Darkness
By Alpha Anomaly
Getting up from his seat in the stands, Dante was extremely concerned about the proceedings of the match he had just witnessed.
"Frog…something is very wrong with him. I can't quite put my finger on it, but…" Dante trailed off as he muttered to himself.
"Something just doesn't fit," he contemplated, scratching at his eyebrow as if racking his brain for a hidden answer. Then, something occurred to him.
"Wait, Riku…he's supposedly holding dark emotions in him, right?" Dante frowned, and decided to get some more information on the mysterious youth.
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'I can feel myself growing more powerful every day,' Cloud smiled to himself as he strolled back to his hotel after the jolt of power he felt from Riku's soul flowing into his body. 'Finally, I can have the power. I will have the strength that I was unable to attain earlier in my life. Sephiroth is growing angry, I can feel it. No evil soul has won a match yet, he must be agitated. His deal with that figure must not be going well for him. Ah well, no matter.'
Out of the corner of his eye, he caught Link and the one winged angel himself in a heated argument as he exited the tunnel leading back into the streets of the huge metropolis. Deciding that it wasn't any of his business, Cloud continued along his way. 'Things get stranger here every day,' the former champion thought to himself as he continued back to the hotel.
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"Yeah, come in!" a voice came from the other side of the bare door with only the symbols 2035 on it.
Dante entered the room, and shut it behind him, then made sure no one was in the room before helping himself to a soda from Sora's refrigerator. "So, Sora," the white haired demon began, "Tell me about Riku."
Sora's expression immediately turned from happy and welcoming to very somber. His voice trembled and cracked as he thought about his friend. "Why do you want to know about Riku, and more importantly, what?" the keyblade holder inquired to Dante.
"Well, kid, I've heard there's some dark stuff about him. It may be important to some other contestants. What can you tell me about that?" He propped his feet up on the table, and slid the Rebellion out of its place on his back, leaning it against the hotel room wall.
"He..he was my best friend," Sora trembled. "He was taken over by the darkness, lured to it by a very evil man, Ansem. Ansem was the leader of the Heartless, essentially the embodiment of darkness and evil, who now resides within Riku." Dante stared, confused. 'What in the fires of hell are Heartless?' he thought to himself as he waited for Sora to continue. When the keyblade master said no more, Dante began again.
"Okay, kid. So, what you're saying is that Riku is controlled by darkness, or at least has the capability to spread it, right?" Dante was very confused and was simply trying to boil it down to one fact.
"Well, he has Ansem under complete control, and he'd never spread darkness the way he used to. He has a darkened heart, but he really is a good person."
Dante had garnered all the information necessary from the boy, and had discerned from the jumbles of blubbering one critical piece of information. Riku was capable of spreading his dark influence into others through the keyblade.
"Thanks, Sora. I may be in touch soon," a very serious Dante explained as he lowered his feet, stood up and grabbed the Rebellion, replacing it in its position on his back.
"Yeah, any time, Dante," the boy said, closing the door behind the half demon.
"I knew it!" Dante exclaimed to himself as he trudged back to his own hotel room. "Riku spread dark influences into Frog's body when he was weak and losing control over this "Ansem" guy. I have to go talk to Frog soon, he's in real danger."
As the son of Sparda rushed around the building, searching for Frog's hotel room, something occurred to him. He questioned himself momentarily in his mind. 'Why was I able to sense Frog's evil influences inside of him?' he thought to himself, scanning the door numbers, looking for the amphibian swordsman's. 'Could it be my half-demon nature? I wonder if any of the other demonic influenced contestants felt something…'
Dante found the door to Frog's room ajar, with one of Frog's good friends, Crono, sitting inside, the amphibian nowhere to be found.
"Crono, quick, where's Frog?" Dante inquired, panting.
"I have no clue, he was supposed to be in his room, that's where he told me he'd be," the swordsman, usually silent, explained quickly. "Why?"
"Well, I think there may be a problem, and it may be related to his disappearance," Dante said, no joking around.
Crono looked over at the amphibian's Masamune, lying dormant in its scabbard on its weilder's bed, and not with the swordsman. "I think you're right about one thing, demon. I think there is definitely a problem."
