all those people back there? You don't want to see your home the way it was before Yan and the Children?"
"Sora's right, Criss," Riku said. "You said yourself. You'd rather be dead that live in a world of fear. You said that 'Yan-Shu once was famous throughout the worlds as a place where you only had to imagine something and it would come true'. Well, here's your chance. Imagine Yan gone; the Children, gone; the Heartless, gone. Imagine a world where kids play in safety in the dark of the streets of this world. We're that dream's only hope."
Criss smiled. "You really do care about this place, don't you? You're not even from here, either...Okay. We'll find this body and beat the Father of the Heartless once and for all. For the dream."
The four of them nodded together in silent agreement. "For the dream."
Water rushed by in the tunnel below, quick as an adder's strike and just as deadly. They were swimming in the last tunnel before the door to the bowels of the Stone Temple. Unfortunately, they were unable to reach it because of the rapids of the tunnel below.
What was causing it, not a one of the four could discern.
"What are we going to do?" Criss moaned. She grabbed the last of the ladder rungs and began banging her head against the stone wall of the tunnel. It hurt, but what was hurt but weakness leaving the body?
"We're going to think and stop panicking," Riku pulled her away from the ladder. "Cut that out, you'll give yourself a headache."
"No, I'm beyond headache range, I'm thinking more along the lines of mines going off in my skull." Criss thought for a moment. "Nah, tarts, I take that back. Like bombs. Big bombs that break the strong force—"
"Then stop beating yourself up, lass, because help has arrived!" In less that three seconds, Criss glanced up to see Molly the Water Dragon smiling at her. "I'll get ya to that body, then you kids are on your own."
Molly wrapped her arms around Kairi's waist, waited for her to take a breath, then suddenly reappeared empty-handed. She continued this process until finally, she took Riku and placed him on dry ground. The silver-haired boy glanced round.
The chamber was simple, the tunnel beneath them, still in turmoil, and a single black door on the other side. In the center, four giant, multifaceted jewel pillars stood tall and proud. A fifth, smaller pillar of stone stood in the center, encaging a small lever.
Then, Riku looked up.
The pillars weren't pillars at all, but legs of a creature much larger than the chamber suggested. A body the same colors—red, blue, green, and yellow—as the crystallized feet. Almost instantly, Riku knew what it was.
A giant cat.
"Speaking of cats," Criss said, wringing her calico hair of excess water. "I haven't seen Cleopatra since we left the campsite. Have you, Riku?"
"Nope. Oh, well, we'll find her later, right? Let's get up into this thing. Thanks for your help, Molly—"
But Molly was gone. Somehow, Cleo had swum the might current and was currently purging her fur of water. Criss knelt down and picked up the tiny calico, hugging her gently. Despite himself, Riku smiled. The two were so good for each other.
"I'm thinking that stone thingie in the middle is what we need, tarts," Criss said, helping Cleo wring some water from her coat. She led the way to the stone platform and climbed into the little cage. There was barely enough room for two of them to fit in. Riku squeezed into the cage and pulled the lever.
The ground rumbled beneath as the creaking old cage tottered up, up, up into the belly of the jewel cat. Somewhere inside his head, something told him that he was doing the right thing. He hadn't felt this right since he, Sora, and Kairi had agreed to build the raft. Or had he felt the same sort of right when he was first rescued by Criss? He couldn't tell himself.
And that frightened him.
Riku and Criss piled off the cage into the faint multicolored glow, letting the cage descend to retrieve Sora and Kairi on the ground below. Once all four were within the giant cat, the pale glow brightened into white.
The white light revealed that although the outside appeared transparent, the rest was opaque. Riku, Sora, Kairi, and Criss, who held Cleo, were inside an enormous white room. In the center was a heart etched into the floor. Four comfortable-looking chairs sat around each little "quadrant" of the heart, equal in parts.
Cleo leapt from Criss' arms and sprinted for the four chairs. The Shikon chased after the little calico, who braced itself against the floor and spun to a halt facing them. She let her tail flick from side to side as they joined her there.
"Cleo, what's gotten into—" Criss reached down to pick her up, but was halted by the fact that Cleopatra the calico was no longer there. Tiny black shoes had all but devoured the tiny cat. Criss jumped backwards. In Cleo's place was Molly, the Water Dragon.
"What the—what happened to my cat?!"
Molly sighed, merely shaking her head in a wise way that made Criss want to bite her tongue. In an instant, she almost did.
The Water Dragon transformed before them once again, in her true form. Her skin was soft as Cleo's fur, silver as Riku's hair. The wings that spread from her back were leathery and tough, the same color as Kairi's red hair. Behind her, her tail continued to swish, and the pointy cat's ears atop her head seemed a tad out of place as they continued to twitch with every sound.
"You always were so naïve, Criss," she said. "Cleo was merely a guise, which I took to protect you from Yan and show you the way here. And now, you are finally here, inside the body that you are a quarter a heart of. Lady Arami-Tama, your seat."
The Water Dragon wrapped her red wings about her, gently pressing her into the blue quarter of the heart.
"And Lady Nigimi-Tama, yours." Kairi was guided in the same fashion to the yellow quarter of the heart.
"Lord Kushimi-Tama." Sora was guided into the green seat, next to Kairi.
"And Lord Sakimi-Tama." Riku sat in the red seat, next to Criss. "You four souls, the Shikon, make up the heart of the true world of Nekopolis, the world now known as Yan-Shu. A simple mistake in the process, with much tampering from Yan, of course, made it seem as though half the Shikon was made up of Yan and Shu. Shu, of course, knew better than that.
"The Shikon, according to Shinto philosophy, was made up of four souls. The Arami-Tama, Nigimi-Tama, Kushimi-Tama, and Sakimi-Tama, which, in rough translation, means Valor, Harmony, Miracles, and Love. Yes, Riku, I am sure that we are correct. Together, under one mind, one influence, one body, you must become a Naohi, or True Spirit, to defeat Yan once and for all.
"Should this fail, and you prove to be a Magatsuhi, a Twisted Spirit, the worlds will crumble and fall under the rule of each of Yan's Children. The cats that guard the original two-hundred will not stay here, knowing that their own heart, the Shikon, has failed. They will flee, and with it will go the last line of defense in Nekopolis."
"So, no pressure, right?" Criss joked feebly.
Feet sloshed through ankle-deep water once more. According to Bar and Molly, the "body" that the newly united Shikon needed to find was as close to the darkness as one could come. Without being consumed by it, that is. Two pairs of black shoes, one pair of white and purple shoes, and one pair of yellow shoes squished in varying degrees of pitch and noise.
Loudest of all was Criss. "Find a body, yeah, sure, why not? Close to the darkness, cool! Fight Yan, awesome. So why is it that I don't feel like celebrating?!"
Just behind her, Kairi and Sora shared a look. Riku sighed, putting a hand on her shoulder. "If we want to save the world, we've just got to do it, Criss."
"Save the world? Save the world, he says. Well, what happens if I don't want to save the world? Huh? I'm my own person, I'm not dictated by fatalism."
"You don't really mean that, do you?" Sora looked at her. "I mean, you really don't want to save all those people back there? You don't want to see your home the way it was before Yan and the Children?"
"Sora's right, Criss," Riku said. "You said yourself. You'd rather be dead that live in a world of fear. You said that 'Yan-Shu once was famous throughout the worlds as a place where you only had to imagine something and it would come true'. Well, here's your chance. Imagine Yan gone; the Children, gone; the Heartless, gone. Imagine a world where kids play in safety in the dark of the streets of this world. We're that dream's only hope."
Criss smiled. "You really do care about this place, don't you? You're not even from here, either...Okay. We'll find this body and beat the Father of the Heartless once and for all. For the dream."
The four of them nodded together in silent agreement. "For the dream."
Water rushed by in the tunnel below, quick as an adder's strike and just as deadly. They were swimming in the last tunnel before the door to the bowels of the Stone Temple. Unfortunately, they were unable to reach it because of the rapids of the tunnel below.
What was causing it, not a one of the four could discern.
"What are we going to do?" Criss moaned. She grabbed the last of the ladder rungs and began banging her head against the stone wall of the tunnel. It hurt, but what was hurt but weakness leaving the body?
"We're going to think and stop panicking," Riku pulled her away from the ladder. "Cut that out, you'll give yourself a headache."
"No, I'm beyond headache range, I'm thinking more along the lines of mines going off in my skull." Criss thought for a moment. "Nah, tarts, I take that back. Like bombs. Big bombs that break the strong force—"
"Then stop beating yourself up, lass, because help has arrived!" In less that three seconds, Criss glanced up to see Molly the Water Dragon smiling at her. "I'll get ya to that body, then you kids are on your own."
Molly wrapped her arms around Kairi's waist, waited for her to take a breath, then suddenly reappeared empty-handed. She continued this process until finally, she took Riku and placed him on dry ground. The silver-haired boy glanced round.
The chamber was simple, the tunnel beneath them, still in turmoil, and a single black door on the other side. In the center, four giant, multifaceted jewel pillars stood tall and proud. A fifth, smaller pillar of stone stood in the center, encaging a small lever.
Then, Riku looked up.
The pillars weren't pillars at all, but legs of a creature much larger than the chamber suggested. A body the same colors—red, blue, green, and yellow—as the crystallized feet. Almost instantly, Riku knew what it was.
A giant cat.
"Speaking of cats," Criss said, wringing her calico hair of excess water. "I haven't seen Cleopatra since we left the campsite. Have you, Riku?"
"Nope. Oh, well, we'll find her later, right? Let's get up into this thing. Thanks for your help, Molly—"
But Molly was gone. Somehow, Cleo had swum the might current and was currently purging her fur of water. Criss knelt down and picked up the tiny calico, hugging her gently. Despite himself, Riku smiled. The two were so good for each other.
"I'm thinking that stone thingie in the middle is what we need, tarts," Criss said, helping Cleo wring some water from her coat. She led the way to the stone platform and climbed into the little cage. There was barely enough room for two of them to fit in. Riku squeezed into the cage and pulled the lever.
The ground rumbled beneath as the creaking old cage tottered up, up, up into the belly of the jewel cat. Somewhere inside his head, something told him that he was doing the right thing. He hadn't felt this right since he, Sora, and Kairi had agreed to build the raft. Or had he felt the same sort of right when he was first rescued by Criss? He couldn't tell himself.
And that frightened him.
Riku and Criss piled off the cage into the faint multicolored glow, letting the cage descend to retrieve Sora and Kairi on the ground below. Once all four were within the giant cat, the pale glow brightened into white.
The white light revealed that although the outside appeared transparent, the rest was opaque. Riku, Sora, Kairi, and Criss, who held Cleo, were inside an enormous white room. In the center was a heart etched into the floor. Four comfortable-looking chairs sat around each little "quadrant" of the heart, equal in parts.
Cleo leapt from Criss' arms and sprinted for the four chairs. The Shikon chased after the little calico, who braced itself against the floor and spun to a halt facing them. She let her tail flick from side to side as they joined her there.
"Cleo, what's gotten into—" Criss reached down to pick her up, but was halted by the fact that Cleopatra the calico was no longer there. Tiny black shoes had all but devoured the tiny cat. Criss jumped backwards. In Cleo's place was Molly, the Water Dragon.
"What the—what happened to my cat?!"
Molly sighed, merely shaking her head in a wise way that made Criss want to bite her tongue. In an instant, she almost did.
The Water Dragon transformed before them once again, in her true form. Her skin was soft as Cleo's fur, silver as Riku's hair. The wings that spread from her back were leathery and tough, the same color as Kairi's red hair. Behind her, her tail continued to swish, and the pointy cat's ears atop her head seemed a tad out of place as they continued to twitch with every sound.
"You always were so naïve, Criss," she said. "Cleo was merely a guise, which I took to protect you from Yan and show you the way here. And now, you are finally here, inside the body that you are a quarter a heart of. Lady Arami-Tama, your seat."
The Water Dragon wrapped her red wings about her, gently pressing her into the blue quarter of the heart.
"And Lady Nigimi-Tama, yours." Kairi was guided in the same fashion to the yellow quarter of the heart.
"Lord Kushimi-Tama." Sora was guided into the green seat, next to Kairi.
"And Lord Sakimi-Tama." Riku sat in the red seat, next to Criss. "You four souls, the Shikon, make up the heart of the true world of Nekopolis, the world now known as Yan-Shu. A simple mistake in the process, with much tampering from Yan, of course, made it seem as though half the Shikon was made up of Yan and Shu. Shu, of course, knew better than that.
"The Shikon, according to Shinto philosophy, was made up of four souls. The Arami-Tama, Nigimi-Tama, Kushimi-Tama, and Sakimi-Tama, which, in rough translation, means Valor, Harmony, Miracles, and Love. Yes, Riku, I am sure that we are correct. Together, under one mind, one influence, one body, you must become a Naohi, or True Spirit, to defeat Yan once and for all.
"Should this fail, and you prove to be a Magatsuhi, a Twisted Spirit, the worlds will crumble and fall under the rule of each of Yan's Children. The cats that guard the original two-hundred will not stay here, knowing that their own heart, the Shikon, has failed. They will flee, and with it will go the last line of defense in Nekopolis."
"So, no pressure, right?" Criss joked feebly.