It was in Hollow Bastion that Kairi dreamed a memory hidden deep inside her heart. The castle was bustling with noise as the servants prepared the place for a huge party. The aroma of roasting sweet meats travelled speedily down the corridors alerting the guests that were beginning to arrive the promise of a good evening of feasting.
The party was in full swing now, since the guest of honour had woken up, a baby girl lay In her cot in the centre of the ballroom watching the guests of royalty dance past happily. She wondered what all this was for, but at such a young age barely a few weeks old she forgot her question almost before it even entered her head.
It was later on in the night now, and it was time for the guests to honour the baby girl. They each formed a line and in turn placed their gifts in front of her- Kairi.
But as the line of guests began to thin another person stepped up to the child. The figure- a woman wore dark purple robes and out of her pale head grew two large horns. She was known throughout the kingdom as maleficent, the witch-faerie who delighted in the practise of dark magic and the study of the Heart.
She had not been on the guest list but here she was.
The child's father, a tall well-built man with long pale hair recognised the sorceress for who she was immediately, and dashed forward to cut her off,
'No Maleficent!' he roared but bounced away from the baby as he hit some kind of invisible shield.
Maleficent just looked at him and smiled,
'Foolish man' she muttered and returned her attention to the just born Kairi. Pointing a lone curved finger at the baby girl she whispered a few mystical words and a light began to glow around the kid,
'Let it be known' Maleficent cried out to the masses,' that the child now contains one of the seven shards of darkness inside her form. With this dark spot upon her heart she will lead a cursed life, hunted mercilessly by the Heartless who seek the shards. Your child,' she turned to the father, 'my old enemy… is doomed' and with that she disappeared leaving only a shrill cackle to echo through the building…
'Gah!' Kairi sat straight up, her body was soaked with sweat. Sora sat sleeping deeply across from her in the row boat,
'Sora!' Kairi gasped and shook the teenager awake,
'Huh? What's wrong?' he muttered drowsily rubbing the sleepy dust from his eyes,
'We're here' she said pointing straight up. Sora followed her finger and saw through the midst of bubbles the Bottle only a few kilometres off from where they were,
'Let's go!' Sora cried and leapt out of the boat, 'Arghh!' he gurgled as his whole body sank under the water. Kairi quickly grabbed him and pulled him back into the boat,
'Looks like the water has depth now aye?' she smiled as Sora coughed water onto the floor,
'Let's row the rest of the way, shall we?' Sora suggested. And so with as much strength and speed the two exhausted teens could muster the grabbed the oars and began to paddle furiously towards the destination.
After a short while they began to near a steady circular waterfall of dishwashing liquid streaming down from the bottle,
'We have to go through that' Kairi exclaimed with a sudden certainty. They went to row again but found the boat was already travelling towards the dishwashing liquid on its own.
The boat slid cleanly through the waterfall and into a large bay. A small sandy island lay dead ahead of them. O it was perched a small tin and wood shack surrounded by three large trees with bubbles to replace the foliage,
'What the hell?' Sora let the words escape like a whisper from his lips. Kairi frowned as a sense of familiarity and deja'vu hit her like a thick wall of heat,
'It feels like… home?' she sighed to herself.
