Part Eight: Initiation Rites
Aerith and Yuffie were waiting for Sora as he entered the Third District, and Aerith, who noticed Sora's numerous cuts and wounds, rushed over, her hands glowing with a white light. After a few words chanted in a language unfamiliar to Sora, Aerith's light enveloped him. It was cool inside, like a minty-fresh breeze, and although the brightness was overwhelming, Sora was still comfortable.
The glow subsided, and Sora noticed how the pains and wounds had melted away better than a potion could have made them and even as an added bonus, the various small tears in his clothes were mended.
"Whoa? What?" Sora articulated as he held out his jacket and stared at where previously separated threads were joined together as tightly woven as if they had never split in the first place. "What happened?"
Yuffie laughed. "With all the Heartless around, Aerith figured that it'd be worth it to learn how to cure clothing as well as flesh." Pointing to her companion and making the crazy gesture with the other hand, she added, "She's kinda weird like that, but she's the best white mage we've got."
Aerith backed away from Sora and turned to her comrade, insulted. Yuffie responded to the white mage's glare with a peppy grin before she bounced forward. "So you made it out of there nice and alive I see! Welcome to Trinity!"
Sora grinned. As easy as most of the trial had been, he already knew that he had passed. "Thanks!" Expecting them to say something more, he waited. He needed some sort of assignment, and he needed to get out to find his friends. When they said nothing more, he started again. "So..."
"Hold on! Be patient! We have to wait for Sq–er–Leon to come, you know," Yuffie managed to scold while maintaining her perpetually hyper demeanor, and Sora wondered if she was on a permanent sugar high. "Speaking of which, where is he? He said he was going to pick up the delegates."
Neither Sora nor Aerith missed the irony of that statement, and they exchanged amused smiles. "Yuffie," Aerith reminded her, "Leon had to pick up the king's delegates, I'm sure they'll be here soon." With an apologetic smile, she addressed Sora, "Sorry for making you wait, but we have to take care of our guests."
To say the least, Sora was thoroughly lost. A place like Traverse Town couldn't have a king. Nothing that Sora had seen could possibly pass as a palace, and Trinity seemed to run things in all three districts.
"King? Delegates?" Sora echoed Aerith and wondered what was going on.
"You see," Yuffie explained, picking up from where Aerith had left off, "King Mickey used to be one of the most influential leaders of all the worlds. His kingdom pretty much owned and developed the Gummi technology that lets us travel between worlds. Of course, he was a benevolent leader, and one of the most respected ones. But two years ago, he disappeared, leaving no trace of where he might have gone. Sent the kingdom into an upheaval."
Aerith led them back into the small house that served as Trinity Headquarters. "However, two of the king's most trusted advisers have arrived now. We're hoping that they might know where to find him."
So they were waiting for someone important to arrive. "So you think that he'll help you get rid of the Heartless?"
Yuffie paced around the little brick square, gesturing wildly as she talked, "It can't hurt to have him on our side. He's one of the--"
The sound of a heavy door creaking open on rusted hinges marked Leon's arrival and cut Yuffie off from the rest of her explanation. Chains jangled, and Leon walked in, accompanied by two other people and a dog--if 'people' was indeed the right word to describe those whom Leon escorted. The first 'person' was a duck, short, squat, and with a permanent-looking scowl etched on to his feathery face. With his staff held high, the duck attempted a dignified demeanor--an attempt completely undermined by his waddling walk.
The other was just as peculiar. An anthropomorphic dog, he was much taller and thinner than his companion, though his floppy ears and bulky snout displaced any elegance that stature might have lent him.
A yell that reminded Sora of seagulls calling distracted him from staring at these new curiosities. The duck stomped forward, shaking his cartoonish staff at Sora. The death glare in his eyes might have intimidated Sora if they didn't belong to a duck. Instead it provoked a smirking response from the boy.
"Stop staring!" the duck quack yelled as he raised his staff and started to chant something. Leon stepped forward to interrupt.
"This is not the time." Leon lectured both duck and boy. "These are Donald, Royal Wizard–" he pointed to the unintimidating duck– "And Goofy, Captain of the Royal Knights–" this time he pointed to the dim-looking dogoid.
"They are the delegates of King Mickey of Disney Castle," Aerith patiently explained to Sora. "Please forgive this recruit's behavior. He's just recently arrived on this world, and so everything is still new to him."
Yuffie elbowed Sora. "Apologize," she hissed, "we can't offend the delegates."
"Sorry for being so rude," Sora apologized, even though he didn't recall being impolite. Observing and staring were two completely different things, after all.
"That's better," Yuffie said cheerily, leading Donald and Goofy to the headquarters while Leon approached Sora.
"You've proven that you can defeat the small fries," Leon said, "but can you handle the leaders?" He led him down to the main part of the Third District as Aerith followed Yuffie and the delegates into the house.
The Trinity members who had been milling about the plaza earlier were gone now, and Leon ordered Sora to go forward. He complied, and immediately, Sora. The other possible exits were blocked as well,
Sora heard a sound like old tin rattling and automatically prepared for a fight. The leader descended, detached metal feet falling first, followed by an armored torso, arms, and helmet-clad head, all in a very violet shade. As far as monsters went, the giant tin soldier was not as terrifying as the large shadow he'd fought back on his island. Sora walked forward, ready to fight.
"I'm gonna crumple you like a can!" Sora shouted with bravado at the purple knight Heartless. His battle cry shouted, he rushed forward with his sword at the ready and advanced on the soon-to-be tin can.
He hit a leg, and the vibration from metal hitting metal strained Sora's grip on his weapon. He held on, though, and continued his assault on the leg. It soon detached from the rest of the machine creature and began kicking him.
Unsure of how to respond to this sudden attack, Sora covered his head with both of his hands and rolled away from the angry foot. When he was far enough away, he stood up again, planning his next assault on the disembodied limb, and the rest of the armor suit's body slammed into his head.
The blow disoriented Sora for a second, causing him to wobble a bit before he regained the offensive and slammed his sword back into the torso of the armor, forcing it to retreat towards the fountain. Content that it was far enough back from him, Sora concentrated on exacting his revenge upon the metal leg.
Just a few sweet strokes of his sword and the leg fell to the ground, twitching a little as if it were working up the strength to get up again. Then it clanked down one final time and disappeared while Sora concentrated on ridding himself of the other parts, the other leg first, followed by both of the arms, all while suffering a few more blows to his own head in the process.
The torso was the last to go, and only the fireworks he had seen on the islands compared to the explosion that ensued. Sparks flew off metal as it broke down, and some of them brushed against Sora's cheek, causing little points of pain to flare up on contact and die quickly.
The walls that had contained the battle receded into the ground, and the spectators from above – the Trinity leaders and the delegate s-- descended the stairs. Aerith rushed over, ready with a cure spell to heal the various dents and scratches acquired from the battle. Leon, Yuffie, and the delegates approached more slowly, Yuffie grinning, Leon looking blank, Goofy smiling dopily, and Donald scowling a ducky scowl.
Once Aerith had finished healing Sora, Leon stepped forwards, still wearing a bland expression. "Congratulations."
Yuffie, as bouncy as Leon was bland, jumped in. "You've just been made a member of Trinity. And guess what? Because you want it so much, we're even gonna give you off-world duties."
Coughs and strained laughing sounded from the other members of Trinity as they crowded back into the main district. A few of them stepped closer, getting a look at their newest member. While the chatter amongst them was indistinct at best, Sora could make out enough to feel uncomfortable.
"Hey look! It's just a scrawny kid!"
"Hah, they're giving him off-world duty. Must be that gullible. Poor sucker. Better him than me, though."
"Still, he beat down that construct of Cid's pretty good."
"But how you think he's gonna do against real Heartless leaders?"
"Who knows? No better than the last loser who had his job."
When Sora prepared to step forward and protest against these people, Aerith held him back. "Don't let them bother you. You did well, and you have a reason for going off-world."
Sora shrugged her off. "I'm not bothered, really. I just want to find my friends." Sora waved them off and their assurances, although he still tried to silently convince himself that he wasn't being manipulated into this and that as long as this was the best way to find RIku and Kairi again, he'd do it anyway.
Out of the blue, he laughed out loud. Shame on them for thinking of going to other worlds as a chore. Hadn't he and his friends wanted to go see them so long ago? Yes, and now their delayed dream was coming true. And not just that, but he had taken down that hunk of metal almost as fast as a storm ripped up a raft. He dared any of the Trinity members making fun of him to say the same.
Everyone looked at him, and Sora grinned a face-splitting grin. "This is an adventure, and I bet that they're just jealous that I get to go and they have to stay behind."
"That's the spirit!" Yuffie said, jumping up and down enthusiastically. "Now let's go get Cid and Brant and get you to your Gummi Ship. You've got other worlds you need to go to."
Yuffie's burst of energy coupled with his own evoked a sudden impatience in Sora. This tiny, cramped world fenced him in, and he needed to be free again. Like his island, this town was a prison, but unlike his island, this looked and felt just as closed in as it was.
Cid and Brant finally came out of the headquarters, Cid managing to scowl and look proud at the same time, and Brant theatrically tipping his hat to Sora in congratulations
"I heard about your great deed, young lad. A difficult feat and one accomplished with much panache it was." Brant said, offering forth a small bundle. "Some potions and ethers as a reward for your efforts in controlling Cid's creation."
After withering glances from Leon and Cid, Brant quited. "Kid, you did decent. Didn't think you had it in you," Cid admitted at last, "Got the best of my machine, you did."
Sora accepted the bundle from Brant and unraveled it, happy to see the vials of friendly green liquid lined up in a neat row and ambivalent about the bottles of frothing blue liquid. He held one up, investigating the contents by the glow of a streetlight. "What's this for?" he asked.
"That concoction is the ether of legend," Brant said, "Said by thousands of the wisest sages to refresh the energies of the mind in the same manner as potions refresh the body."
"Okay..." He thought he knew what ethers did after hearing that explanation, but he couldn't be sure. They sounded nice to have around, though.
"Don't confuse the kid with fancy words." Cid said. "Kid, they're ethers, and they help with focus. Usually if you don't use magic or fancy attacks, then you don't need them."
So he probably didn't need them now, although who knew? This was a new place, and with everything new that he had learned, magic wasn't impossible, and definitely he could train sometime and learn special attacks. He wrapped the bundle up and put it under his arm. "I'm gonna keep it anyway. Because I'm gonna go out and learn magic sometime. You'll see." He grinned at all of them. "Thanks!"
"You ready, kid? There are a lot of people who need rescuing from the Heartless." Cid strode towards the exit leading to First District, much to Sora's dismay. He had hoped to be done with the mass of people packed shoulder-to-shoulder.
Sora looked at the little bundle tucked under his arm and the sword hanging from his side. Ready? Of course he was. "Ready for anything." He walked to the exit where Cid was waiting and waved to the rest of the Trinity members and the delegates from Disney Castle. "Bye everybody!" he shouted, "See you all when I get back!"
The comfort of the Third District gave way to the congestion of the First District, and Sora found himself walking in the wake left by Cid as the mass of people almost magically parted for him. The trip was mercifully brief in comparison to the much longer trek to the Second District entrance.
They stopped at a massive door, one that Sora didn't know how he and Cid were going to handle opening until the older man simply knocked. "Hey! Open the door! We've got someone for refugee duty!"
Gears and hinges creaked as the door heaved itself open, revealing a spacious dock area. The walls surrounding it were clear, giving Sora a glimpse of the blue and green space beyond. It reminded Sora of the seas back home, wide and open to a bunch of new experiences. But, unlike his familiar home waters, this new sea wasn't lying, and no storm would come to take away these possibilities. Actually, this space was like the sky, with cloudy wisps floating in front of scattered stars that twinkled, some soft and calm, a few frenzied, and one that flickered on and off like a flame in a strong wind.
Cid must have caught Sora gaping. "Kid, we don't have all day. Now stop your gawking and get over here."
Sora pulled his eyes away from the distant view beyond and focused on the old man and the ships directly behind him. "Say gramps, this is just the sky, right?"
"'Just the sky?'" Cid echoed, "Look, kid, this ain't 'just' anything, and interspace ain't no playground. You can get killed." He walked into the port and headed towards the large ship docked closest to them.
"It's still the sky we look at, right?" Sora said, persisting in his curiosity.
"Who cares? Now get on the ship, you've got refugees to pick up. So stop wasting time."
Sora complied, and he followed Cid onto the ramp leading up to the intimidating, white ship. Maybe he'd get to pilot it, sailing it across the sky–no, interspace– like a raft along the ocean and using new worlds as his ports of call. The metal floor beneath him clanked with cold authority, and he shivered at the chance to have this authoritative machine under his control. Always, he had wanted to be the captain of the raft, and yet the raft was nothing compared to this ship. Though it was huge in volume, probably for carrying as many refugees as was possible, the twin engines in the back promised speed, and the row of heavy lasers pointing towards the front promised strength and security.
"Kid! Snap out of it and get on the ship! We don't have time to waste!" Cid yelled, pushing Sora towards the ship; however, he didn't sound nearly as irritated as he had before with Sora's staring into space, and before he passed Sora, he paused to make a comment. "She's a beauty, isn't she? She's got Ga brand weaponry and Flare engines, and even now, I've got some Meteor lasers ready to install." Like the monster Sora'd fought earlier, Cid must have built this ship– the pride in his voice betrayed that.
"Hey, am I going to be piloting this?" Sora asked, hoping that Cid's sudden good mood would make him more open to the request.
Unfortunately it backfired, as Cid's mood suddenly turned. "You? Pilot this thing? Kid, you've got to be joking. It takes years of experience to pilot this thing, and only the best of the best are good enough for this. If I didn't have other things to do here, I'd be the one to pilot her." He led the way to the cockpit, where a tattooed man with a blond mohawk sat, making last minute adjustments to the controls. He muttered something in a language completely foreign to Sora.
"What's he saying?" Sora asked.
"Beats me. That guy's the best we've got, though, so who cares if he talks funny? Says his name's Brother, although we don't got a clue whose brother he is. And he understands what everyone else says, even though he can't speak worth anything."
Brother glowered at Cid as he continued flipping switches in preparation for take off. Cid approached Brother and gave some last minute instructions to the pilot of his creation, and Sora took this opportunity to look around a bit. Unlike the ship's exterior, which spoke of artistry and revolutionary design, the interior was blank. Outside of the small bridge, where Sora and his crew would sit during the journey, the engine room, and a small cabin for the crew members who lived on the ship even while they were off-duty, the rest of the space was nothing but an expansive room with empty, white walls. Nothing except for the rows of lights that illuminated the interior interrupted the cool smoothness of it all. He supposed that this place was where the refugees went when they boarded the ship.
Not seeing anything else worth touring, Sora returned to the bridge, where Cid was just on his way out. "Remember kid, when this thing takes off, wear your seatbelt. She's gonna go really fast, and you're gonna go flying if you aren't wearing one. Also, good luck. You're gonna need it." With that, Cid left the ship as Sora walked onto the bridge.
There was one available seat, this one right next to the pilot. Sora strapped himself in, although he wondered how a ship could go fast enough that someone would need to be strapped in. It was just a boat, one that sailed through the sky–or interspace, though Sora still thought of it as the sky–but still a boat.
Brother yelled at him in a rapid string of words that Sora couldn't even start to decipher. When it was time for some sort of expected response, Sora passed it off with a shrug and an "Uhh... sure..."
Apparently this was enough for Brother, as he turned his permanently scowling face back to the front. His hands moved furiously across the control panel, and the floor beneath Sora began to rattle violently, causing his teeth to chatter from. The ship began to rise, and the supports keeping it in the port dropped. From the windows, Sora saw the glass around them give way, and the ship lurched forward a bit. It took long enough, but the ship was finally free of the port, and the shaking relented a bit. Thinking that it was safe to move about, he prepared to take off his seat belt when the engines kicked in again and this time with a furious wail and tremors that shamed the earlier ones. Wisely, he chose to remain harnessed.
"Blast off!" Brother yelled in a heavy accent that Sora could never have figured out. The ship obeyed the command as it accelerated and pressed Sora so far back in the chair that he expected that he was becoming one with the upholstery. With his eyes literally kept open by the force, Sora saw the space surrounding them turn into a blue-green blur.
"Amazing..." he said, forgetting for just a bit that he was off to see other worlds and marveling in the wonder of a ship that could not only sail through space, but could do so at a speed that he couldn't even start to comprehend.
And even better, he was finally, finally starting on a journey many years overdue.
Whew! Things are finally starting to get moving. Although, as an advanced warning, next chapter is going to be another interlude. Yeah. I know you're all just thrilled about that.
Anyway, thanks to all the people who have reviewed, even though I've been spotty about updating. And special thanks to my editor Koorino Megumi who makes my writing sharper and more legible. I definitely couldn't do so well without her.
Next part should be coming reasonably soon, so hang in there! Thanks everyone!
Aerith and Yuffie were waiting for Sora as he entered the Third District, and Aerith, who noticed Sora's numerous cuts and wounds, rushed over, her hands glowing with a white light. After a few words chanted in a language unfamiliar to Sora, Aerith's light enveloped him. It was cool inside, like a minty-fresh breeze, and although the brightness was overwhelming, Sora was still comfortable.
The glow subsided, and Sora noticed how the pains and wounds had melted away better than a potion could have made them and even as an added bonus, the various small tears in his clothes were mended.
"Whoa? What?" Sora articulated as he held out his jacket and stared at where previously separated threads were joined together as tightly woven as if they had never split in the first place. "What happened?"
Yuffie laughed. "With all the Heartless around, Aerith figured that it'd be worth it to learn how to cure clothing as well as flesh." Pointing to her companion and making the crazy gesture with the other hand, she added, "She's kinda weird like that, but she's the best white mage we've got."
Aerith backed away from Sora and turned to her comrade, insulted. Yuffie responded to the white mage's glare with a peppy grin before she bounced forward. "So you made it out of there nice and alive I see! Welcome to Trinity!"
Sora grinned. As easy as most of the trial had been, he already knew that he had passed. "Thanks!" Expecting them to say something more, he waited. He needed some sort of assignment, and he needed to get out to find his friends. When they said nothing more, he started again. "So..."
"Hold on! Be patient! We have to wait for Sq–er–Leon to come, you know," Yuffie managed to scold while maintaining her perpetually hyper demeanor, and Sora wondered if she was on a permanent sugar high. "Speaking of which, where is he? He said he was going to pick up the delegates."
Neither Sora nor Aerith missed the irony of that statement, and they exchanged amused smiles. "Yuffie," Aerith reminded her, "Leon had to pick up the king's delegates, I'm sure they'll be here soon." With an apologetic smile, she addressed Sora, "Sorry for making you wait, but we have to take care of our guests."
To say the least, Sora was thoroughly lost. A place like Traverse Town couldn't have a king. Nothing that Sora had seen could possibly pass as a palace, and Trinity seemed to run things in all three districts.
"King? Delegates?" Sora echoed Aerith and wondered what was going on.
"You see," Yuffie explained, picking up from where Aerith had left off, "King Mickey used to be one of the most influential leaders of all the worlds. His kingdom pretty much owned and developed the Gummi technology that lets us travel between worlds. Of course, he was a benevolent leader, and one of the most respected ones. But two years ago, he disappeared, leaving no trace of where he might have gone. Sent the kingdom into an upheaval."
Aerith led them back into the small house that served as Trinity Headquarters. "However, two of the king's most trusted advisers have arrived now. We're hoping that they might know where to find him."
So they were waiting for someone important to arrive. "So you think that he'll help you get rid of the Heartless?"
Yuffie paced around the little brick square, gesturing wildly as she talked, "It can't hurt to have him on our side. He's one of the--"
The sound of a heavy door creaking open on rusted hinges marked Leon's arrival and cut Yuffie off from the rest of her explanation. Chains jangled, and Leon walked in, accompanied by two other people and a dog--if 'people' was indeed the right word to describe those whom Leon escorted. The first 'person' was a duck, short, squat, and with a permanent-looking scowl etched on to his feathery face. With his staff held high, the duck attempted a dignified demeanor--an attempt completely undermined by his waddling walk.
The other was just as peculiar. An anthropomorphic dog, he was much taller and thinner than his companion, though his floppy ears and bulky snout displaced any elegance that stature might have lent him.
A yell that reminded Sora of seagulls calling distracted him from staring at these new curiosities. The duck stomped forward, shaking his cartoonish staff at Sora. The death glare in his eyes might have intimidated Sora if they didn't belong to a duck. Instead it provoked a smirking response from the boy.
"Stop staring!" the duck quack yelled as he raised his staff and started to chant something. Leon stepped forward to interrupt.
"This is not the time." Leon lectured both duck and boy. "These are Donald, Royal Wizard–" he pointed to the unintimidating duck– "And Goofy, Captain of the Royal Knights–" this time he pointed to the dim-looking dogoid.
"They are the delegates of King Mickey of Disney Castle," Aerith patiently explained to Sora. "Please forgive this recruit's behavior. He's just recently arrived on this world, and so everything is still new to him."
Yuffie elbowed Sora. "Apologize," she hissed, "we can't offend the delegates."
"Sorry for being so rude," Sora apologized, even though he didn't recall being impolite. Observing and staring were two completely different things, after all.
"That's better," Yuffie said cheerily, leading Donald and Goofy to the headquarters while Leon approached Sora.
"You've proven that you can defeat the small fries," Leon said, "but can you handle the leaders?" He led him down to the main part of the Third District as Aerith followed Yuffie and the delegates into the house.
The Trinity members who had been milling about the plaza earlier were gone now, and Leon ordered Sora to go forward. He complied, and immediately, Sora. The other possible exits were blocked as well,
Sora heard a sound like old tin rattling and automatically prepared for a fight. The leader descended, detached metal feet falling first, followed by an armored torso, arms, and helmet-clad head, all in a very violet shade. As far as monsters went, the giant tin soldier was not as terrifying as the large shadow he'd fought back on his island. Sora walked forward, ready to fight.
"I'm gonna crumple you like a can!" Sora shouted with bravado at the purple knight Heartless. His battle cry shouted, he rushed forward with his sword at the ready and advanced on the soon-to-be tin can.
He hit a leg, and the vibration from metal hitting metal strained Sora's grip on his weapon. He held on, though, and continued his assault on the leg. It soon detached from the rest of the machine creature and began kicking him.
Unsure of how to respond to this sudden attack, Sora covered his head with both of his hands and rolled away from the angry foot. When he was far enough away, he stood up again, planning his next assault on the disembodied limb, and the rest of the armor suit's body slammed into his head.
The blow disoriented Sora for a second, causing him to wobble a bit before he regained the offensive and slammed his sword back into the torso of the armor, forcing it to retreat towards the fountain. Content that it was far enough back from him, Sora concentrated on exacting his revenge upon the metal leg.
Just a few sweet strokes of his sword and the leg fell to the ground, twitching a little as if it were working up the strength to get up again. Then it clanked down one final time and disappeared while Sora concentrated on ridding himself of the other parts, the other leg first, followed by both of the arms, all while suffering a few more blows to his own head in the process.
The torso was the last to go, and only the fireworks he had seen on the islands compared to the explosion that ensued. Sparks flew off metal as it broke down, and some of them brushed against Sora's cheek, causing little points of pain to flare up on contact and die quickly.
The walls that had contained the battle receded into the ground, and the spectators from above – the Trinity leaders and the delegate s-- descended the stairs. Aerith rushed over, ready with a cure spell to heal the various dents and scratches acquired from the battle. Leon, Yuffie, and the delegates approached more slowly, Yuffie grinning, Leon looking blank, Goofy smiling dopily, and Donald scowling a ducky scowl.
Once Aerith had finished healing Sora, Leon stepped forwards, still wearing a bland expression. "Congratulations."
Yuffie, as bouncy as Leon was bland, jumped in. "You've just been made a member of Trinity. And guess what? Because you want it so much, we're even gonna give you off-world duties."
Coughs and strained laughing sounded from the other members of Trinity as they crowded back into the main district. A few of them stepped closer, getting a look at their newest member. While the chatter amongst them was indistinct at best, Sora could make out enough to feel uncomfortable.
"Hey look! It's just a scrawny kid!"
"Hah, they're giving him off-world duty. Must be that gullible. Poor sucker. Better him than me, though."
"Still, he beat down that construct of Cid's pretty good."
"But how you think he's gonna do against real Heartless leaders?"
"Who knows? No better than the last loser who had his job."
When Sora prepared to step forward and protest against these people, Aerith held him back. "Don't let them bother you. You did well, and you have a reason for going off-world."
Sora shrugged her off. "I'm not bothered, really. I just want to find my friends." Sora waved them off and their assurances, although he still tried to silently convince himself that he wasn't being manipulated into this and that as long as this was the best way to find RIku and Kairi again, he'd do it anyway.
Out of the blue, he laughed out loud. Shame on them for thinking of going to other worlds as a chore. Hadn't he and his friends wanted to go see them so long ago? Yes, and now their delayed dream was coming true. And not just that, but he had taken down that hunk of metal almost as fast as a storm ripped up a raft. He dared any of the Trinity members making fun of him to say the same.
Everyone looked at him, and Sora grinned a face-splitting grin. "This is an adventure, and I bet that they're just jealous that I get to go and they have to stay behind."
"That's the spirit!" Yuffie said, jumping up and down enthusiastically. "Now let's go get Cid and Brant and get you to your Gummi Ship. You've got other worlds you need to go to."
Yuffie's burst of energy coupled with his own evoked a sudden impatience in Sora. This tiny, cramped world fenced him in, and he needed to be free again. Like his island, this town was a prison, but unlike his island, this looked and felt just as closed in as it was.
Cid and Brant finally came out of the headquarters, Cid managing to scowl and look proud at the same time, and Brant theatrically tipping his hat to Sora in congratulations
"I heard about your great deed, young lad. A difficult feat and one accomplished with much panache it was." Brant said, offering forth a small bundle. "Some potions and ethers as a reward for your efforts in controlling Cid's creation."
After withering glances from Leon and Cid, Brant quited. "Kid, you did decent. Didn't think you had it in you," Cid admitted at last, "Got the best of my machine, you did."
Sora accepted the bundle from Brant and unraveled it, happy to see the vials of friendly green liquid lined up in a neat row and ambivalent about the bottles of frothing blue liquid. He held one up, investigating the contents by the glow of a streetlight. "What's this for?" he asked.
"That concoction is the ether of legend," Brant said, "Said by thousands of the wisest sages to refresh the energies of the mind in the same manner as potions refresh the body."
"Okay..." He thought he knew what ethers did after hearing that explanation, but he couldn't be sure. They sounded nice to have around, though.
"Don't confuse the kid with fancy words." Cid said. "Kid, they're ethers, and they help with focus. Usually if you don't use magic or fancy attacks, then you don't need them."
So he probably didn't need them now, although who knew? This was a new place, and with everything new that he had learned, magic wasn't impossible, and definitely he could train sometime and learn special attacks. He wrapped the bundle up and put it under his arm. "I'm gonna keep it anyway. Because I'm gonna go out and learn magic sometime. You'll see." He grinned at all of them. "Thanks!"
"You ready, kid? There are a lot of people who need rescuing from the Heartless." Cid strode towards the exit leading to First District, much to Sora's dismay. He had hoped to be done with the mass of people packed shoulder-to-shoulder.
Sora looked at the little bundle tucked under his arm and the sword hanging from his side. Ready? Of course he was. "Ready for anything." He walked to the exit where Cid was waiting and waved to the rest of the Trinity members and the delegates from Disney Castle. "Bye everybody!" he shouted, "See you all when I get back!"
The comfort of the Third District gave way to the congestion of the First District, and Sora found himself walking in the wake left by Cid as the mass of people almost magically parted for him. The trip was mercifully brief in comparison to the much longer trek to the Second District entrance.
They stopped at a massive door, one that Sora didn't know how he and Cid were going to handle opening until the older man simply knocked. "Hey! Open the door! We've got someone for refugee duty!"
Gears and hinges creaked as the door heaved itself open, revealing a spacious dock area. The walls surrounding it were clear, giving Sora a glimpse of the blue and green space beyond. It reminded Sora of the seas back home, wide and open to a bunch of new experiences. But, unlike his familiar home waters, this new sea wasn't lying, and no storm would come to take away these possibilities. Actually, this space was like the sky, with cloudy wisps floating in front of scattered stars that twinkled, some soft and calm, a few frenzied, and one that flickered on and off like a flame in a strong wind.
Cid must have caught Sora gaping. "Kid, we don't have all day. Now stop your gawking and get over here."
Sora pulled his eyes away from the distant view beyond and focused on the old man and the ships directly behind him. "Say gramps, this is just the sky, right?"
"'Just the sky?'" Cid echoed, "Look, kid, this ain't 'just' anything, and interspace ain't no playground. You can get killed." He walked into the port and headed towards the large ship docked closest to them.
"It's still the sky we look at, right?" Sora said, persisting in his curiosity.
"Who cares? Now get on the ship, you've got refugees to pick up. So stop wasting time."
Sora complied, and he followed Cid onto the ramp leading up to the intimidating, white ship. Maybe he'd get to pilot it, sailing it across the sky–no, interspace– like a raft along the ocean and using new worlds as his ports of call. The metal floor beneath him clanked with cold authority, and he shivered at the chance to have this authoritative machine under his control. Always, he had wanted to be the captain of the raft, and yet the raft was nothing compared to this ship. Though it was huge in volume, probably for carrying as many refugees as was possible, the twin engines in the back promised speed, and the row of heavy lasers pointing towards the front promised strength and security.
"Kid! Snap out of it and get on the ship! We don't have time to waste!" Cid yelled, pushing Sora towards the ship; however, he didn't sound nearly as irritated as he had before with Sora's staring into space, and before he passed Sora, he paused to make a comment. "She's a beauty, isn't she? She's got Ga brand weaponry and Flare engines, and even now, I've got some Meteor lasers ready to install." Like the monster Sora'd fought earlier, Cid must have built this ship– the pride in his voice betrayed that.
"Hey, am I going to be piloting this?" Sora asked, hoping that Cid's sudden good mood would make him more open to the request.
Unfortunately it backfired, as Cid's mood suddenly turned. "You? Pilot this thing? Kid, you've got to be joking. It takes years of experience to pilot this thing, and only the best of the best are good enough for this. If I didn't have other things to do here, I'd be the one to pilot her." He led the way to the cockpit, where a tattooed man with a blond mohawk sat, making last minute adjustments to the controls. He muttered something in a language completely foreign to Sora.
"What's he saying?" Sora asked.
"Beats me. That guy's the best we've got, though, so who cares if he talks funny? Says his name's Brother, although we don't got a clue whose brother he is. And he understands what everyone else says, even though he can't speak worth anything."
Brother glowered at Cid as he continued flipping switches in preparation for take off. Cid approached Brother and gave some last minute instructions to the pilot of his creation, and Sora took this opportunity to look around a bit. Unlike the ship's exterior, which spoke of artistry and revolutionary design, the interior was blank. Outside of the small bridge, where Sora and his crew would sit during the journey, the engine room, and a small cabin for the crew members who lived on the ship even while they were off-duty, the rest of the space was nothing but an expansive room with empty, white walls. Nothing except for the rows of lights that illuminated the interior interrupted the cool smoothness of it all. He supposed that this place was where the refugees went when they boarded the ship.
Not seeing anything else worth touring, Sora returned to the bridge, where Cid was just on his way out. "Remember kid, when this thing takes off, wear your seatbelt. She's gonna go really fast, and you're gonna go flying if you aren't wearing one. Also, good luck. You're gonna need it." With that, Cid left the ship as Sora walked onto the bridge.
There was one available seat, this one right next to the pilot. Sora strapped himself in, although he wondered how a ship could go fast enough that someone would need to be strapped in. It was just a boat, one that sailed through the sky–or interspace, though Sora still thought of it as the sky–but still a boat.
Brother yelled at him in a rapid string of words that Sora couldn't even start to decipher. When it was time for some sort of expected response, Sora passed it off with a shrug and an "Uhh... sure..."
Apparently this was enough for Brother, as he turned his permanently scowling face back to the front. His hands moved furiously across the control panel, and the floor beneath Sora began to rattle violently, causing his teeth to chatter from. The ship began to rise, and the supports keeping it in the port dropped. From the windows, Sora saw the glass around them give way, and the ship lurched forward a bit. It took long enough, but the ship was finally free of the port, and the shaking relented a bit. Thinking that it was safe to move about, he prepared to take off his seat belt when the engines kicked in again and this time with a furious wail and tremors that shamed the earlier ones. Wisely, he chose to remain harnessed.
"Blast off!" Brother yelled in a heavy accent that Sora could never have figured out. The ship obeyed the command as it accelerated and pressed Sora so far back in the chair that he expected that he was becoming one with the upholstery. With his eyes literally kept open by the force, Sora saw the space surrounding them turn into a blue-green blur.
"Amazing..." he said, forgetting for just a bit that he was off to see other worlds and marveling in the wonder of a ship that could not only sail through space, but could do so at a speed that he couldn't even start to comprehend.
And even better, he was finally, finally starting on a journey many years overdue.
Whew! Things are finally starting to get moving. Although, as an advanced warning, next chapter is going to be another interlude. Yeah. I know you're all just thrilled about that.
Anyway, thanks to all the people who have reviewed, even though I've been spotty about updating. And special thanks to my editor Koorino Megumi who makes my writing sharper and more legible. I definitely couldn't do so well without her.
Next part should be coming reasonably soon, so hang in there! Thanks everyone!