Black Dreams Eternal

by Priest Li Xiang

The Emperor of the Known Worlds knows who his enemies are, and who his allies are. Though perhaps his enemies are a bit stronger than he supposed... ch2: Sora is out for vengence against Kabuto.

3. dreams 02 p1

This chapter actually took us the better part of nine months to write. It got far to long in the process, but it's setting us up for the next Big Plot Point. Huzzah.

---

Black Dreams Eternal: Chapter Two, part One
Written by: Tidus ((Priest)), Sora ((Crys)), Yasha ((Kaya)), Aeon ((Shadowclaw)), Arados, Mozenrath ((Magda)), Lutra ((Syrup)), Aura and Skailer ((Hea))

---

Sora's eye was twitching madly as he finally set the Gummi Ship to the ground. He finally released his death grip on the controls.

It had been.....a long ride. A very long ride. Filled with arguing. Lots of arguing. The yelling...it was still ringing in Sora's poor ears. At first Aeon and Tidus had just glared at each other. Eventually they started yelling at each other, and then it came to the point where words just weren't enough. (Those scorch marks and slices in the walls were never going to come out)

The Keyblade Master now turned to glare at the two men, eye still twitching. "Get. Out." He snarled through clenched teeth.

Tidus laughed a bit nervously, from where he was hiding on the far side of the room. Sora had been absolutely terrifying after Aeon had thrown him into the wall-- of course, Tidus had gone berserker which had been what caused Aeon to toss him, so he'd dug some pretty deep trenches into the wall with his spines.

Well, Sora had been frightening when he'd woken up from the little nap Aeon had forced him into. Obviously, Sora had been yelling at Aeon for awhile, and the Bird-boy had shot him a half smug, half relieved look when Sora rounded on him.

So Tidus had cowered until Sora's fury until the Keyblade Master had felt the blonde was suitably chastised. Tidus had decided to hide himself in one of the wall panels, but a look from Sora had caused him to just hide in the corner.

He wanted Yuna. She'd make everything all better. Or maybe Wakka-- Wakka was nice and large and friendly, and certainly NOT scary. Sora's black clothing certainly didn't help the look.

So when Sora practically snarled at them to get out, Tidus got out. Quickly.

Aeon shouted back at Sora.

"Fine!"

With a flap of his wings he propelled himself backwards and out of the Gummi Ship's door. Once he was higher up in the air Aeon relaxed and calmed down slightly. He wasn't really that keen on being cooped up inside. He had wings, so it made sense to make use of them. A couple of good hard flaps shook off any loose plumage from his mid-flight fight with Tidus in the Gummi Ship.

Damn Tidus. He'd stopped Scale Boy from doing any more damage to either them or the Gummi ship as it was.

Flying back down to the ground a good few feet away from Tidus Aeon apologized to Sora for his outburst.

"Sorry about that. I'm not so keen on being . . . well . . . cooped up for that long."

He looked over at Tidus for a brief moment before turning back to Sora.

"Not that badly damaged is it?" Aeon asked.

Sora twitched, obviously still quite irritated. He got out of the Captains seat, surveying the damage. There were large trenches dug into the metal walls, scraps of the metal sticking up from the trenches like little claws. There were various holes in places, some punctured, others melted in. The areas of metallic interior that weren't torn apart were dented in. Scorch marks tinted the silvery walls black. The floor was littered with golden feathers and odd little black scales.

The Keyblade Master twitched and stepped out of the Gummi Ship. "My baby..." He groaned. "You KILLED HER!"

He glared at the two sinspawn, not that he knew what a sinspawn was. At the moment he didn't feel like questioning it. "You two." He snarled. "Are never. EVER. To be in my ship EVER again!"

Before either could reply Sora continued, rubbing his temples. "Until you two can get along I can't really bring either of you anywhere, now can I? We can't fight the Heartless if you two are too busy fighting each other!"

Sora turned away from the two, pulling his hair. "I have no idea what the HELL you two have against each other, but you guys have to GET OVER IT! We can't have you guys constantly arguing and fighting with each other like a bunch of....of..." Sora struggled for the right word. "Little KIDS!" He finally cried, throwing his arms down.

Sora took a deep breath attempting to calm down. "You guys go see if Arados and Yasha made it, okay?" He said. "I'm going to see if I can fix this at all before we get Cid." He looked back at the duo of Sinspawn. "Well? Go."

"I'm not a kid," Tidus grumbled, pointedly ignoring the fact that he was still acting like a child, "C'mon Feather-head. When Sora gets in a mood, you DO NOT want to bother him."

The blonde crossed his arms, tucking his hands into his sleeves and glaring at the woods that surrounded the stone and mortar Traverse Town. High walls wrapped around the town, likely to protect the inhabitants from the wild animals of their world-- not that the walls did any good against beings such as the Heartless. Or, his thoughts turned darker, the Sinspawn and Fiends that had inhabited Spira.

He stared at Aeon out of the corner of his eye. He'd never seen a Sinspawn like him, although for some strange reason, he got the feeling that they had met before. It caused his hackles to rise, and that had been the reason why he-- yes he, as in Tidus-- had picked the fight on the ship with Aeon. It had spiraled out of control pretty quickly.

"Like most everything else in my life," the teenager muttered aloud, before shaking his head, and speaking to his most annoying of companions, "Well, Arados and Yasha's ship isn't here, so it must be at one of the other entrances to the town."

"A most logical conclusion." Aeon muttered, his mind elsewhere.

Tidus really hadn't changed much had he? Aeon shook his head, clearing the thoughts from his mind.

Not my thoughts. Not my problem. he thought.

He turned to Tidus and studied him closely.

"How much would you say you weighed? Cause its much easier to search from the air and kinda pointless leaving you behind if your friend gets as moody as you claim."

"You didn't have to deal with him when Riku and Kairi used to tease him," Tidus blinked a couple times, drawing out of his memories of years ago, before the Heartless, before the End of Days, before Zanarkand and Spira, "Uh... I'm about... a hundred and sixty pounds. A little less than that last time I checked."

It was at this point that it dawned on him that Aeon meant that he was going to take him up into the air-- flying.

Tidus didn't have issues with heights-- he would have been really screwed back on Spira if he had. However, he did have issues with Aeon, which made him nervous.

Staring at the other sinspawn, his brow furrowed and he frowned, "If you promise not to drop me, I won't insult you for the next five hours."

Aeon grinned at Tidus.

"I'll hold you to that and no worries about being dropped."

Aeon mock-shuddered.

"Knowing my luck I'd have to clean up all the mess."

With one last somewhat friendly grin at Tidus Aeon took hold of Tidus' wrists tightly and started to hover off the ground, his wings flapping harder and harder as the pair slowly gained more and more height.

Aeon hovered there in mid air for a moment, getting his bearings, then flew off, heading in the opposite direction to Sora's Gummi Ship.

Secretly he was quite impressed with his own efforts, seeing as it was the first time he'd ever taken a passenger "along for the ride".

---

At one of the other entrances to Traverse Town, a smaller Gummi Ship landed. Inside, Arados was just trying to figure out which button turned the ship off while Yasha was already trying to look around Traverse Town through the windows. She scanned the millions of buttons, trying to block out Yasha's constant stream of talk and remember which button it was.

Arados had spent most of the trip doing three things. One, listening to Yasha, who seemed persistent to talk to her whether she wanted to or not. Two, trying to keep Yasha from pushing all the lit up buttons. And three, spacing out. The most eventful thing that'd happen was probably when Arados had spaced out so much that they nearly hit a really, really, really big rock and had only been saved due to the fact Yasha had taken advantage of Arados's seeming lack of consciousness and pushed a button that just happened to be the artillery button.

So, now landing in Traverse Town, Arados was trying to adjust from black spacey nothing-ness to bright neon lights and apparently lotsa people. And now, she couldn't remember which button shut of the gummi ship! "Um... Yasha?" She turned and poked the dragon girl on the shoulder, "Do you know how to turn this thing off?"

Although it probably wasn't a very good idea to let Yasha have free range of the controls, nothing really bad could happen to them....

.... right?

Yasha perked, ears giving a twitch, and turned to smile hyperly at Arados. "Turn off the shippy? Sure-sure!". Clicking her talons together cheerfully, she hopped over behind the captain's chair, grinning widely. "I watched Sora do the whooole thing!" She blinked, examining the control panel closely for the one flashy button she wanted.

"Lessee, speed, guns, radar--Ohhh there it is!" The perky dragon-girl promptly smacked a glowing green button, and the lights went off in the entire ship. Along with everything else. "See? I can do it!" Yasha happily informed Arados, beaming in the dark.

---

Aeon climbed a bit higher in the air. While he was quite fond of flying, it wasn't so easy with a heavy load in his hands. At least this way, he'd be able to see Arados's Gummi Ship with any luck and head straight for it.

He was half-impressed by the lack of comments from Tidus, save for the occasional muttering about places he knew. Mind you, Tidus might be too petrified to say much else. Aeon knew for a fact his skin gave off a fair amount of body heat; Tidus must be half baked.

The sunlight on Aeon's back felt great up here, and unconsciously he rose a bit higher again. The sky was quite possibly the one place Aeon could really relax and let go, and boy it felt good.

Oops. Better not thinking about the letting go part.

"Hey Tidus!"

He squeezed the boy's wrist slightly to get his attention.

"See them yet?"

Being carried was not exactly the same as riding in an airship, or skidding down a heavy-duty cable to keep Yuna from marrying that freak with the disturbing hair. Hanging from his wrists wasn't all that fun, and for a moment he considered pulling off a stupid trick just to be able to land on Aeon's back for the flight instead of being carried.

Gravity was evil, he mused after a few moments, eyes scanning the ground, "Hey, there's Cid's shop... and that's where I first met Yasha and--" the pressure on his wrists caused him to look up at the man carrying him.

It was vaguely disturbing to be this close to a Sinspawn, and NOT be trying to kill it.

"Not yet. They may not have-- oh! There they are!" He pointed with his foot, given that trying to rip his hand out of Aeon's grip might have resulted in him being dropped.

Aeon looked down at where Tidus was pointing with his foot.

"Finally! My arms were getting kinda tired."

He blinked suddenly, kinda wishing he hadn't just said that aloud.

"Er . . I'd have flown back down to the ground before they got that bad." he reassured Tidus.

Aeon turned so that he was angled in the direction of the other's Gummi Ship. With any luck this event should please Sora somewhat and calm the keyblade wearing boy back down.

Aeon spread out his wings to their full and stopped flapping, using momentum to glide down towards the ground at a fair speed. As they grew closer and closer he started to lean back in the air, simultaneously straining to pull Tidus from his current position below, and upwards so that he was dangling in front of Aeon rather than beneath him.

As they reached about a feet from the ground Aeon let go, the miniscule descent meaning Tidus should land quite happily on his feet as if he'd jumped off a small wall. Aeon landed somewhat harder on his feet, wincing somewhat with the impact.

"Not bad for a first passenger flight. And five hours minus about 10-15 minutes of insult free time left to enjoy." he remarked, turning to smile at Tidus.

"That was kinda fun. Maybe I should fly more people around more often." he mused, walking off in Yasha and Arados' direction.

---

"Now which way is the way out?!" Arados exclaimed back in the ship, now trying to get her eyes to adjust from light to dark. Blinking a couple of times to get the bright, flashing lights out of her eyes, she managed to somehow find the door without breaking anything. Arados was never as relieved to see ground as she stepped out of the Gummi Ship. Not that she'd say that aloud. "Do you have any idea where the others would be?" She asked Yasha, looking back at the Gummi Ship.

Yasha bounced along behind Arados, clearing the doorway of the Gummi Ship with one bound. She grinned childishly to Arados' question.

"You wanna find the others? Okay!"

Yasha stretched her feet out, talons digging into the cracks in-between the bricks that made up the walkway. Leaning backwards and fanning the air towards her with her wings slightly, she took a delicate sniff.

"Well, I don't smell Yummy Hair....but there's.... oh! I can smell Tidus' hair-gel! It's coming this way!" she quipped excitedly, bouncing in place. How she managed to do this with her claws still stuck in the ground was anybody's guess.

"Tiiduuss!"

Tidus laughed at Yasha's enthusiastic greeting as he and Aeon made their way towards the other two. He himself was grinning and waving, "Hey Yasha! I hope you didn't get into too much trouble without me there!"

Of course, they have known each other for very long, but he didn't really care about that. Yasha was his friend, and it was like how things had been with his friends from Spira-- except with less awkwardness at the beginning of it.

Aeon was somewhat some calm and reserved in his greeting.

"Hey."

He stood away from them just standing there. Watching. I don't deserve friends like that he thought bitterly. Not with all this suffering in my head.

He thought back to the battle, when the Heartless had him pinned down, their coldness leeching him of the will to live. What hadn't scared him most was the fact he could have died back then, but more the fact he felt he should have. Aeon shook his feathered head. No. That wasn't his life. Despite the burden he carried he deserved a chance. So why did he feel so wretchedly guilty for being happy?

He walked up closer to the three others.

"Enjoy your flight?"

"Hm?" Arados looked from Tidus and Yasha's reunion, to Aeon. Stepping out of the pitch black Gummi Ship and into the brightly lit town, she'd spent the last minute or two trying to re-adjust to the neon lighting without wincing from the glare.

"It's... really bright here." Arados replied, blinking a few more times as she attempted to take a look at the shops. Looking back to Tidus and Yasha, Arados felt a little uncomfortable and awkward.

Hardly knowing any of them except for probably Yasha, Arados felt like she was intruding. Though after a few seconds she fell back into her revere, looking to all three of them. "Wasn't there another guy with you two?" She pointed out.

---

Sora sighed as he swept feathers, scales, and chips of some odd, black spike-like thing from the floor of the Gummi Ship. There hadn't been anything he could do about the trenches, dents, and scorch marks. The least he could do was get all the junk off of the floor.

"Gee, Cid's going to have fun attempting to fix all this..." Sora muttered as he scooped the pile of battle-produced junk into a dustpan and tossed it outside. Not like anyone was going to notice anyway...

Another sigh escaped his lips as Sora looked back at the trashed interior. He attempted to push some burnt fluff into a tear in one of the seats and only managed to make the fluff crumble to ash.

Sora grit his teeth and rubbed his temples as the voices of the arguing Sinspawn still rang in his ears. Well, now her certainly remembered why he'd occasionally gotten so annoyed with Tidus back on Destiny Islands...

'It's not like I can blame him for being who he is.' Sora thought to himself, a bemused smile gracing his lips. 'I really shouldn't have yelled at them like that...' A flash of guilt ran through his mind as he thought back to just a bit earlier when he'd been so furious. Tidus had looked pretty darn scared. 'That was pretty harsh of me, I didn't have to yell at them so much, even though they were acting pretty stupid, and ruined my Gummi Ship...'

Sora shook his head and decided he'd better go get Cid. It'd be better if he went alone anyway, he doubted Cid would be happy with the damaged Gummi Ship as it was, better to not have him find the culprits for the moment....

After a bit of walking, Sora got to Cid's shop. He blinked as he heard several clangs and bangs coming from the warehouse behind it, as well as several expletives being howled.....

Sora noted no one was at the counter so he shrugged and pushed open the door behind the counter into the warehouse. Might was well see what was making Cid curse more so then usual...

And just as Sora opened the door an explosion rocked through the building, causing various tools and shelves to fall from the walls. Sora blinked as smoke filled the air....along with a few more expletives...

"Um...Cid? Are you okay!?" Sora called into the dimly lit warehouse, coughing as he made his way around the sleek Gummi Ships. "Cid!?"

The blonde haired pilot popped from underneath a Gummi Ship that had been lowered to the ground, face completely black. Only his blue eyes showed, and they shut as he coughed. "Yeah, what the Fing hell you want!?" He snapped. Then he noticed who it was. "Oh, Sora. Sorry." He said, pulling himself from beneath the Gummi Ship and attempting to get some of the black soot off of his face.

Sora raised an eyebrow. "What are you doing in here?"

Cid got most of the black off of his face so it was at least , he continued to rub his face, so most of the soot that he got off ended up back on his face. "I'm tryin' to install this new Gummi Block on one of the ships. I found this weird...substance....thing. I decided to see if it could super-power a Gummi Ship, but no matter what Gummi I try and put the stuff into, the block's not strong enough to hold the stuff."

Sora blinked. What was Cid talking about? "..Okaaaay. Um, anyways, Cid. You know how the Heartless started showing up again right?"

Cid's expression darkened. "Damn those Heartless.." He growled, muttering a few more curse words under his breath.

"Yeah, uh. Well, you see I've found some......friends....to help me...fight them..." Sora trailed off, suddenly struck with a thought. It was HIS responsibility to battle the Heartless. What was he doing asking these people to leave what could be fairly normal lives and go off on a journey that could result in their death or worse? Who was he to ask them to maybe give their lives for this?

"Kid? Sora? Sora!?" Cid rolled his eyes. "F#ing angsty teens and their damn f#ing angst fests...." He lightly whacked Sora over the head.

"Ow!" Sora glared at Cid. He pushed the thought to the back of his mind. 'Now's not the time...' "Anyways, there's a lot of us and there's no way we could all fit in one Gummi Ship. One of them has another Gummi Ship, so I was wondering if you could combine mine and hers into a bigger one?"

Cid shrugged. "It shouldn't be a problem."

Sora grinned. "Great! Also....ah.....my ship got.....a little damaged...do you think you could fix it?" He scratched his head sheepishly.

Cid shrugged. "Sure." 'What's the worst shape the ship could be

in?'

"WHAT THE F#ING HELL DID YOU DO TO THIS F#ING THING? THERE'S S$ EVERYWHERE! WHAT THE F# HAPPENED HERE!?" Cid demanded, eyes extremely wide as he pointed at the wrecked Gummi Ship.

"I didn't do it!" Sora cried, waving his arms.

"WHAT THE HELL DID THEN?"

"Um...I picked up some friends who don't really like each other?"

Cid continued to curse under his breath as he paced round the Gummi Ship.

"I swear when I find the F#ing B$#$ who did this..."

"....This...is gonna take awhile then?"

"NO F#ING S#!"

Sora winced. "Um....okay then..." He said, backing away.

Cid took a deep breath. "This is gonna take all F#ing night..."

"..Sorry?" Sora offered.

"GODDAMNIT!"

"...Um...Oh would you LOOK AT THAT!" Sora said brightly. "It's REALLY late, I'm going to go RENT a hotel room.."

"Mother F#ing B#$$#$ I'm gonna rip out their F#$ing spines..."

"...um..BYE!" Sora left. Quickly.

Sora finally jogged up to the rest of the group. "Hey guys!" He said, finally coming to a stop. "Um....I went to Cid about the ships, he said it was okay." He scratched his head.

"He's kinda...busy at the moment.." Sora shot Aeon and Tidus a look. "So I think we should go to him tomorrow." Sora shrugged. 'Unless we all want our heads bit off....'

"So..." Sora looked over towards the second distract. "I suggest we get some sleep, rent hotel rooms or something." He looked back at everyone. "What do you guys say?"

Aeon blinked

"Er inside?"

Truth was he preferred sleeping outdoors in the open. Being cooped up indoors wasn't his idea of fun. In fact being cooped up period wasn't any fun for him. Still, he did owe them for coming along when they did and helping him get off that doomed planetoid thing.

"Sure. Inside it is then."

Aeon's wings twitched slightly, as they often did when he was unsure or uneasy.

Tidus gave Sora an apologetic grin, still feeling bad about having mauled the Gummi Ship in his fight with Aeon. Of course, thinking of Aeon caused the blonde's eyes to slide over to warily watch the other Sinspawn, and he had to bite his lips from making a comment when he noticed the bird's wings twitch.

He'd promised, after all, and Tidus never welched on a promise. Well, almost never, considering that promise he'd made to never pilot anything again... he'd broken that one pretty quickly. Which actually had led to this mess.

Right then, no breaking promises-- having to deal with another Sinspawn without Yuna by his side was his punishment, he was sure of it.

"So where are we staying? There's kinda a lot of us..." the blonde wondered, looking around them in confusion, and scratching the back of his head.

Arados nodded absently, looking around at the various buildings and people. Her eyes rested on one particular creature: a weird little thing with white fur, little wings, and what seemed like a red balloon coming from it's head that kept floating back and forth.

'Why do I have the feeling that things are only going to get stranger?'

Yasha squealed and waved to the fat little moogle waddling around at the other side of the district. Then, for seemingly no reason at all (not that she needed one, this is Yasha we're talking about), pounced onto Sora's head. Quickly making herself comfy before Sora could throw her off, she propped her chin into the spiky-haired one's mess of tangles and beamed in her normal fashion.

"Oi oi, Yummy Hair! Are we gonna stay at the Hotel, huhuhuhuh?"

Sora sighed as Yasha once again jumped onto his head and proceeded prop her chin upon his head. Sora twitched. 'I bet she KNOWS this annoys the hell out of me, she's just PRETENDING to be blissfully unaware of my discomfort so she can high off of my shampoo...'Sora shook his head slightly before deciding to attempt to ignore the dragon-girl.

"Yeah, I guess we're gonna stay at the hotel, the Small House is Cid's place now and I don't think he'd be too happy to have all of us staying in his one room place..." Sora began walking towards the second distract. "So let's go.."

Sora pushed open the doors to the hotel, Yasha still attached to his head. "...Okay, how are we gonna do this?" He wondered aloud. "Each room's prolly enough room for three people, so two rooms should probably be good.."

As travelers checked in and out of the hotel, a small figure watched all from a corner. Some wondered why a child would be alone, or who she was waiting for.

Aura smiled simply, hugging her huge Teddy Bear. Her eyes alighted upon a particular group of travelers; while they might look odd, a look of recognition crossed her face.

Scrabbling up, bear dragging behind her, she ran to Sora. She stared up at him... or, rather, er, his hair. The gravity-defying- spikiness! Where had she seen it before...?

"KITE!" She cried, throwing herself at Sora.

"GAH!"

Sora cried out as yet ANOTHER weight found itself on him, this time in the form of a small girl attaching herself to his waist and dubbing him "Kite".

Sora reeled backwards, swinging his arms to maintain his balance. Somehow he managed to right himself and now stood with a dragon girl and another girl clinging to him. The Keyblade Master twitched.

Sora looked down at the girl. "Would you get o-" He began to demand, but stopped when he realized what he had perceived to be a threat was an innocent looking child, looking up at him with wide, twilight purple eyes.

"Ummm...ahhh.....hello.." Sora blinked, wondering why on earth this girl had tackled him.

Aura stared up at Sora, a little taken back. "Kite? Onii-san?" she repeated, still clinging to him. She smiled, waving her teddy bear around, and whacking a few people in the process. "Hi! Aura!" she said gleefully...

"Whhhhaaa?" Sora blinked slowly. 'Onii-san? Where'd that come from?...Why in the world does this girl think I'm her brother?'

Sora's expression darkened slightly. 'Maybe...he was another victim of the Heartless? Another causality? Another person's world destroyed, another person's life ruined because of me?' He looked down at the innocent young girl, she looked back with eyes that sparkled with what was obviously joy.

'But I'm not your brother!' Sora wanted to shout. 'Your world and him were probably lost because I couldn't get there to help! Your brother might be dead because I didn't do what I was supposed to! He might be dead or worse because of me!' But he didn't.

Those large, smiling eyes, so happy to see him. Sora didn't want to tell her that her brother may be gone. He didn't want to tell her that what she believed to be there was not. She looked so happy....he couldn't tell her...

But to lie, to make her believe he was what he wasn't? Was that right? To make her believe he was her brother?

No. That wasn't right. If she were to find out he were lying, wouldn't that hurt worse?

Sora winced. "Um.......miss?" He said, trying to sound gentle. "I'm sorry... but...." He wanted to look away, he didn't want to see the girls eyes anymore, but he couldn't tear his gaze away! "I'm not your brother. You're mistaking me for someone else. I'm....sorry."

Aura tilted her head slightly in confusion. "No onii-san...?" she trailed off, than hugged her teddy bear close, feeling a little shy. So these people weren't them, after all...

She remembered the scary black creatures that she'd seen when she first came, and following some people onto this ship. It'd landed here... and she'd been in the hotel since. It seemed one of the few places the "glowy eye things" (( A shy smile worked it's way back up. These people were like her friends... the smile got bigger. She looked at Sora, wondering why he seemed so sad. "No sad!" she said happily, waving her teddy bear up by Sora's face. "Aura!" she pointed to herself, than looked at them. She seemed to want to know their names.

Yasha's big, molten gold eyes sparkled. There was no other way to described it, they -sparkled-.

"YAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAY!" After ecstatically shrieking into Sora's poor abused eardrums, Yasha hopped off his head, landing gracefully in a crouch next to the small girl. Giving her best, cheerful, disarming smile(Which was hard, seeing as Yasha was half-dragon and tended to scare people a good bit, but she managed to appear harmless somehow none-the-less.), she picked up the white-haired girl delicately in her huge claws and hugged her very gently.

Setting the girl down, Yasha also gave the teddy bear a quick, loving hug, then handed it back. Both of her wings were fully out-stretched as beamed and giggled mirthfully.

"I'm Yasha!"

Aura blinked, staring with large eyes at Yasha. Both arms waved frantically as the little girl began to jump up and down. "Hi!" she said in a sing song voice, waving. Though many things could frighten her, the strange dragon girl reminded Aura vaguely of Maha...

Suddenly, she halted, placing her bear carefully on the ground. She took a few soft footsteps forward, eyes wide again, and... poked Yasha's wing. "Fly!" She said happily, petting it. Giggling, she stepped back to her bear and squeezed it shyly.

She paused, holding the bear now with one hand. The other hand, the one which she touched Yasha's wing with, she stared at. After a few moments, she held it up, head turned slightly. "Glowy eyes?" she asked.

Reason unknown, the little girl seemed to gather more urgency. "Glowy eyes? Scary.... glow!" she said in a almost loud voice, words rushed, pulling both on Sora and Yasha's arms.

Aeon watched the little child wandering around with some interest. Her innocence was . . . strangely pleasant?

Kneeling down near the child Aeon regarded her with his eyes, his head cocked to one side.

"Aura. Pretty name."

He blinked and smiled, a difficult task with a beak instead of a mouth. He hoped he wasn't appearing too threatening.

He looked at her curiously, just watching her and nothing more.

When did humans come in sizes this small?

Yasha happily let Aura yank on her wing, not minding it at all. She blinked in confusion when Aura started talking quickly. "Glowy?..." A soft dawning of realization came to her eyes, which darkened slightly to an angry amber. A low, protective growl rose from her throat.

"Are you okay?! Did they hurt you?!?"

For some reason, this girl felt really, really important to her. The dragonic girl always immediately took to people, but this girl was really special, but she wasn't sure why...

Aura stopped babbling, soft purple eyes turning to look widely at Yasha. The little girl shook her head, soft milk white hair waving back and further. "No... follow ship!" She said softly, the memory of ship, made out of block like things, and people on it.

"Came into-out of-World-Tsukasa-twilight!-ship-watching..." she began to babble again, arms waving frantically as she tried to explain. She calmed down as she looked at each of them in turn. "Awake in world..." she said softly, smiling as if remembering something pleasant, though it was unsure of what she meant. "Saw glowy eyes... scary!" She shivered, "Watch, no hurt. Dark... cold, broken." The last words she said with a weird look on her face, an expression of confusion on her face. It passed as she looked at Yasha and Sora.

"People with ship, and glowy eyes left..." Aura giggled as she came to the next part, "Follow people, came here." she finished.

She clapped her hands a little as she remembered how she'd snuck onto the ship. They hadn't found her, either! It'd been a fun game on Aura's part, though these unknown travelers would of been shocked to find the little stow away.

Sora listened to the girl, watching the expressions flit across her face and quickly moved away as her teddy bear nearly smacked him in the face. 'So... she lost her world.....poor kid, she had no idea what was going on...'

"So...you lost your world, and you've just been waiting here, all alone?" Sora said, more of a statement then a question.

Aura tilted her head to the side, blinking in slight confusion. Tracing a seam absently on the bear, she started to nod, than seemed to change her mind and started to shake her head.

Frowning a little with frustration, she answered, "People on ship brought here... they go away, stay here since then." She nodded, reaching up and tugging on Sora's shirt. "Stay with you?"

Sora blinked down at the small girl as she tugged at his shirt, innocent, twilight colored eyes staring into his.

'I can't let her stay with me...she's just a little kid, she could get hurt! But I can't just leave her here....' He looked down at the girl, whom just blinked up at her. '...There's something about her...that I can't quite place....'

The Keyblade Master's face softened into a smile, a genuine, real smile that hadn't seen the light of day in a long time.

"Alright..." He said, closing his eyes and shoving his hands into his pocket, gentle smile still upon his face. "You can stay with us."

'I just hope....by letting her stay, she won't end up getting hurt....I hope I haven't just made a mistake...'

---

No one would expect this boy to be alive, considering the past few years and what was hidden within the boy. Oh, you'd like to know? Well, if you insist, I shall allow myself to say what the boy secreted. He had half of his heart ripped out of him, leaving an emotionless hole within him that somehow produces emotions. He once had the ability to summon the powerful spirits of his home world, Mahteys, but the spirits dissolved when the world dissipated. There is also one last thing that the boy hid within himself: that he was, in a way, not real.

Enter Skailer, a fourteen-year old mess of a boy. He was around an average height for a preteen, though he was older than it, but he possessed an amazing athletic ability to make up for the loss of height. His ears were like a monkey's and covered in light blonde fur, as was his long, monkey-like tail that he loved to make use of. Skailer's skin was fair from a moderate balance of being both indoors and out for most of his life, and his clothes...by the gods, his clothes were basically rags; with what a white, dirty sheet of a shirt on his torso and filthy blue pants, commonly referred to as blue jeans in your area, I am assuming. He also wore black sport shoes with white ankle socks so as to feel the wind at his ankles when he ran. His most prized possession was, and probably still is, a silver chain fastened around his neck from which dangles an Aquamarine charm. Underneath all of that, however, lay a scar. A physical and emotional scar. Pure white, running clean across his ribs. If anything were to happen in that area, it certainly meant death - or near death, as Skailer had an extremely strong will, even in the face of death and destruction. His hair was a metallic blonde and fell just between the area at the bottom of his ear lobes, but above his shoulders. On the boy's belt was a stainless steel dagger, and fastened on his arm was a strange claw-like weapon that required his grip to function properly. But his deadliest weapon, of course, were his fangs. Not large fangs, they were not long enough to protrude out from his mouth.

Now, I'm sure you have a clear picture of Skailer in your noggin. Let us get on with the details on how he stepped into our little adventure, shall we?

Skailer had just dispatched a couple of heartless: Stealth Soldiers, they are called, I'm sure; last time I checked that is what they were called. Anyways, our little monkey boy trudged through the second district with a heavy heart (he had come so close to losing it again; oh, how he would never want to see another heartless ever again!) and a heavy body. Blood oozed out of his mouth, down his forehead and along one of his arms. However, this would not stop our living example of perseverance from at least trying to get a room (last time he tried the man at the desk told him off for being dirty).

Skailer leaned up next to the door to the hotel, wincing as pain shot through his spine and back again like a shining bullet. The doors would not open. Skailer, being persevere as the gods would allow, slammed his elbow into the door, opening it. Unfortunately, he stumbled head-under-heels in, letting out a cry of, "WHOA!" And upon landing, he struggled to stand.

"Ne riylt...at roltz," He said in ancient Gemian, wheezing. "A yn af zidili kyaf...."

Sora's head whipped towards the sound of the hotel doors banging open and a young voice calling out "WHOA!", followed by the thump of a body hitting the wood floor. He blinked, his eyes focusing on the wounded boy on the floor who could be no older then Sora was when this whole thing had started. Blood stained the boys ragged clothes, crimson splotches upon dirt covered white. Metallic blonde hair fell forward, hiding his eyes from view.

A man whom apparently had been staying at the hotel walked past, gave the boy a glance, rolled his eyes and walked on.

The Keyblade Master careful removed Aura's small hand from his shirt and strode over to the fallen boy. He knelt down on one knee beside him, chains adorning his clothes jingling with the movement.

'..He has ears and a tail......still doesn't beat Aeon in the weirdness department through...' Sora's brows furrowed as he studied the boy. 'Look's like he's been through a lot......'

Sora placed his hand upon the boys shoulder, face showing a small amount of genuine concern through the mask of indifference Sora had constructed for himself. "Hey kid, you okay?" He asked.

Skailer grimaced as the voice, seemingly far away, spoke to him. He looked up at the face before him, eyes barely open, and said, "Zal...rydi mi nit? Euo ziin wynahayl...A gu fut pfum rum, cot..." He pushed his torso off the ground, and pointed at the desk. "Juohg euo nuzt pafghe bit ni y luun, zal? A zryhh kye euo cyjp mrif A yn ychi." With that, Skailer again lay himself on the floor in exhaustion.

Sora blinked confusedly, looking towards the desk the boy had pointed at. ".....you want a room?" He guessed. "...Ah... okay."

He gently took the boys arm and pulled it over his shoulder and slowly helped the boy to his feet, allowing him to use Sora to lean on. 'I sure have met a lot of odd people today...' He thought as he began to stride back to where his friends were.

Yasha blinked slowly, large, golden orbs taking in the appearance of yet another stranger. It was a boy, not nearly as young as Aura, probably Sora's junior by only a year or so. There was something strange about him, about his Heart...

Halved. His Heart was in a complete mess; had a Heartless attempted to steal and only managed to get away with a chunk of it? Or had something far more dangerous occur? Shaking away a chilly sense of sudden ferality, the half-dragon decided to investigate the newcomer.

Sprinting to the desk in a fluid movement that would seem difficult with her lanky legs, Yasha skidded to a stop right in front of Sora and the other boy.

"Oi-oi, Yummy Hair! Did we get another new friend already?"

Skailer clutched his chest and, trying to play the part of tough, stood up but immediately fell over again. "Ne riylt roltz...nyeci at'z ciif ryhdig wul tuu hufb." He shook his head. Indeed, his half- heart was aching so bad he felt like it was about to burst. But he had too hold on longer...just for a little while longer.

His eyes drifted to Sora's. "Euo...rydi mi...nit ciwuli?" He asked, but he then shook his head as pain once again flashed in his body, and lay flat on his back on the floor. "Ooooooooow........."

Yasha blinked slowly, crouching down slightly to get a better look at the monkey-tailed youth. After a minute's close scrutiny, she came to her conclusion.

"Half the Heart is missing, need a Behälter. Will die without one." Nodding to herself once, she slowly reached out to the metallic-haired boy, eyes blank in a trance-like of concentration to form the necessary Behälter.

Skailer watched as those claws reached out for him. He knew where they were going. He knew EXACTLY where they were going, and what they were about to do. Too bad, he wasn't going to allow it.

Skailer lashed out with his claw immediately, screaming. ""Wojpafb Heartless! Aw euo gyli tuojr ne riylt, ul mryt az hiwt uw at, euo zryhh gai yt tri nilje uw ne chygi!" He cried, pressing the tips of the blade against Yasha's scaly skin, eyes wide and threatening.

No one was going to take this boy's heart, no matter how hard they tried. Such was Skailer's impenetrable will.

Tidus took about half a second to take in the scene, before he leapt forwards, teeth bared in a snarl. It was quite the change from the laughter that he hadn't been quite able to suppress throughout the entire scene with Aura. But then, no one threatened his friends while he was around!

His Behälter touched the skin of the monkey-boy's throat. The water- like blade of the Brotherhood was unwavering as it's edge was pressed against the flesh almost strong enough to break it. Frosty blue eyes stared down the other, "Don't you /dare/ twitch, or so help me Yevon, I will take off your head."

Momentarily looking away from the monkey, Tidus glanced at his friend, "Oi Yasha, you okay there?"

Skailer yelped as the blade pressed against his skin, especially on his throat. His face expressed a sad mixture of fear and confusion. "Gu fut rolt ni, zal, khiyzi...A myz vozt giwifgafb nezihw wlun tryt galte Heartless." Skailer began to wriggle backward, but with his hands began pushing the blade away from him. This caused the flesh in his hands to tear and bleed as he desperately pushed the blade AWAY from his throat. "Yli euo ofymyli tryt at az fut y jlani tu giwifg ufizihw?"

Aeon having been watching silently for the most part now moved forward, catching the edge of the sword's blade with his talons and pulling it back from Skailer's neck and giving the obviously frightened boy a chance to breathe.

"Hey hold up a sec. The poor kid's out of his mind and it doesn't sound like he understands a word we're saying. No offence but if I didn't know who the hell anyone was the last thing I'd let you do is touch me."

Aeon knelt down in front of the boy, doing his best not to look threatening, not an easy task for a phoenix/human hybrid sinspawn with talons on his hands and a beak.

"I'm. Aeon." he said slowly and clearly.

"We mean no harm. We're friendly. Friendly. Do you understand?"

He smiled to get his point across, being careful not to make any sudden movements.

Skailer nodded. "A ofgilztyfg," He said, nodding. As long as they meant no harm, he had no reason to fight back. He pointed to himself. "Skailer," He said, referring as to that was his name. He then pointed to Aeon, as if to ask, "What is your name?"

Aeon pointed to the boy.

"Skailer?"

Nodding he pointed back to himself.

"Aeon."

He kept his smile on his face, more genuine than merely to put the boy at ease now. Working past this language barrier was kind of fun. A challenge mixed in with its own reward. He spoke to the others behind him without looking back.

"For the slow witted people here his name is Skailer."

Aeon thought back over the rest of the boy's speech trying to see if he could get anything else from it.

Sora nodded, having remained silent for most of these proceedings. Yasha appearing to be attempting to take Skailer's heart had worried him a bit, but from what she had said, him only having half a heart, she clearly knew what was going on. So, when she had appeared to have been reaching for Skailer's heart, Sora hadn't been too worried. 'She's pretty good in whatever she does, even if it looks if she's trying to do something bad I don't think that would be the case....'

Then Skailer had brought up his weapon to defend himself from what he obviously believed to be an attack. 'So obviously he doesn't know what's going on either...I wouldn't blame him for being scared, he's probably been through a lot. To him, Yasha's probably just a regular Heartless and he's only trying to defend the half of his heart he has left..'

Only half of a heart...how did that come to be? How had he made it this far? Clearly it pained him...yet he was continuing on anyway. From what Sora had been hearing as of late, of those whom had had their hearts return to them, many of them had been without hearts for so long to have their heart back pained them. If that was the case with this boy, then he would be needing one of those things.....a 'Behälter', if Sora's memory served right. So that was probably what Yasha had been trying to do, and Skailer had been stopping out of fear.

Tidus, Sora supposed, had been acting out of friendship, seeing Yasha in what he believed to be danger. Interesting, he'd had only known the dragon girl for a few hours and already he was defending her as a friend. Interesting..

Though now probably wasn't the best of times for Tidus to come running into what was already a pretty crazy situation. Thankfully Aeon was there to prevent what might have been pretty ugly.

Sora shook his head, smiling to himself. Yasha, Tidus, Aeon, Arados....he had to admit, he was growing attached to them, and even Aura, whom he had just met, was growing on him. He to these people some how, in a way he couldn't explain, nor fully understand.

"So your name is Skailer?" Sora asked, raising a brow. "Okay then... ah... Skailer. Can you speak English?" He asked, pronouncing each word slowly, hoping the boy would understand.

Skailer stared at Sora incredulously. "Of course I speak English," He said smartly. "I just wasn't in my right mind to do so yet." Clutching his chest, Skailer attempted to stand up, but he slid and fell a little bit back to the ground. "I've never hurt so bad...You guys wouldn't mind lending me a hand, would you?"

Aeon got up and moved closer, somewhat relieved that the language barrier was gone. Now he could help without Skailer misinterpreting his actions.

Thing is, given their different heights it looked like it would quite difficult to support Skailer by offering an armrest. Suddenly Aeon got an idea. He dropped his cloak on the floor and walked right up to Skailer. He then knelt down and picked the boy up in his arms using his wings to help with balancing the weight.

"You could do with a healer. Those wounds look like they need tending to."

"Oh, oh!" Aura said softly as she stared at Skailer, keeping a shy distance. But when seeing the state of which he was in, her shyness soon evaporated.

Silently, she pattered up to Skailer, eyes wide. She stared at him for a few moments. The little girl was slightly afraid of him, given the scene a few moments ago, but a friendly smile still worked it's way up on her face. "Hurt?" She asked softly, looking to Aeon and than Skailer again, head tilted.

Moment later she pried herself away from her Teddy bear, holding it out to Skailer. "Aura!" She said still softly, but slightly louder this time.

Yasha blinked blankly, tilting her head to the side slightly as she watched Aeon's and Skailer's odd exchange in uncharacteristic silence (> "But..."

Yasha was interrupted a second time when Aura toddled forward with her bear. Smiling gently, she picked up the little girl from behind, and set her down next to Sora. Hopping in front of Skailer, she flapped her wings out for balance and crouched down.

"Half a heart, pain. Need Behälter, stop pain."

Skailer blinked at Yasha. Was this girl out of her mind? He knew - at least, he thought he did - that she was trying to take his heart. She couldn't fool him!

At least, Skailer would have believed all of this if he wasn't in pain already. He vaguely nodded. Wheezing, he whispered loudly, "Aw euo yli buafb tu gu at, gu at xoajp, wul traz kyaf az cibafafb tu cijuni ofciylychi."

Tidus stared at the Heart, "Man... that doesn't look healthy..."

Shifting his attention to the owner of the Heart, he tipped his head curiously as he awaited what the monkey-boy would want his Heart held in. Tidus was sure that the other was finally feeling the relief that was not having to deal with a damaged Heart-- the pain would be going away, right?

After all, he'd felt better after his Heart had been placed in his blade, and Tidus didn't think it would be any different for this boy. So he stood and watched curiously.

Skailer tugged at his necklace. "Af rili, aw euo khiyzi, ny'yn...yfg nypi at xoajp, A gu fut wiih dile buug." His head thudded against the floor lightly. He was looking at his heart - his half-heart - once again; he didn't like the way it looked. It made him dizzy.

Yasha blinked, then blinked, and blinked, and finally blinked some more. The draconic girl looked down to the battered heart, then further down to the boy on the floor, vainly trying to make enough sense out of what he just said for her tiny brain to understand. She leaned over to Tidus, and whispered--very loudly--, "What's he saying? I don't speak monkey!", she whined pathetically.

Tidus scratched the back of his head, brow furrowing as he tried to make the words that the kid on the ground had said make sense. No matter how he rearranged the sounds in his mind, he couldn't really figure it out, either.

"Sorry Yasha, but I don't speak it either," with a little frown, he poked the monkey-boy between the eyes, apparently having completely forgotten that he'd just been holding a sword to the other's throat mere minutes earlier, "Speak English, man. You were speaking it a few minutes ago."

Skailer swatted Tidus' arm away the instant it landed between his peepers. "Gu fut gyli tuojr ni, euo wahtre kolichuug," He said, scowling angrily, then he tugged on his necklace. "Een Heer," he said, which was supposed to be, "In here", but alas, he wasn't fluent enough in English. "Een thiz." His eyes rolled up into his skull. His heart was gone again, and he was beginning to feel it.

Yasha began panicking when the monkey-tailed boy's eyes rolled beyond where she could see. She had never seen someone do that before, and it didn't look entirely healthy, as far as she was concerned. Flapping her leather wings uncertainly, she clasped both clawed hands around the half a Heart, preparing to take a wild stab at it. The boy had--she hoped--been rambling something about the necklace. While this made absolutely no sense at all to her either way, she didn't see anything else in her immediate vision on him that would work properly.

Kneeling in front of the ailing adolescent, Yasha slowly loosened her vice-like grip on the fragile remaining portion of the Heart. She narrowed her eyes in concentration, this would be harder. She hadn't yet worked with such a small object, and the Heart itself was in an extremely delicate situation. The small necklace began glowing an identical shade of red to the Heart.

On such a small item, the diffusion of the energy could be seen much more clearly, in the form of an unnatural glow surrounding the object in question. Unexpectedly, Yasha felt the remaining Heart in her claws begin to break apart. She clenched at it in fear, than had to quickly let go as the Heart attempted to collapse in on itself instead.

The dragon-girl was shocked for a second. 'The beat of the Heart... it's so unstable and erratic! It won't last even a minute more, this boy--..', she felt her resolve thicken, 'he can't die after coming so far!'

Shutting her eyes tightly, Yasha crushed the rest of the Heart into the tiny piece of jewelry all at once. The trinket glowed red hot for a moment, but withstood the energy overload and slowly began to lose the strange coloration.

Sighing with relief, the draconic girl did the only thing she could from a kneeling position; flopped over onto the floor. "Som'body wake me ina mornin'..."

The monkey-boy ceased breathing for a mere few seconds, then slowly let his breath out with a hissing sound. Blinking, his pale blue eyes stared at the ceiling as his eyelids flickered open. 'Where...am I?'

A strange, old feeling welled up within Skailer's soul. It was familiar...like the time he was destroyed as a heartless. It was the feeling that the light was near. It was hiding...but it was near...it was close....

Too close for comfort.

Using his amazing athletic ability to jump, Skailer pushed himself off of the ground, regardless that blood still flowed from his wounds, and leapt onto the counter, drawing his dagger. "Who the hell are you people?!" He cried, glaring in Sora's direction with an expression mixed between horror and anger. "What are you trying to do?"

Sora had watched the Heart Behälter making...process, with a sort of grim fascination, and now blinked up at Skailer, whom was now crouched upon the counter, dagger in hand, glaring at him.

'Well, crap, if a bleeding monkey-boy falling through the doors in pain didn't attract peoples attention, the fact that he just suddenly had the energy to jump on the table and he's yelling at the top of his lungs will.' A part of Sora's mind distantly thought.

Sora blinked again, looking confused. 'He's awfully edgy now.....we helped him and now he's going nuts? Though, I guess I'd be bit nervous too if a bunch of people popped out of nowhere without introducing themselves and then a weird dragon girl proceeds to take out your heart and put it in a necklace.....but he didn't seem so worried before.......what got him so scared that he felt the need to jump onto the table and grab his weapon?'

"Whoa...um... okay... hi there.." Sora said, stepping forward and putting his hands up slightly, palm outward as if to show he had no weapon. "Um...I'm Sora...and these are my friends. We were trying to help you...." Sora flashed a small smile, hoping he wouldn't end up just scaring the poor boy off.

Skailer seemed wary of Sora in particular. He had only been calm because he was hurt. Now the pain was gone; he was not going to surrender so easily. "Ri az tri Light, A pfum ri az..." he muttered, and lowered his weapon - but only a little. "What do you want from me?" He asked casually. "I'm not hurt anymore, so I'm not going to surrender so easily this time."

But what if they were really trying to help him? "Wulbit at," he muttered. "Fu ufi az hapi tryt yfenuli...." Ever since his best friend betrayed him the night of his world's destruction, Skailer wasn't very trustful of other people.

"No more fight! No more fight!" Aura wailed from her spot on the floor, hiding her face in her Teddy Bear, a position she'd been in since they'd started to heal Skailer. After a moment of sniffling she pulled away from her doll. The little girl shivered as she looked at Skailer, than to Yasha, finally to Sora.

She pattered over to the keyblade-weilder, latching tightly onto him and peering over at Skailer and Yasha. The half-dragon girl would probably never hurt her but the scene minutes ago had scared her enough to make her now wary of both. "Heartless take Heart. We not." the child said softly.

A picture of the dark creatures circling around, watching from the shadows, flashed in her mind. She looked up at Sora with wide eyes, clinging to him tighter. "We... help. Right, onii-chan?"

Sora looked down at the child for a moment as she stared up at him with those twilight pools. 'So few words and she said pretty much exactly what I would have taken tons to say..'

The Keyblade Master smiled. A real smile, not the fake smile he'd been using for so long. "Yeah." He said. He looked back to Skailer. "We're just trying to help you. In case you haven't noticed, you're still bleeding. Just sit down and relax, we're not going to hurt you."

Sora blinked, slightly put off by the boys constant stare. "Ahhhh....I just told you, I'm Sora." He said, brows furrowing. 'Maybe he has short term memory loss...or something...'

Skailer nodded. "I see." -Is this guy stupid?- he thought. "What I mean to say is, WHAT are you?" Skailer said it as modestly as he possibly could. And that's saying something.

Funny. Skailer has a hard time being modest around people that sink their claws into him.

"Oh." Sora blinked.

'Oh yes, that could classify as a Tidus moment right there....God I'm an -idiot-.'

Sora flashed a sheepish smile, but it quickly faded as Skailer just continued to stare at him. "...Ahh..." 'How am I supposed to answer a question like that? -What- am I?' "I'm....me, I guess." He said with a shrug, stuffing his hands into his pockets and shifting his eyes to the floor, growing uncomfortable under the constant glare of royal blue eyes. There might have been more to the answer, he -was- Keyblade Master, after all, but he didn't much feel like releasing this information unless he had to.

Aura blinked and peered to Skailer and then Sora. She was slightly miffed why the spiky-haired boy seemed to have trouble answering Skailer's question. She stepped out from behind him, smiling as she stated, "Sora is Sora!" She nodded her head and relinquished her grip on the said boy, twirling in little circles. "He's a SORA!" She giggled.

She stopped and added seriously, "And me a Aura." She grinned again and clapped her hands. But after the few moments of silence that followed her answer she froze and quailed a little, fluttering behind Sora again. The little girl looked up at him with a wavering voice, "Right?..."

Sora looked down at the small girl clutching the thick fabric of his jacket once more. And yet again he felt the smile coming, unbidden, to his face.

"Yeah, that's right." He said. "You're a Aura. And I'm a Sora." He looked back at Skailer. "Is that a good enough answer for you?"

Skailer stared blankly yet seriously at Sora, like a tiger hunting its prey. "You're stalling," He said in monotone, eyes not blinking. "I know your name. But tell me WHAT you are...or I may have to pull my dagger again."

It was very unlike Skailer to be so uptight with strangers, but he sensed the Light...that danger that almost destroyed him long ago. Now he was alive, and he felt it again. He wanted to know what it was, and if this "Sora" was hiding something, he was going to have to get rough.

No. This was the Light he was dealing with. Get rough? He'd die! But lo and behold, Skailer was not the type to give up. No, not at all. His perseverance, however, would someday cost him his life. He had to watch his step.

Unfortunately, that's what he was worst at.

Sora met the boys glacier stare with a calm one of his own. 'I don't get it....what's up with him? He's awfully edgy about something...'

"Alright fine. -What- am I? I'm..."He hesitated slightly, looking towards the floorboards. Could he really say he was Keyblade Master? That was technically Riku's title...wasn't it? But Riku wasn't here. He was locked in Kingdom hearts. 'So I guess the job still falls to me... right?'

Sora looked back up, meeting Skailer's eyes once more and squared his jaw. "My name is Sora." He said evenly. "And I'm the Keyblade Master."

Those last two words echoed in Skailer's ears. It was true! His old senses hadn't failed him! Regardless of his earlier statement, he immediately jumped back into a ready fighting position - a position that looked as if he were about to fight for his life. His icy cold eyes stared into Sora's, alight with both fear and terror, the terror prevailing over the fear. His fanged, clenched teeth bared so that he could breathe through them, and his entire body tensed. His tail wavered in the air for balance as blood pumped swiftly through his veins. His gaze never left Sora, just as his fingers never loosened their grip on the handle of his small yet dangerous weapon.

"Jolziz!" He muttered. "A nozt nypi ryzti yfg izjyki ciwuli ri wafgz uot mryt A yn...." He began to edge towards the door as he growled to Sora in sheer terror, "Put it down...and back away...real...slow- like...and we can both live...."

Sora blinked at Skailer's reaction, confused sapphire staring into glacial eyes. 'What's wrong with him? Why's he so scared all of a sudden?'

He once again held his hands up, palm outward as to show he didn't have any weapons. "What's wrong?" He asked, speaking slowly and carefully, eyes narrowing slightly. You don't mess around when someone's got a dagger pointed at you.

Sora wouldn't summon the Keyblade unless it was absolutely necessary. Skailer wasn't really in a good condition as it was and Sora didn't want to have to hurt him anymore, but if the monkey tailed boy made any move to harm himself or any of his friends, he'd call forth the weapon without a second thought.

'This might get ugly....I hope not, Aura's pretty much attached to my jacket and if Skailer attacks she could get hurt. Can't let that happen...'

"Whoa, Dude, calm down!" Tidus waved his hands, conveniently forgetting that he had a weapon in his hand. The others had to duck to avoid being hit with it.

Staring at the kid who was standing ready to battle, Tidus frowned slightly. What would a ninja do...?

Oh, wait, that's probably not the way to go with this. Use your head, Tidus, my man!

Dropping his hands, he blinked in sudden realization as he saw the weapon, "Uhm... oops. Sorry guys...", then turned back to the monkey- boy.

"Look, if Sora was gonna hurt you, don't you think he'd go after something a bit more threatening first? You know, like Birdboy, Yasha or me? Two Sinspawn and someone who's still mostly Heartless are probably a lot more dangerous than some kid with a dagger."

Yasha frowned slightly, although it changed immediately to a childish pout, and hopped up behind Tidus in agreement. Once he stopped swinging his sword like a maniac, that is. She flapped her wings vigorously, nearly decking the people that were just standing back up from dodging Tidus' Brotherhood.

"Fighting is bad, we're friends! Right? Friends don't fight. Sora's trying his hardest for everyone!", Yasha shook her head suddenly, folding her wings back up.

"Suffering always comes before salvation.."

Having just ducked first Tidus' blade and Yasha's wings Aeon took to the air, using his wings to fly a few paces backwards to avoid any more potential clobberings.

"And if Tidus and I can go as long as we just have without coming to blows then surely you can find it in yourself to sheathe your weapon and relax."

He'd objected greatly to being referred to as a sinspawn again but unfortunately for him it was a truth he couldn't hide from.

"Now we can either go inside and get some rest or sit here waiting for you to bleed slowly to death. Your choice of course."

Skailer's eyes remained locked onto Sora's. "If you were me," He growled to Aeon, "You'd be terrified as well." With that, Skailer threw himself against the door and charged outside, dropping his dagger. Of course, his actions were a but....how shall we put this...stupid, as the heartless were more than likely waiting for him on the other side of that door.

While the main contingent of Heartless in Traverse Town had long since been thrown out, it was hardly a safe place to be at night. There were the few Heartless that still did weasel their ways through the 'cracks' in the magical barrier that surrounded the town- - as was made obvious by Yasha, Tidus and Sora's battle a day or two earlier.

Atop that, there were the generally not-nice people living in Traverse Town. For the most part, the Heartless had been keeping them out of the limelight, but they were still there.

One of those 'not-nice' people smirked as he watched the monkey-boy dart out of the hotel without any weaponry. A husky chuckle passed the silver haired man's lips, "Well, well, well..."

Dropping off the roof-top, the young man waved a hand, and darkness began to pool in a corner. Glowing eyes rose up, and began to form into the familiar shape of a Soldier.

But the pale youth in black was... and artiste, of a sort, and began to mutate the shadowy form of his once brethren. Kaitei's dark laughter echoed throughout Traverse Town as he sent the beast off after Skailer.

Ridding his universe of a pesky child should be simple. After all, he already had the key to winning this war-- he had the Keyblade Master's Heart.

"Well that was dramatic, wasn't it?" Arados said from back inside the Hotel, her first words spoken during the whole ordeal. Most of the time she'd been observing the little girl, Aura... the little child seemed different, ethereal, more than she seemed. But before she could get closer to the child Skailer had made his appearance.

Arados shifted her wings and let her gaze fall upon each of them still left in the Hotel. Her sight lingered on Sora for a second longer than it had the others. 'The Keyblade wielder?... the one who opened the door...' she thought, a small smile flickering momentarily before disappearing again.

Tilting her head towards the way Skailer had run out, wings tensed and her eyes narrowed. "We should follow him," she said, voice little more than a icy whisper, "Something's happening." Her wings arched slightly as she gripped her scythe tighter.

Sora didn't reply to Arados, having already been heading for the door, chains jingling as he ran. 'This isn't good. He left his weapon here, he's injured, and there could be Heartless out there!'

The Keyblade Master bit his lip as he pushed the double doors of the hotel open and charged into the cool night air, boots clicking against the pavement. 'I scared him........he...was completely terrified of me..' The image of the young boy staring directly at him, eyes wide with what could only be described as complete terror flashed through Sora's mind and he winced. It was not something he wanted to see again any time soon. A person completely terrified because of -him-.'..Why? What happened to make him so scared of me?' He wondered.

"...what have I done?" He whispered, brows furrowing. "He was scared of -me-, so he ran, while he was injured, left his weapon, and just ran out into the streets of Traverse Town.......he could be killed and it'll be all my fault..."

Sora bit his lip, squeezing his eyes shut and then opening them. He wasn't going to let that happen. Skailer wasn't going to die. Not if he could help it.

"Sora, Sora!" Aura squealed as she chased after him, regardless of the Heartless danger, chasing after the spiky-haired boy. She caught up with him in time to hear him accusing himself and a small frown appeared on the little girl's face.

"Sora!" She said firmly, yanking on his jacket again. "Heart!" she continued, patting the area where her Heart was with her free hand, "Half black... torn heart..."

Aura's voice died to a hushed whisper as she peered up at Sora intently. "Keyblade... Heartless afraid of Keyblade... torn heart..."

She repeated again. The little girl smiled but did not seem the same as she was a few moments ago... her eyes held a faint light blue hue and didn't seem human, to knowing for a small child...

Then she blinked, and it was gone. "Heart, torn heart, keyblade, heart!" She repeated hurriedly once again, lost in her words.

Skailer froze as he stood outside. Heartless! He reached for his dagger, but it wasn't with him. he stood helplessly as he stared at the heartless' claws, shaking in terror. Slowly he backed away, putting a protective hand over his right set of ribs.

Not that it helped any.

The twisted Heartless lunged for the boy, claws ready for ripping the boy's Heart out of him.

Standing at the edge of the alleyway, Kaitei twitched his fingers like a puppeteer. His shadowy creation followed his movements, and the pale haired youth grinned ruthlessly.

Now this... this was fun.

--- It was times like these that Mozenrath, sorcerer and former ruler of the formally existing Land of the Black sand, cursed the misfortune that was the End of Days. For him anyhow. "End of Days" had become a popular term among the other refugees around here, talking of the time their homes were destroyed and their hearts taken.

They found their hearts. Or they returned to them. He took his back, as anyone as attached to their own spirits as he should have.

So no. Needless to say, he was not feeling particularly merciful when he ventured out of his home that day to deal with the racket that'd drawn him out of his reading. Across the way, he spotted another human and curled his lip up in near disgust at their attempts to flee the situation.

"Pathetic," he murmured.

"Yessss." Xerxes slid over his shoulder, and he gave him an absent stroke before ignoring him completely. His familiar tended to stay in the house unless he was going to the First District to sell potions to the Item shop, or to another world for that matter.

With a bound, he took his footing up on the railing separating the street from another below it. He allowed his power to carry him the rest of the way, a bolt of eerie blue-black flame rising from his gloved hand. He came down lightly some distance aside from the commotion, aimed, and fired. The flames leapt from his hand and circled the offending heartless in question before striking it in the center of the back.

"Now, what have I told you wastes of space about loitering?" he mused, half a scold in his tone while a smirk slid across his face.

Skailer kneeled onto the ground, breathing hard and clutching his ribs. His claw blades flashed. As he turned to see the man behind him, he stood warily between the two. At least he still had his claw with him; if there were any around attempting to cause him any harm; he would slice them through.

But where to go? Heartless on one side, the Light on the other...Skailer was stuck; unknowing what to do. Sure, he was just saved a lot of pain, but they might want to use him for something. Skailer stood still, keeping his left hand over his right set of ribs while in his right hand the claw was at ready.

---

Kaitei scowled at the interference. Dammit all!

He'd been so close-- he could almost taste the remnant of soul that the monkey-child called a Heart. So close... ah, well. This sorcerer had taken out his puppet quite quickly; not that it bothered him. A puppet was a puppet, and as soon as he let the strings go, that puppet could no longer move.

Trailing a finger down his cheek, the would-be emperor smiled cruelly, and began to call upon another Heartless. This one was one unlike any seen to the weary travelers in this town of all sorts.

The shadowy-bird form began to draw itself up out of the ground, a set of red prayer beads wrapped around it's neck. It's golden-yellow eyes glowed malevolently as it drew it's sword from it's side.

The Yagudo had been so much fun to corrupt into this Heartless form. Even if he had been under Ansem's control at the time, Vana D'iel had been Kaitei's idea, and he was /so/ glad that he'd managed to take quite a few with him when Sora sealed the End of Days.

---

Lutra had been wandering the first district of Traverse Town since her abrupt arrival. She had no idea where the teleport-crystals would take her, but she certainly wasn't ready for a town light up brighter than Jeuno at midnight. It didn't take long however, for her to find a valuable source of information in the Moogles. Lutra hadn't seen a moogle in years, but they were just as helpful as she remembered. They warned her of the Heartless in the second district, somehow they still managed to sneak through the seal even after the door was shut. Not much of it made sense to her, but they did mention Heartless tended to drop valuable items and munny when killed. Since a decent meal and bed to sleep on seemed high on her priorities, Lutra headed into the second district.

And saw the Yagudo with glowing yellow eyes...

A twitch went through the Mithra's body causing her tail to go stiff and her ears lay back under her hat. Instinct drew her sword for her but temperance made her wait just long enough to cast two spells before rushing down the walkway. Frigid air circled her blade, ice crystals forming in the air as she passed while a thin but tough stone layer covered her skin. She rushed past the Hume in robes and the boy on the ground, bringing her degen up she swung at the Yagudo's side before running past him. She turned and raised her left arm to cast another spell without batting an eye.

"Paralyze!"

Not here, not so far from home...Lutra thought the Yagudo were in disarray with the other beastmen. How did this one appear? Did it follow her from the teleport crystals? No matter...an enemy was an enemy, and this was no different.

About time the people in this city started showing a little backbone! Mozenrath thought with a smirk. He was not the least bit surprised to see his blast had broken the last heartless, nor was he quite so bothered at the appearance of another creature, one that he sensed would probably be a bit more difficult to take down.

Seeing that he had a chance, thanks to the new magic-user's move, he summoned his will for another undertaking. Rather than bombard it with bolts of energy, he would attack it with something more tangible.

In /theory/ anyway.

He crossed his wrists, one over the other, in front of him and muttered low under his breath, the effort bringing a building aura about his lean frame. A few concentrated gestures more, then he threw his gloved hand to the sky. "Hear me, Scirocco!" he boomed, "Spirit of the desert Gale! Hear the voice of your master and /obey/!"

From the sky came a burst of wind that carried a grayish purple mist with it. It tore around the sorcerer like a maddened tornado, neither dislodging him from his place nor breaking his concentration. It then stilled at his side, taking the form of a massive wolf-like creature with glowing red eyes.

Mozenrath reached up to draw an affectionate hand across its muzzle before sending it to do its damage with a simple command of "Destroy!"

The Wind Jackal gave way to another gust of wind and wailed into a spiral around its quarry.

The former Lord of the Black Sand smirked to himself.

Skailer clenched his fists and stood with both claw and dagger at ready (it's not easy holding a claw and a miniature sword in the same hand, but lo and behold, Skailer had mastered that art!), Skailer pushed himself up as he watched the Yagudan Heartless take a beating. He felt an old urge rise within him, but he resisted, lunging into the fray and giving a mighty (well, not mighty, but pretty quick) uppercut near the bird-thing's throat, all the while on constant alert.

His side was throbbing, but he didn't let go of it. No. Vara would have made fun of him. He had to stand strong. And because of that, he stiffly stood and looked about him.

These people...it was hard to tell who was with what side.

Lutra hadn't expected such a show of force from the robed Hume. Apparently he was a summoner, though Lutra had never seen an Avatar like his before...different world, different gods she supposed. Help was help, and she wasn't about to criticize...though really, he should have summoned something that could use ice attacks against a Yagudo. The boy had also thrown in an attack...was he bleeding? She would worry about that later, for now there was a Yagudo to kill... "Holy light, hear my plea," she whispered the quick incantation for Dia while the Yagudo was busy with the Avatar. So long as its attention was off her, Lutra could take the time to cast spells in between swings of her icy sword.

---

In the shadows, Kaitei frowned, eyes growing distant. There was a sense of... urgency... from one of his other puppets, one that built with every moment. Scowling, the youth let the Yagudo's strings go, so that he would fight however he was inclined to.

Right now, the youth was needed elsewhere. Perhaps the Prison World would be getting a new inmate or two. The puppeteer shifted into shadow, and was seemingly absorbed by the stones of the roadway, off to take care of what had called his attention.

---

Although the Yagudo were widely considered some of the smartest of the beastmen, their loss of Heart and subsequence falling under first Ansem's power, and then Kaitei's had stripped them of the majority of their intelligence.

Knii Zaua was no exception to this rule. Where once he would have been an enemy of some strength and ability, where once he would have withdrawn to sniper attack with his magic from a distance, where once he would have actually had a chance to defeat the small group that fought him... well, that chance was no longer existent.

This did not mean, however, that he would go down easy. For in place of the famed Yagudo intelligence, there was almost Orcish stubbornness-- although Knii would have quite vocally denied such a thing.

The Yagudo's attention been caught solely by the Mithra-- this was an enemy it knew, and knew well. While the form was vaguely familiar, the species was intimately familiar. Knii had participated in the destruction of the race, after all.

The paralyze spell was annoying, but easily ignored. After all, it didn't stop him from attacking-- just made him feel like he was plowing through sludge to do so. Her ice-coated sword, on the other hand, bit painfully into his arms and body, drawing cuts across his face. The eerie scrape of metal on bone rent the air every time he caught the weapon across his beak.

The winds that the Summon had created were more annoying than the spell-- the distinct, black feathers that covered his body helped to cut back on the stinging winds, although it, too, was forcing him to move slower than he really wanted to.

It was frustrating, and to be honest, where the wind struck the bare scales of his legs, and the open cuts left by the cat-girl's sword, it hurt like a bitch.

He gave a startled cry when the monkey-thing that his master had originally been toying with joined the fray. The boy struck him in the throat, just beneath his beak. The jarring crack of bone against bone rang through his skull, dizzying the bird-man.

Of course, the Summon had to take that moment to increase it's attack, and the Yagudo found himself slashing his sword at the spiraling winds, hoping against hope that this wind-beast was like the Air Elementals back on Vana D'iel.

With that hope bubbling in his breast, he got his confidence back, and began to fight even harder. A few more moments, it was all he needed-- the Paralyze spell would be wearing off soon, he could feel it.

Or was that... a build up of magical energy came from behind him, and he could hear the familiar sounds of casting. Still fighting, he turned in time to see the last movement of the casting.

He could feel his health begin to lag, and cursed himself for a fool, as the Dia spell began to take effect.

Nonetheless, he was a fool who wouldn't go down without a fight. With an inarticulate screech, the Yagudo threw himself at the Mithra, intending to take her down with him.

Lutra really shouldn't have been surprised to have the Yagudo charge her. She should have been ready for it and leaped out of his path, or had her sword out for him to land on. Instead, she was too busy preparing a blizzard spell and took a direct hit, pushing her back several feet and knocking her on her tail...most undignified. That would have really hurt too, would have...if not for the deceptively thin layer of stone covering her skin and protecting her clothes. Thank the gods for whomever invented Stoneskin; she could take one or two more hits like that, but better not to risk it. "Just die, you monster!" she screamed. Giving the black beastman an angry glower from underneath the brim of her hat, Lutra held out her hand directing a completed ice spell at him. Grabbing up her sword Lutra hopped to her feet, ignoring the ache from where she landed. If the Yagudo wanted to fight with her, then she'd give him hell...

Knii was jarred by the clash of metal-on-metal as the mithra blocked his swing, but he didn't let it bother him. He could feel his strength draining from him-- the dia spell, the summon, the physical attacks from the other two; it all contributed to it, but he refused to let it get to him. Had he had teeth, they would have been clenched as he fought on. As it was, he held his sword in a white knuckled grip, and his world had tunneled down to the mithra.

Again and again, their swords clashed in an ancient dance. More and More, Knii could feel her sword get through his guard to scratch his skin. Dark gray feathers turned black with the blood that soaked them.

His strength was beginning to fail him. A half insane grin crossed his face as he prepared to use Wise Reflection, and whatever weapon skill came to mind first.

It wouldn't be much longer now. The Yagudo was bleeding severely and Lutra could see a lurch in his step. Her own stoneskin spell had worn off, but it didn't matter, a few more strategic hits and--no. Not that...Lutra had seen a Samurai use his Wise Reflection technique before...it was an awesome sight, not exactly a pretty one for the goblin on the receiving end. Lutra only had a second to decide: she could cast a Blind spell and hope the coming chain of attacks would miss, or take a risk that the Yagudo was weak enough she could kill him with a weapon skill of her own. Blind would take time to cast, and there was a chance of it failing... The Yagudo raised his blade, screeching in rage. Lutra had to act. "Shining Blade!" The Mithra took her gamble, swinging her sword the first strike was made across the Yadudo's exposed torso, the second coming down over his arm and chest. A yellow cross of light marked the path of her sword, increasing the strength of her attack. Lutra immediately backed away, unsure if it had worked. There was a clatter as the Yagudo's blade fell from his claws. The beastman groaned in pain and fell at last, clutching the wide gash in his stomach. Lutra stared as the body turned to shadows and faded away, leaving only bloody feathers and a set of prayer beads. Bodies didn't usually turn into shadows...was that a Heartless? Taking a soiled rag from her pocket, Lutra cleaned the blood from her weapon and let it slide back into its sheath. That could explain why it was here to begin with, Heartless can move easily between worlds... Lost for a moment in her thoughts, Lutra calmly reached down and took the prayer beads, breaking the thread and letting the beads drop, she curled the grass thread around her fingers to pocket. She might be able to use that later, to fix a seam in her gloves...

Sora blinked as the fight erupted before him. At first he had considered jumping in, but after watching for a minute he realized these two could probably take care of themselves. It didn't look like the monster would be getting anywhere near the already wounded Skailer with these two around anyway, and he needed to stay there so if the fight did stray this way, he could keep Aura safe.

So he watched, nodding to himself as he beheld the scene of an odd cat-like girl and what he assumed to be a sorcerer of sorts, take down the beast that had appeared in the middle of the second distract.

"I'm going to guess that thing didn't appear on it's own..." Sora murmured as the beast vanished into shadowy smoke. "..wonderful.."

Sora made as if to jump into the main area of the "..but second distract but stopped. "...maybe I shouldn't....I might just...scare Skailer more..." He bit his lip. "..But I can't just leave him hurt like this.......how am I supposed help him if he's scared of me?"

Skailer stayed back, trying to halt the blood flow while the fight raged on. He hadn't noticed that he had almost backed into Sora, but to him it didn't matter.

If only he knew how to summon!

"Ckopex, mre yli euo guafb traz tu ni?" He muttered as he tried to stand....

Snap! went something in Skailer's body and he fell back down again. He certainly wasn't going to be back up for a while. "A ryti euo, Ckopex," He muttered again. "A ryti euo, a ryti euo, a ryti euo."

Sora visibly winced as the younger boy in front of him collapsed, a loud snap coming from his body.

"..that can't be good." He murmured as he ran foreword to catch the boy. However, instead of holding him he carefully lowered Skailer to the ground.

"Okay, now look Skailer." Sora said, looking directly into the boys eyes. "I don't know why you're so scared of me. I'm sorry for whatever I may have done to do that. But all I've really done is be nice to you, I don't see why you're scared. I'm only trying to help you. I can't force you to trust me, but you aren't in any condition to run. If someone doesn't heal those wounds soon you might... die." Sora bit his lip. "Like I said, I can't force you to trust me. But....I can heal you if you let me. I can heal you if you tell me what's wrong." He sighed, then continued.

"Just let me help, alright?"

Skailer would have scampered off, but currently he was in no condition to do so. He simply lay with his back to the ground, eyes wide shut and breath light.

"A badi ok. Euo maf."

He tried to sit up, but the pain would not allow him to do so. Skailer remained still, waiting for Sora's reaction.

Sora blinked slowly. "...um... right, I didn't get that." He said, brows furrowing in confusion. "You were speaking English before, can you tell me whatever's wrong in English, please? It'd make things a lot easier."

"A zyag-AHEM!" Skailer cleared his throat. -Oh yeah. These people don't speak Gemian. D'oh.- "I said, 'You win'," Skailer moaned, exasperated. "Do what you want with me; it's not like I can do anything about it. Ow." He said this as he attempted to move again, but failed miserably.

Sora nodded. "Alright. Now maybe I can finally heal you." He summoned the Keyblade to his hand, deciding to worry about Skailer's reaction later, and closed his eyes, concentrating.

'I hope I remember how to do this.' "Curaga." He muttered, and a sound like bells chiming rang through the air. A soothing green glow glowed over Skailer's body, his wounds beginning to heal themselves, skin knitting together.

The glow faded and Sora smiled. "There, that's better." He said, dismissing the Keyblade.

Skailer winced and closed his eyes, expecting the finishing blow to come any moment. Instead, he felt his pain ease.

"Mryt tri - ri -riyhig ni?(What the - he -healed me?)" Skailer muttered. His worst enemy had -healed- him? This had to be a mistake.

"Mr- um, why? You're supposed to finish me off. This is jufwo- I mean, confusing me."

Skailer's eyes then darkened and he slid a foot back into sparring position. "Oh, this is about Hea, isn't it? Or is it about Mahteys? Alark? Maybe Vara? You can't touch my riy- er, heart, if that's what you want. But I'm willing to make a deal, if it's considerable...." His tail stiffened and eyes sharpened. Obviously he still saw Sora as an enemy.

Sora blinked slowly as Skailer jumped back into fighting position. "..Um....Hea? Vara?...what?" He said, looking slightly confused. "I have no idea what you're talking about. I don't get why you would think I'd attack you. Why on earth would I want your heart? I'm not a Heartless. I don't want to hurt you." He frowned slightly.

"I don't get it, why are you so scared of me? What'd I ever do to you?" He asked, raising a brow.

Skailer blinked. "Guiz ri fut linincil?(Does he not remember?)" He muttered, then lowered his dagger and pondered, staring at the ground. "Fu...ri guiz fut. Ri juohg fut rydi. A myz y Heartless yt tri tani...zryhh A tihh ran? Ul zryhh A myat? ... A zryhh tihh ran. (No...he does not. He could not have. I was a Heartless at the time...shall I tell him? Or shall I wait? ... I shall tell him.)"

Skailer looked up. "When I was a heartless, you beat the living hell out of me," He said dryly. "It hurt. Now just feeling -it- near makes me scared....a little! I'm not really scared! Cot...A yn....(But...I am....)"

Sora blinked for a moment, letting this sink in. "Ohhhhhhhh......" He said slowly, comprehension dawning. Of course, all those Heartless he had fought had been people once. It was only natural for Skailer to be scared of him. There were bound to be others out there who would be afraid of him too. And that wasn't a very pleasant thought.

Sora smiled, a slightly weaker one then it had been before. "I'm really sorry. I should have figured all the heartless I fought were people once, and those that were would probably be scared of me... it's perfectly natural for to be scared if I'm the wielder of a weapon that hurt you...I'm sorry." He bowed his head. "If I could go back and stop myself from hurting people I would, but I can't. So all I can do is apologize for hurting you and for scaring you so much." He turned away. "Anyway, sorry. If you want to get away from me now, you can. I don't want you to be stuck around someone you're scared of." With that, he began to walk back towards the hotel.

Skailer blinked slowly. Sora didn't know this? ....of course. He was just a kid. He wasn't supposed to know everything about who he was.

Yet.

As Sora turned and walked away, Skailer felt himself walk after him. :What am I doing?: Skailer wondered. :Why am I following him? ...right, he's not going to hurt me. Do I have something to ask him? Or am I going back into the hotel to get a room? Why am I talking to myself?:

Skailer halted a moment, then looked at the sky as if it were going to give him an answer. Then, shaking his head, he kept striding into the hotel. Hopefully the hotel manager wouldn't throw him out like he did last time.

And that was only two weeks ago.

Mithra ears were hard to keep from eavesdropping. She had heard everything the boy with the strange weapon and the -formerly- wounded boy had said. Glancing out from underneath the brim of her chapeau, she focused on Sora. He had fought the Heartless? So...he was the one that sealed them away and brought the light back to her home? That...boy? He couldn't have done anything alone, but still; he was a boy. A child, young, inexperienced; he should be home playing games not saving the worlds.

She refused to believe it. Yet she was also curious: what if her suspicions were true? She would have to watch the boy, but just watch for the moment. He could also be tied to the heartless in other, more dangerous, ways. Turning sharply and barely giving the mage who had helped her defeat the Yagudo a glance, she began to follow Sora.

Sora blinked as he heard not one, but two sets of footsteps following him. Confused, he turned around to see not only Skailer, but the cat- like women whom had been battling the Heartless creature following.

"....erm...why are you following me?" Sora inquired with a raised brow. He pointed at Skailer. "I thought you were scared of me." He then pointed at the mithra. "And I have -no idea- who you are.."

Mozenrath's attention had been solely on the cat-woman until Xerxes hissed at something else entirely. The monster slew, there was little else going on but the chatter of strangers and --

His eyes narrowed marginally. "You."

He strode up to the boy that'd taken a fairly quiet role in the battle as far as he'd seen. There was little chance of being wrong. The keyblade master. Surely. That in itself left him torn; on one hand, the thirst to taste the destruction of a few more heartless drove him to one string of actions. On the other, there was little else he wanted to do but throttle this boy for his own misfortune. His gloved hand clenched at the reminder, that his heart had been lost. This whelp had been to his world, but that did not save him. Not in the least.

"You wield the key?" he asked, placing himself in the midst of things without being asked or welcomed; if he'd interrupted another conversation, he neither knew nor cared.

Before Mozenrath had 'invited' (which was putting the term lightly) himself into the conversation, Sora had turned his attention to her. So much for not being noticed, though it was hard to be stealthy in boots on cobblestone walkways. He had said, just a touch rudely, that he had no idea -who- she was. That could be easily remedied. "I am Lutra, sixth rank Red Mage of Windurst. My home was recently freed from the heartless...are you the one I am to thank for that?" Nothing she said probably meant anything to the boy, save for her name and question. It was habit to answer with her job and allegiance as well as name. Before she could expect an answer however, Mozenrath approached. Lutra's tail stiffened in irritation. Key...? That was a word she'd heard whispered before on the lips of beastmen and often in fear. So then, this was the boy responsible for saving her world, if a little late about it...unbelievable.

Sora blinked as the man who had been the second competitor in the battle against the Heartless seemed to step out of nowhere, midnight blue cape flaring behind him. Both this new guy and the cat girl- Lutra, that was her name- had inquired the same thing.

The brunette gave a slight sigh. Were things always going to be like this? "Yeah, the Keyblade Master. That's me.." He smiled slightly at Lutra. "..Yeah, I guess that was me... but I had a lot of help... so... yeah.." He really needed to work on talking to people, if things were always going to be like this, he needed to stop stuttering so much. 'I may be an adult, but I still sound like I'm a kid!' He thought.

"Yeah, the Keyblade Master. That's me.."

Mozenrath glowered; the Keyblade Master was no more than a mere whelp, as could have been expected. No wonder his home didn't last all those years ago. He could barely assess whether or not, even after time had passed, that the keeper of the key were any better or worse at his job. Judging from the influx of Heartless lately, it wasn't bloody likely.

Still, the chance to play some greater hand in the destruction of the Heartless continued to command him, and he took a step back to give a deep bow. "I am Mozenrath, and you may consider me at your service, Keyblade Master. I, too, hunt the Heartless and seek to save worlds, but also to research. We may benefit from one another."

"Benefit," Xerxes echoed.

Skailer eyed Mozenrath closely. Now, when I say "closely", I mean he leaned to where their noses were no more than an inch apart and locked his gaze onto Mozenrath's. It his eyes still lingered with the essence of the heartless, and his gaze bore deep into Mozenrath's eyes.

After a while, Skailer leaned back. "You don't look like someone who'd help," He said bluntly. "Neither do you have the behavior. I find it hard to trust people like that. And that means you, too."

With that Skailer puffed out a small breath to blow the hair out of his face and turned, entering the hotel and leaning against the wall, waiting for the reaction.

His tail, however, got caught in the door just as it

closed."AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!"

Skailer screamed in surprise and in pain as his monkey-esque tail became entrapped between the two doors. Futilely, he tugged on it, shouting, "BIT AT UWW! BIT AT UWW!(Get it off! Get it off!)"

Mozenrath took a step back when the other being with a tail came up (or tried to come up) nose to nose with him. Being insanely tall, he gave the boy points for trying, but the attempt in itself earned an angered hiss from Xerxes, which took a stroke to calm.

"You don't look like someone who'd help," He said bluntly. "Neither do you have the behavior. I find it hard to trust people like that. And that means you, too." And then he promptly attempted to blow in his face.

He glared and took a step back, gloved hand tightening at his side. "Then mayhap you should see more of the worlds, half-heart," Mozenrath uttered dangerously, "before passing judgment on someone you know nothing of. Let's not forget that I saved your life." He paused to brush some imaginary dust from his robes. "I believe some gratitude is in order on your part."

Mozenrath raised an eyebrow when the figure gave a sudden shriek, one loud enough that it sent Xerxes diving for the safety of the crook of his arm. He smirked. Served the little beast right.

"Loud enough?!" Tidus grumped, sticking his head out of the door of his room to briefly glower at Skailer. He and the others had decided to settle into their rooms and let Sora deal with the monkey-boy. The sinspawn figured the two must have made up, since Skailer was in the hotel now.

The fact was, Tidus had been dozing, given the fact that he'd finally worn off his normal levels of hyper-ness. He'd be back to normal by morning, but right now he was so very tired. Skailer's shouting had woken him, and it annoyed him to no end.

Stomping, the blitzer kicked open the door to let the monkey's tail free. Dimly, he noted Sora and two others outside the doors, but he really didn't care right then. Actually, he felt about ready to lean against a wall and fall asleep.

A bed would be more comfortable, though, so he started back to his room.

"Man Sora... How can you possibly be still awake?" the words though mumbled were shot over his shoulder, at the still open doors, so they could be at least partially made out.

Somehow in the confusion of grabbing keys and such Aeon had found himself paired up in a room with Tidus. Thankfully the sword-swinging highly-strung one had dropped into bed at a rate of knots, only getting up to investigate a loud shriek from downstairs. Aeon shrugged. As long as he didn't wake up with Tidus holding a sword to his neck it didn't matter. In the space of a day he'd gone from being chased to being in a group, even if the group had obvious sanity issues. Aeon glared at the bed, not particularly wanting to use it. Carefully he slid open the window so that he didn't wake Tidus, then leapt out and landed neatly on a tree branch outside. Feeling more at ease in the open he leant against a branch, wrapped his wings around him and fell asleep, praying for a peaceful night's rest.

Sora blinked as Mozenrath swept into a low bow, offering his services. That being the last thing Sora expected, he stood in stunned silence as Skailer attempted to stare Mozenrath in the eye, then turned on his heel and headed towards the door, only to have his tail caught.

The resulted screech apparently had woken Tidus up, judging from the mumbled "Man Sora... How can you possibly be still awake?" that came from the double doors as Lutra swung them open, apparently going to get a room.

This inquiry seemed to prompt a massive headache, the kind that comes from lack of sleep. '..when was the last time I slept?....day before yesterday? Okay... mental note, sleep more, running on caffiene only hurts far more in the long run...Gah..'

Sora sighed and ran a hand through his hair, glancing at the large clock placed upon the chapel tower. "..Right, okay." he muttered, turning back to Mozenrath. "It's one o' clock in the morning, everyone else is asleep or going to sleep." He looked down at Aura, whom was yawning. "She defiantly shouldn't be up right now." He looked back to Mozenrath. "Is it okay if we continue this tomorrow?" He inquired.

Skailer eyed Mozenrath fiercely. "I'd prefer not to be called that, tallboy," he snarled. "Besides, It's rather rude of you to order us to thank you. You remind me of Vara. He never thinks before he speaks."

Skailer then glanced up at Tidus and grinned sheepishly. "...heh...sorry. And...thanks." Gingerly he held the middle of his tail in one hand and used the other to smooth out the hairs on the lower half, almost as if stroking it. He wasn't in love with that particular limb, he was just quite fond of it. He stared at Lutra and blinked. He blinked again. "....Alark?" He asked, unaware that it wasn't his childhood friend. "Is that you, Ay?"

Abandoning the question immediately, seeing that the woman was indeed someone different; Skailer shoved open the door to the Red Room, climbed up the sides of the bed (much like a squirrel) and fell asleep in the canopy of the bed, the majority of his tail hanging off the side and slowly waving back and forth.

"I'd prefer not to be called that, tallboy."

Mozenrath snorted indignantly, not at the insult but because the little ingrate thought that would bother. He made his best "I am hurt and forever forlorn" expression and rolled his eyes.

"Besides, It's rather rude of you to order us to thank you. You remind me of Vara. He never thinks before he speaks."

"Perhaps you should stop making connections with me, Half Heart," Mozenrath warned with a glare, "And you certainly should not be making distinctions of any kind until you have some better grasp of this language. I /ordered/ nothing, merely suggested, and that comment was directed mainly at you." He straightened his glove. "Try taking your own implied advice. Don't just think before you speak. Start thinking altogether."

He turned to Sora then, glad of the reply. Was it really that late? A subdued yawn from Xerxes gave him the only answer he needed. Ah, well.

"We certainly may continue this in the morning, Keyblade Master," he allowed cordially, then indicated a house across the way. "That is where I am taking up residence. If it would not trouble you to come by in the morning, I will be happy to receive you."

Sora nodded. "Alright, I'll see you tomorrow then." He said. "Now if you'll excuse me..." He turned and finally re-entered the hotel building, closing the double doors behind him.

'Right... can't sleep yet, gotta get Aura to bed. Don't think I should leave the kid by herself..' Sora sighed and looked down at the child whom seemed firmly attached to his right leg, forcing a tired smile. "Alright Aura, where do you wanna sleep?" He inquired,

Aura blinked up at Sora, stifling another yawn as she rubbed her eyes with the back of the hand that was holding her bear, her other hand tugging imploringly on Sora's pants. "Aura stay with onii-chan... please?" She asked quietly. Her sleepy purple eyes showed a good hint of fear in them.

To be blunt, the little girl was half terrified of the others. Memories of the fight still played in her head and the one she felt safest with was Sora... Aura didn't know why, not questioning it, just glad to be around someone familiar. Though why everything was so familiar around him, she had no idea...

Sora nodded. "Sure, no problem." He said, grabbing the last key from the desk and heading to the blue room, Aura tailing behind him.

"Okay." He said, swinging the door open. "Now you sleep in that bed." He said, pointing at the bed closest to the door. "And I'll sleep on that one, alright? If you get scared or anything just wake me up, alright. Now onii-chan -really- needs to sleep."

With that, Sora stumbled over to his bed, flopped onto it, and was asleep before his head hit the pillow, and for the first time in ages, he really slept, not plagued by nightmares for once. It was a nice change.

Arados took a key and headed to her room, stretching her wings as best as she could in the confines of the hallway. Slipping the hey in the lock and closing the door quickly behind her, Arados didn't bother to turn the light on, leaning against the inside of the door as she waited for her eyes to adjust.

For a moment she felt her lungs constrict and her wings tense as darkness surrounded her on all sides. But soon faint outlines appeared and broke the solid shadow. Arados let out a quiet breath of relief before moving to the bed.

Rather than lie down, Arados kneeled on it first, eyeing a lamp on the nightstand. 'I thought that maybe it was a dream...' she thought, 'And I woke up and I was still in that realm. But it's real enough. Mica...' The anthromorph felt a wave of sadness as she remembered her cousin, lost forever into that hateful darkness...

Shaking her head, Arados remembered the faint spark of light in the darkness. The glimmer of hope that had drawn them out. Had Sora done that? Really?

'What happens to the darkness when it meets the light...?' She thought. Her hand reached for the lamp. Maybe it was the lack of sleep that dulled the girl's usually icy senses, or maybe being around an innocent 4 year old, but she reached out and pulled the lamp string to turn it on.

But no flash of insight came, nor any revelation. Merely a searing glare of light that caused the winged girl to make a muffled yell and shield her eyes hurriedly. All she got from that little stunt... was a headache.

Sighing, Arados flicked the light off and settled into the bed, ignoring the spots that flickered in her vision.

Skailer lay curled in his little ball for quite a while before he actually fell asleep. He didn't have much of a dream; he didn't even remember it, but he was now wide awake.

Were any heartless near?

Skailer leapt lightly off of the canopy of the bed, feet hitting the ground with a soft thud and he flipped his tail in odd directions. Making sure no one paid heed to his awake presence, Skailer strode forward and pushed the door open. Didn't bother keeping quiet, he just wanted out.

He made his way out to the stone road outside the hotel and stared at the sky. There were stars. There were so many stars out tonight. He remembered the nights in his home world getting darker and darker because the light of the stars slowly ceased to illuminate the sky.

But tonight...it was so bright.

Skailer took a deep breath in, and slowly let it hiss back out through his teeth. Sharp, pale eyes scanned the lower parts of the square. No, no heartless around tonight. His work was pretty much on hold.

See, Skailer had taken it upon himself to quite literally kill off his own kind. While he failed miserably as a heartless doing this, when he regained his body he was actually able to do it much more efficiently.

But he never, -ever- made a clean job of it. Hence a stain of crimson on the left arm of his shirt.

"Damnit," Skailer muttered, "And this is the only one I have, too...."

Yasha resisted the urge to squeal randomly, having a feeling Tidus would be cranky if she did. For someone who was shouting louder than the rest of the group combined a few hours ago, he sure got sensitive hearing fast. Peeking through the doorway to the room Tidus and Aeon had chosen, she blinked in surprised to find only one bed was occupied, and making very loud snoring noises at that. Ignoring the sound, she peered around, not spotting the firebird anywhere.

"Maybe he went to roost instead?", Yasha quipped quietly to herself. Glancing around one last time, she decided upon the best course of action. Flopping right onto the worn mattress.

Said piece of furniture gave a horrible groan and shuddered from the sudden weight, but miraculously did not break. Flipping onto her side and pulling her wings out of the way, her claws hooked onto the sheets, and once she was appropriately tangled in them, curled up into a ball and fell comfortably asleep.

Aura clutched her Teddy Bear loosely, blinking sleepily at the wall. Any fears the tiny child had were put to rest by Sora on the other side of the room. With one finally yawn, Aura closed her eyes and snuggled happily into the bed.

But not for long.

After a few moments Aura sat up and rubbed her eyes. She gave what could be an annoyed look at her toy before grinning. Obviously stuck with an idea, the child picked up her bear and jumped nimbly off the bed. Crossing the room quietly to not wake Sora, she placed the bear by the door on a chair, then flitted quickly back into her bed, belly flopping into the sheets and curling up again.

Smiling, the little girl slowly fell asleep. She had nothing to worry about with both Sora and her bear watching her.

-- chapter is really long, hit the next button and go to part two of chapter two--