Kingdom Hearts: Warriors of Light

Atlantis-Chapter 22

Miraculously Kita managed a safe and near perfect landing amidst the plentiful trees on this strange world. Though her adrenaline was rushing through her veins with anticipation, her body and mind were still fatigued. For a moment, Kita and Riku sat upright in their chairs looking out the front of the Gummi Ship at the new world. It was a sunny forest with huge lakes all over the place. The breeze blowing through the trees and the small waves crashing on the banks of the lakes looked far more refreshing than the jungle they had previously visited. Without much conversation, Riku and Kita left the ship finally receiving the wave of fresh, cool air they'd been searching for.

"Well, there's not much here, but it's not bad," Riku said stretching his arms. He looked beside him at Kita who looked as tired as ever. She closed her eyes and fell to the ground. "Hey! You ok?"

"Yep," Kita said sounding happy. "I'm just gonna take a little nap."

"I thought this was gonna be a quick visit," Riku pointed out. "You do know Donald's still flying around out there probably wondering where you are." His words were too late. Kita was out cold. So instead of interrogating her, Riku walked to the shore of the lake closest to the ship. The water was unbelievable clear. Riku bent down and scooped out some water and drank it. "Much better than the salt water back home," he said to himself.

Riku was beginning to notice that this world seemed too peaceful. Now that he had time to think about it, where were all the heartless? Then again he didn't notice any people either so maybe it wasn't a world the heartless would bother terrorizing. Riku walked back to Kita to make sure she hadn't moved. When he got there unfortunately, his visions of this being the perfect world were shattered. There stood a heartless right over Kita's head. "Hey, leave her alone!" Riku said pulling out his blade. He chased the heartless away this time before attacking it to avoid injuring Kita. As he did, the heartless seemed rather eager to get away. It scurried into a bush.

"Come on out and fight like a man," Riku taunted the heartless. However, he was stunned to see at least one hundred pairs of glowing yellow eyes appear out the shrubs staring back at him. "I said like a man, not like an army of men," he said before darting in the other direction. Riku ran back to Kita and started to shake her shoulder. "I know you'll kill me for this, but you have to get up… NOW!"

"What?" Kita said looking annoyed. She rolled over to give Riku a nasty look, but the group of heartless coming her way caught her eyes first. She jumped to her feet as fast as she could, pulled out her key blade and prepared to fight. She and Riku stood back-to-back, whacking every heartless that came at them. To their misfortune, more and more were appearing out of nowhere.

"This isn't working," Riku said.

"Yeah, I can see that," Kita said.

"Come on!" Riku said grabbing Kita's hand and pulling her away from the site. She turned to see that they were headed straight for the lake.

"Um, you know what you're doing?" Kita asked doubtfully.

"Nope," Riku answered still charging for the water. "Take a deep breath and swim." Together they lunged into the water and swam away from the heartless infested shore. Kita took a moment to look back and see that there were now ten times as many heartless as when they had begun fighting them. She took a breath and dove underwater. The clarity of the water made it easy to see. Riku had stopped swimming and was hovering in the water. Kita swam up to him to see what was the matter. He was looking straight down to the bottom where more heartless where waiting for them.

"Wal we ooh now," Kita said, her words drowned out by water.

"Wim!" Riku shouted kicking back to the surface. Together he and Kita broke surface and started gasping for air.

"Got anymore brilliant plans?" Kita asked. But before she could catch her breath, she was suddenly sucked back under water.

"Kita!" Riku shouted taking a deep breath and diving down to retrieve her. It looked as though a heartless had reached out one of its tentacles and dragged Kita down to the bottom of the lake. Riku was beginning to wonder if he'd be able to reach her without drowning himself. He swam as fast as he could, watching Kita struggle to break free. She was getting tired and running out of air fast. Another water heartless jumped in Riku's way and prevented him from getting to Kita. He had to fight the heartless off to get through, but when he had finally destroyed it, he was out of breath. He had no choice but to surface again for more air or they would both drown.

When he was refreshed, he swam down again immediately, but Kita was hanging limply in the heartless's grip. Suddenly out of nowhere, someone came swimming through the water. Riku watched as he continued to approach. The person swam up to the heartless and attacked it with a spear-like weapon, forcing it to drop Kita. The person caught Kita and started to swim off with her.

"Eeey!" Riku tried to shout, but his voice was too muffled. He followed the person, ignoring the fact that he was running out of air. As he watched, the mysterious person suddenly vanished. It was as if they had swam behind an invisible curtain. Riku looked puzzled feeling as though he was losing his mind, but he had no choice but to keep going. He kept his eye on the spot where Kita and the stranger had just disappeared. When he reached it, he noticed there was absolutely nothing there. He held up his sword in front of him to try hitting something, but instead, the end of his sword disappeared. Riku reached out his hand and saw it disappear too. Finally he concluded just to swim forward.

He passed through an invisible wall of water. On the other side, he fell to hit a hard ground. He gasped for breath noticing that there was air here as well. He looked up to see a wall of water floating beside him. He could see the heartless swimming around on the other side. "Where am I?"

Riku turned his head to see that this strange place was even more mysterious. He was now lying on a rock path that led to an ancient city he could see before him. There were buildings, trees, fields and even the sky. "I must be dreaming," Riku said to himself feeling as though this whole place was impossible. He knew he had to get with it because someone had Kita, and he would have to find her. He got up and started to walk down the stone path towards the city. He stood in awe of its mystery. How could a city surrounded by land and sky be hidden below a lake? It made no sense to him.

"Come on, a stranger has come to Atlantis!" a boy said to his friend as the two hurried down the path into the city. Could they have been referring to Kita? Riku followed them, keeping a watch out just incase anyone thought he was an intruder, even though he really was. He arrived in front of a temple, which was impossible to get to due to the crowd of people. Something was strange about the people now that Riku was seeing so many of them together. They all had white hair. Riku climbed up a heap of rocks so he could see over the crowd and watch from a distance. There in the center was a cleared circle where the strange person and an unconscious Kita were in front of a man who looked like the king.

"Lollahec, why have you brought an outsider into Atlantis. You know it is forbidden!" the old king said.

"She is not an imposter," the woman pleaded. "She was in trouble, I had to save her from the heartless."

"And risk being killed yourself?" the king said. "The heartless are on the outside for a reason. How do you know she isn't dangerous?"

"Does she look dangerous to you!" the woman shouted. "I know she is not bad."

"How?" the king asked unbelieving.

"Because she is my daughter!" the woman shouted back. Riku almost slipped and fell from the rocks upon hearing this. Everyone in the crowd seemed just shocked. There were gasps everywhere as everyone started to murmur.

"So you were not only married on the outside, you had a daughter as well?" the king said sounding like it was the greatest crime he had ever heard of.

"I wanted her to be free from the curse that keeps us trapped here," the woman explained. "I only came back so that I would have the chance of seeing her again. I would have died when she was little if I had stayed out there."

"I thought that was what you wanted Lollahec," the king said. "You hated being here and so you left knowing you would die if you were gone for too long."

"But I found purpose out there," the woman said. "Someone who cared about me, and loved me. When Kita was born I wanted to live just to know that she was alive. And I only hoped that we would meet again, and we are together now. What is wrong with that?"

"Because she doesn't belong here," the king said. "Only Atlantians are aloud."

"But she is!" the woman said. "She is a part of me, and I am Atlantian!"

"But she was born on the outside," the king said, sticking to his rules. "So either you get rid of her now or we'll have to kill her. She should never have come here." The woman was crying with anger. She hung her head in disbelief that they were going to kill her daughter. "Guards. Take her away."

"Not so fast!" Riku said jumping down from the rocks. He was able to leap over the crowd and into the cleared circle where Kita and the woman were. "Don't lay a finger on her," Riku said, a devilish look in his eyes. The guards were surprise to see Riku suddenly enter the scene.

"Another intruder!" the king said. "Lollahec, this is all your fault. He probably followed you in."

"Shut up," Riku said, having no respect for the foreign leader.

"Get out of my kingdom or so help me I'll have you beheaded!" the king fought back.

"I'm not going anywhere without Kita," Riku said staring the king down. The woman who had been defending Kita got up and stood between Riku and the king.

"Please your majesty," she said, tears in her eyes. "I've waited my whole life to see her again. What if you never get to see your daughter again? My daughter can leave this place, and she can find Princess Kidagakash." There were more murmurs from the crowd. The king put his guard down in hearing these words. He watched the woman cry in front of him, thinking about what she had said. Riku just stared at both of them feeling clueless as to what they were talking about. The king lowered his head in defeat.

"I suppose you're right about this Lollahec," the king said. "Take her to the healer," were his new orders. The woman raised her head and smiled through her tears. She turned to Riku.

"Do you know Kita?" the woman asked. Standing in front of Riku she was much taller than he was. She looked just like Kita with tan skin, long white hair and vibrant pink eyes.

"Yeah. We sorta save the universe together," Riku explained. He knew he was standing in front of Kita's mother. Someone Kita had been searching for her whole life and was now unconscious and missing it.

"Thank you for coming here," the woman said. "I am Lollahec. Kita's mother."

"Umm, nice to meet you. Ma'am," Riku said, not sure what to do. "And really, it was Kita's idea to come here. She said someone was calling her name and she was drawn here."

"I was thinking about her," Lollahec said. "Perhaps she could hear my heart calling out to her. Come. We should see how she's doing." Together she and Riku went to the healer's building. They arrived to find that Kita had been changed into a cream colored dress to replace her wet clothes. Riku however was still drenched from his arrival.

"Just curious. How did you know she was your daughter?" Riku asked.

"Because I knew from when she born that she looked just like me," Lollahec said admiring her daughter. "How long have you known her?"

"Not long really," Riku explained. "I came from another world. She was with some others and when we all met up in the Magic Kingdom, we just sorta stuck together. My friend Sora seals the worlds to prevent the heartless from coming. Basically that's why we travel from world to world. We're trying to find Ansem and stop the darkness."

Lollahec hung her head. "I fear that all this madness is my fault. When I left Hallow Bastion, I couldn't tell Ansem where I was going. He's probably been trying to find me, but he will never succeed."

"Why not?" Riku asked. "Kita and I got here."