Chapter 8 – Devil in a Blue Dress
Although no one seemed to know exactly where the Heartless had taken Mira, they had all retreated in roughly the same direction. Since they traveled by air, they probably had few topographical obstacles to negotiate, so Sora and company judged that the best way to track them down was to set off in the direction they had fled. Their planned looked even better each time they ran into a group of Heartless stragglers; they invariably seemed to be heading in the same direction as the main bunch had earlier.
With no variation in the direction the Heartless moved, Jiminy figured it wouldn't be difficult to track them back to wherever they were taking Mira. That meant they needed less time for figuring out what to do next and more time for Sora to ask stupid questions.
"You're a cricket, right?"
Sora squinted hard at Jiminy, determined to figure out just what it was about his appearance that bothered him so much.
"I am, indeed," said Jiminy. "I've been a cricket since birth. My mother was a cricket. My father was a cricket. Their parents before them were crickets, too. Right on up the family tree, all crickets."
"Why do you only have four legs, then?" said Sora. "I just noticed that. Most bugs have six legs."
Jiminy halted in his tracks. "Are you sure you want to ask that question, Sora?"
"Something about you has always seemed a little strange," Sora admitted. "If we don't get this out in the open now, I may never be at peace."
Jiminy sighed. "Fine, I'll tell you. Of course you know that I wasn't always your travel companion, but did I ever tell you what my job was before I met you?"
"Never thought about it much, actually," said Sora.
"You mean to say that you've been wondering about my appearance without wondering about my past?" said Jiminy. "Did it ever occur to you that the two might be related?"
"Honestly," said Sora, "it never crossed my mind."
Jiminy gave Sora a dirty look. "You need to be more of a critical thinker if you want to succeed in anything, Sora. Don't let Goofy here be your role model."
"Hey!" said Goofy. "I represent that remark."
"Palooka," said Donald.
"Anyway, Sora," said Jiminy, "I used to be a conscience."
"A conscience?" said Donald.
"A conscience," said Goofy. "You know, that little voice inside of your head that tells you when you're about to do something stupid or wrong."
"I don't know what you're talking about," said Donald.
"Goofy's
right," said Jiminy. "Most humans have a conscience built in,
but I was assigned to work for someone who was not human. Not at the
time, anyway."
"Someone like Donald or Goofy?" said Sora.
"No," said Jiminy. "They're pretty close to human. I did my conscience work for a puppet."
"Why would a puppet need a conscience?" said Sora.
"There," said Jiminy. "You're starting to ask more critical questions. That's good of you. In answer, this puppet was a special one. His master once wished upon a magic star that he would come to life so he could have a son, and the Blue Fairy granted his wish. Partially, anyway. For a while, the puppet, whose name was Pinocchio, resembled both a human boy and a wooden boy. I had to guide him in his moral choices until he proved himself worthy of being completely human."
"So far so good," said Sora.
"It worked, too," said Jiminy. "After a few bizarre adventures, Pinocchio showed a sense of bravery and self-sacrifice, and the Blue Fairy made him fully human. That's when the trouble started."
"I thought he proved himself to be good," said Sora. "Didn't you just say?"
"He proved himself human. With that comes the ability to deceive. Apparently, he just acted like he learned to put others before himself. Within a week of being a real boy, he started acting like a real boy. And as we all know, part of being a young boy is…"
Jiminy gulped. Sora finished his sentence for him. "Pulling the legs off bugs!"
"Gee, Sora," said Donald, "you seem awfully familiar with that pastime."
"Oh, yeah," said Sora. "I did plenty of that when I was younger. Still do. I collect dead bugs, I take them apart for examination, I burn ants with a magnifying glass, and…"
For the rest of that leg of the journey, Jiminy Cricket walked at least ten feet away from Sora.
XXX
Mira awoke with a start. She sighed. Just a nightmare. She glanced at her surroundings: a dungeon. Gloomy gray walls, minimal furniture, an armed guard on each side of the door. She closed her eyes. With any luck, I can get back to the nightmare.
Something interrupted her sleep, though—a voice.
"Interrogation time!" said a guard, a faceless man clad entirely in a suit of iron who had no right to be quite so enthusiastic about his job. "Out of your cell and into your chains, little girl."
Another quick glance at her surroundings revealed no obvious escape plans, and any attempt to argue with someone so gleeful about an upcoming painful event could only do more harm than good, so Mira hung her head and did as she was told. The guard slapped a pair of manacles on her wrists and prodded her back with a lightweight metal spear. In his zeal, he drew some blood.
"Ouch," said Mira. "Do you have to be so rough?"
"When the Ice Princess is through with you," said the guard, "you'll be begging for my hospitality. Now move it."
Mira felt a lump rise in her throat.
XXX
As torture chambers go, the one Mira found herself chained up in didn't seem quite so bad, at least at first. The walls were plain white and featureless except for some audio speakers jutting out of the corners. The floor was blank and cold but not terribly unpleasant to someone standing up. Her chair was hard and decidedly unergonomic, and her chains chafed her wrists and ankles, but the room lacked the dingy dungeon atmosphere of her cell. The guards even seemed in a hurry to leave her alone.
"What is this place?" she asked as her escort finished locking her down and headed for the exit.
"Worse than anything else you could imagine," was all he said as he half walked, half jogged out of the room.
Sure was in a hurry to get out, Mira thought. What could be so scary about this place, though?
A female voice answered her thoughts from the speakers around her. "Welcome," it said. "Welcome. I'm sure you have many questions for me, but in this place, I am the only one who gets to ask."
"Are you going to hurt me?" said Mira.
"Didn't I just say that you don't get to ask me anything?" said the voice. "But enough about you. It's time for you to meet… ME!"
A formerly invisible panel on the side wall of the room slid open to reveal a short, blonde woman of about twenty years. She wore a shimmering, tight blue dress, and she was armed with a microphone.
"They call me the Ice Princess. I have the power to destroy you with my song if you do not tell me everything I need to know. And, dear Mira, I would like to have a little talk with you."
