King's Exile
By Cybra
Suggested Music: "Traverse Town" (Kingdom Hearts), "Attacking Brides" (Van Helsing), "Useless Crucifix" (Van Helsing), "Final Battle" (Van Helsing), "To Zanarkand" (Final Fantasy X), "Ending Theme" (Final Fantasy X)
Special Thanks: To Vyse. Thank you for not only betaing this chapter but for being my Final Fantasy expert. I probably got more than a little annoying with all of my questions.
Disclaimer: Kingdom Hearts, The Great Mouse Detective, and the Basil of Baker Street Mysteries belong to Square, the Walt Disney Company, and the late Eve Titus respectively. The original name of "Sherringford" for Basil's first name belongs to Mlle. Irene Relda.
Chapter 2: Traverse Town
The warp engines shut down upon the Basic Gummi's arrival at the Traverse Town world. The ship drifted towards the spinning orb hovering in Interspace.
"About time." Basil stretched his arms above his head, leaning back in the co-pilot's seat as he did so.
The other mouse nodded his head in agreement. Warp jumps were relatively quick, but Mickey—as Basil had suggested—had purposely flown to multiple known worlds, hovered around them, and then warped away. If anyone had witnessed his and Basil's departure, their pursuer would have lost their trail.
"Pulling into orbit."
The gummi ship obeyed its pilot's commands. It slid into orbit with a fleetful of other gummi ships. A casual scan would mark this ship as one of dozens.
Traverse Town was also known as "the Crossroads of the Universe." It housed shops featuring products from every known world and even a few unknown ones. This world had become—in essence—an intergalactic trading post.
Yet it was here in Traverse Town that portals of sleeping (or dying) worlds would unload their passengers. That is what gave Traverse Town its other nickname: "the City of Lost Souls."
All of this passed through Mickey's mind while he scanned the other gummi ships to make sure none of the Disney Castle ships had decided to drop by. He noted that he and Basil had inadvertently given themselves extra camouflage: At least fifteen Basic Gummis circled the world.
"Here we go," Mickey said.
The pair of mice walked to the transporter. After setting it to "Auto," the pair disappeared in a shimmer of light.
Basil waited impatiently as Mickey tried to come to some sort of agreement with the owner of the Accessory Shop. While it would be nice to not have to worry as much about injury, the situation was not so bad that they could not go without even a Darkness protection ring. Besides, Basil was not terribly excited about the idea of having his ears pierced again.1
Still, it was funny to watch one of the most powerful mice in the universe call the owner of the Accessory Shop a scam artist. To which the owner would promptly accuse Mickey of trying to rob him blind.
"Forget it," Basil sneered. "We don't need this man's shoddy workmanship."
The direct insult on his inventory made the man turn purple with rage. "'Shoddy'! I carry only the finest accessories! If you want to see shoddy workmanship, go to—"
A sudden quake interrupted the man.
Basil's Realm-given senses screamed, "Darkness!"
"Heartless," Mickey hissed unnecessarily.
The mice abandoned the shop and stopped at the edge of the steps.
"Correction: one very large Heartless," Basil said.
The creature terrorizing the general populous liked one of the mythological gryphons. It was as big as a horse plus another half of a horse's size. Midnight-black fur and feathers were offset by the sulfurous eyes. The Heartless symbol—spread across its wings—was a horrifyingly elegant touch, giving it a sort of demonic beauty.
Basil's ears flattened against his skull as it screamed. The sound actually managed to twist a metal streetlamp in front of the beaked mouth into knots.
"Important safety tip: When it screams, don't be in front."
Mickey nodded grimly. "We need to get this thing away from here."
"Preferably in the open, too."
"Time to play bait."
Basil raised his fingers to his lips and whistled sharply. The Heartless spun around to face them.
"Here, birdie!" Mickey taunted. "How 'bout some mouse soufflé?"
The pair turned and ran as the Heartless took up pursuit with remarkable speed. They split up temporarily as a scream filled the air and the sound tore apart the cobblestone.
Basil had visited Traverse Town before and knew where Mickey would prefer to do battle: the open Third District. Unfortunately, the Heartless chasing them had blocked the shortcut. They would have to pass through the Second District first.
They passed through the doors leading to the Second District and held them open just long enough for the Heartless to fly through. They slammed the doors shut and continued running, offering whistles and catcalls of encouragement to the shadow creature behind them.
Leon Lionheart—formerly known as "Squall"—heard the frustrated screams of the Heartless from inside his room in the hotel. He ran outside, Gunblade in hand, with Yuffie right behind him.
The flying Heartless hesitated in mid-air before abandoning its original target and wheeling around to face him.
"Yuffie! Get down!"
Yuffie threw her stars. "Make me!"
Leon growled in frustration. His fellow exile from the world of what was now Hollow Bastion had always been stubborn. Then again, so was he.
"Dammit, Yuffie!" He fired the Gunblade at the Heartless.
Before he could say anything else, the Heartless pulled into a sudden dive, screaming as it plummeted towards them. The ground cracked and split beneath them.
Somehow, Leon managed to leap away before he was the direct target of the sound blast. He saw Yuffie roll out of her own desperate jump.
A fireball struck the Heartless. It pulled out of its dive and swooped around on Aerith, screaming the entire way. Aerith managed to avoid a direct blast but reverberations caused her to stumble over debris.
"Shit!" Cid yelled from behind Leon, announcing his presence with that one word.
Cid tossed a lit stick of dynamite as Leon fired his Gunblade again. Yuffie resumed her attack. Aerith clambered to her feet and readied her Wizard Staff.
A few of Leon's or Yuffie's shots must have hit home. The explosion of Cid's dynamite almost certainly had hit a weak spot. The shadow creature jerked in what seemed like pain before it turned to face them again.
Leon thought he summed up the situation quite nicely: "Well, now we've pissed it off."
Running upright had proven to cause too many close calls, so the two mice had switched to "four-legging it": using their hands as an extra pair of feet. It was not the most dignified way to get where they were going, but running closer to the ground certainly helped pick up the pace.
However, Basil noticed something wrong as he glanced swiftly over their shoulder. "Mickey, wait! Aren't we missing something?"
Mickey risked a glance over his shoulder before the two mice skidded to a stop. "Where is it?"
"I don't know but this doesn't bode well."
The angry screams of the Heartless attracted their attention.
"Neither does that," Mickey said. "C'mon!"
The pair raced towards the source of the sound: the center of the Second District. The area was not an ideal battleground for what they had hoped to do but it would have to suffice. It was time to change tactics.
People running while fighting the Heartless provided the answer as to why the creature had stopped chasing its tormentors.
"Give them a hand?"
"Why?" Basil asked, sarcasm lacing his voice. "They look like they're having fun."
Mickey could not repress his snicker.
The pair leaped up onto the upper walkway, gripping the side and flipping up to make it.
"First step is to bring that thing down. Would you like to start this time?"
Basil's right hand glowed blue. "Oh, may I?"
"Blizzaga!"
One of the Heartless's wings froze, and the creature crashed into the ground.
Yuffie took her eyes off of the fight and searched for the source of the freezing blast.
"Nice shot!" a high-pitched tenor voice complimented whoever had frozen the Heartless's wing.
"Rotten shot," an accented voice groused. "I was aiming for the head."
Two figures jumped down from one of the walkways. It took Yuffie a moment to realize that she was staring at a pair of human-sized mice.
The tan one grinned, the smile feral. His tail slashed the air twice. "Here, kitty, kitty."
So this was the accented voice and the person who had cast the freeze spell. But what of the other?
The black mouse glanced in their direction. "Mind if we join you?"
That sentence spoken in such a high-pitched male voice should have been funny. But it was not. There was something in his voice which told the ninja girl that he could most definitely do his share of the fighting.
"If you're in the mood to have your asses handed to ya, be our guests." Cid trimmed the fuse of another stick of dynamite, preparing for another attack.
The creature screamed in the two mice's direction. They split up, allowing the blast to destroy the bench and part of the wall behind them.
Yuffie threw her stars as Leon fired another shot. One star lodged itself in the Heartless's neck, which apparently caused the shadow creature great discomfort.
The taller mouse appeared suddenly as he leapt over the Heartless from behind. A fist glowed momentarily yellow before he slammed it into the creature's back. Electricity crackled, and the Heartless stumbled.
Aerith cast another fire spell at the creature's neck. Leon, seeing the damage Yuffie and Aerith caused it, fired his Gunblade at the neck while Cid threw more dynamite.
The black mouse dashed into the clearing smoke while the taller mouse flipped over the Heartless's head, miraculously unharmed by Cid's dynamite. A flash of gold drew Yuffie's attention to the abnormally large golden key in the black mouse's hand.
Slash! Gold sliced through black.
In one last, desperate attempt, the Heartless attempted to claw the black mouse, but a well-aimed throwing star to the eye changed its plans.
A golden key tore through the rest of the neck.
The creature dissolved in a puff of smoke.
"And that is how we do that," the black mouse dryly commented.
The taller mouse gave his friend a smile, rubbing his right arm and wincing. Apparently, he had not escaped completely unscathed from Cid's blast.
The Hollow Bastion exiles approached warily. Even though they had just fought together, one could never be too careful.
However now that the battle was over, Yuffie recognized one of the pair that had assisted them. Her face lit up. "King Mickey!"
A friendly smile soon extended across the shorter mouse's features. "Hi, Yuffie, everybody."
Yuffie barely suppressed a giggle as Cid's jaw dropped and his ever-present cigarette dangled from his lips. "You've got to be shittin' me. What the fuck are you doin' here? And who the fuck is this guy?"
Even though the friendly smile remained on the king's face, nothing but seriousness filled his black eyes. "I'll explain that soon enough. In the meantime, I need to do a little work here and in the Third District."
Leon thought his head was going to implode.
The king had used his Keyblade to do something to the doors leading to the First District from both the Second District and the Third District before he and his tan friend had rented a room under an assumed name. Now they all sat in that room, and the king had just finished telling his and the tan mouse's story. The yellow walls and strangely cheery desert decorations of Room Three offered no help as the warrior tried to sort out what he and his comrades had been told.
King Mickey, who now sat cross-legged on the bed, had placed himself into exile and was trying to save the universe by trying to find Kingdom Hearts before the master of the Heartless found it. (As to that person's identity, King Mickey was oddly reticent on that fact.)
The tan mouse stretched out languidly behind the king was, technically, not really alive. Sherringford Basil—or, rather, "Basil"—was actually a Summons who accompanied the king on his self-appointed task.
And now, while these two mice were going against all kinds of odds, they wanted his and his comrades' help.
"You two seem like you can handle yourselves," Aerith said from her spot next to Yuffie. "Why ask for our help?"
"Because we can't be in two places at once," the king explained. "Donald and Goofy need to be directed towards the other Keybearer, not us. If they discover where we are, trip's over."
Leon shook his head in an attempt to clear the cobwebs from his mind. "But we haven't seen anyone with a Keyblade except for you."
This time it was the king who shook his head. "We're early. Those portals must've dropped him off at a later time. Damn, I hate the unpredictability factor in those things."
"He'll catch up," Basil assured. "Donald and Goofy should show up at about the same time, right?"
"Hopefully." The king turned his attention back to the Hollow Bastion exiles. "But can we count on your help?"
Leon looked at his fellow exiles. Perhaps they could be of some assistance and, ultimately, get back not Hollow Bastion but Hallow Bastion. "Sure."
"Thanks. We owe ya one."
"No, we're even," Cid corrected. "You helped save our asses back there."
"So what're you two going to do now?" Yuffie asked.
"For the moment? Sleep and get ready to leave tomorrow." A clock chimed somewhere, and the king winced. "I mean, later today."
"C'mon, everybody. Let's let them hit the hay." Leon started shoving his group out the door.
The door shut with a quiet click behind him. A gentle test on the knob proved that it was locked. The pair of mice would be left alone, and no one would know who really occupied that room.
Cid yawned. "I say we make like them and catch a few Zs."
The rest of them agreed and wandered away from Room Three.
Inside the yellow room, Mickey yawned and slid his body onto bed with his head resting on one of the pillows. Basil scooted off.
"Guess I'd better get back to the Realm." The Summons did not seem too happy with this idea.
"Why?"
"One bed and two of us. You're not too tired to do the math, I hope?"
"Bed's big enough for the both of us." Mickey padded the empty space beside him.
Basil hesitated. "Are you sure?"
"Basil, it's not like we're doing anything. Lie down and go to sleep."
The black mouse had wriggled under the covers and had invitingly left part of them open.
Too tired to argue the point further, Basil climbed in and pulled the covers over himself. "I hope you don't kick in your sleep."
"Minnie's the kicker."
The Summons chuckled and settled in so that they lie back-to-back. "Good night, Mickey."
"Good night, Basil."
1 Basil—like Sherlock Holmes—was a master of disguise. Most likely, he occasionally had to submit to ear piercing to make a costume more authentic.