I'm actually partially surprised to have come as far as chapter three. I've had the "The End" screen for KH on my TV running for over four days now. It's been helping me write. :D Dearly Beloved is just that pretty of a song, though. Millions agree, they just haven't said it yet. I'm hoping this chapter will be as wanted as the last two. I don't think many people are reading it to begin with but that's alright, too. I'm enjoying myself when I write it.

Cid...uhm, gets something to stalk Riku with. There's no explanation for it but I wanted him to tag along. Just go wth it.

Game followers! You know where we're going next.

Wonderland

"That is one weird-ass lookin' world." Cid didn't have to tell me twice. I was the one approaching it. "It's called Wonderland - kinda pansy." Cid also didn't need to say his opinion a second time.

"At least it doesn't look like a scary place to be," I offered the co-pilot. The mechanic grunted at me like a boar. "What? Are you afraid of pink hearts?"

"No!" I couldn't help but grin at the way he was acting. Cid was too manly for a place like that. "Let's just land your idiot ass down on that planet!" I agreed and was carefully instructed on how to settle down without killing the ship. My body wasn't that important to Cid. It took a few times and a bumpy landing but I managed to get away with a few scrapes to the equipment. While nothing was harmed, Cid's heart had been impaled by a giant wooden spike shot from an arbalest. I climbed out of the ship by the ejection ladder and escaped before the man came back to his senses to curse me into the pits of Hell.

As the tip of my toe hit the ground, just before my other foot even reached the surface, I felt my body freeze. A flash of light raged through me and upon me, broken shards shattering everywhere to cast it away. I hit the ground stumbling but my balance kept - just barely. I had no idea what just happened to me. It wasn't painful but I couldn't help but feel like I dove through a glass window made of light. I turned back toward the ship when a small object zoomed it's way out and floated in front of my face. It was in the shape of a tiny flying saucer with a big, black eye in the center of it. It jerked and twisted itself up and down and all around my body before coming to a halt in front of my face. I had no idea what it was either until it gave a very deep, raspy laugh. Cid.

"The HELL are you wearin', Riku? You look retarded!" I was about to retort until I actually looked down at myself. A tight black shirt? I didn't think I had been wearing one the moment before. I lifted my arms toward my face and stared at a velvet crimson sleeve, white fur outlining the cuffs. The coat just hung above the floor, the same faux fuzz dragging behind me at my end and surrounding my neck. Sora's scarf, which I had been wearing for so long it's become part of my anatomy, had kept me from noticing it. However I DID notice I felt siginificantly taller, but that was only because of the knee-high leather boots I had on. Half my foot was jerked about five inches into the air on that heel!

"What am I wearing!" I asked Cid in return. I reached toward the sky only to smack my hand into the feather that was hanging off my blood red French felt hat. These things hadn't existed in centuries! Not to mention half the bag hat was hanging against the side of my head. With the pants as dark and tight as the shirt that was beginning to itch, I immediately wasn't so happy with the world's supposed secure skin. "I didn't put this on!" Was all I could manage out in a snarl.

"If I'm not mistaken'," Cid sped over, still floating in his tin can. "Sometimes a world will react to an outsider this way. Ya have ta blend in anyway so make the best of it!" Easy for him to say. He wasn't the one stuck in it. "Are we gonna find Sora or not, kid?" Kick when I'm down. I worried that wouldn't be the last time he'd do that on this trip. The object reduced it's size in the blink of an eye and came in peace on my hat. With an alien on my head and a stumble of contorted balance to journey beside me, I began forward down the hall. "You walk like a woman."

"Shut up," I snapped. I found a table at the end of the hall, two small bottles sitting on it's very edge. I ignored them for the time being, too busy trying to find a door. To some disturbance, there was none, and it just had occurred to me then I was in a house. With no door. "Well, how the heck do I get out of here then?"

"Riku, look down there," Cid had gotten off my head at some point to float about. I clicked my heels over to crouch down and stare at what he was.

"Where did you get that machine anyway?" I asked out of no where. It looked toward me.

"I made it awhile ago for message deliveries. I jus' wanted ta try it out wit' ya." I nodded without statement and turned my attention back to our investigation. It was a small door with a face for a door knob. Very, very small. It snored like a bear despite that.

"That... better not be the door I have to go through," I announced to the room. It grunted at me in its sleep and I quickly began to spin around to find another doorway maybe obscured by a plant or something. I came back to it in the end. "No way! How can I go through there!"

"Noisy..." grumbled the door knob. I crouched back down and pressured my index finger into my thumb. I flicked the thing right between the eyes and snapped him back to life. "Well, I say - !"

"How do I go through you?" I forced on him. I was getting very frustrated with this world. "You're the only door here. I want in." He eyed me up and down, making my face feel hot because of the attire I was stuck with. It was a little unnecessary. I could feel a burning in the pit of my stomach, though. What if Sora was on the other side of that door?

"Riku! Over here!"

Sora...

"Out with it!" I yelled finally.

"On the table behind you there are two bottles. Drink from one and you shall shrink to my size." The door spoke arrogantly, as if I should've known that. I stood up straight and stepped over to the two bottles. "Those." He said when I looked at him with inquiry. "I'm not sure which one." He answered when I glared at him again. I had a 50/50 chance of shrinking so I had supposed it wouldn't be too bad to just take a guess. I was sure to hate myself later for that. Everything suddenly got smaller instead of larger and I felt my hat impact the ceiling before the top of my skull did. I cried out in agony and the door whistled at the injury. He laughed, even. Talk about insult...

"Stupid..." I grumbled and snatched the other bottle with the tips of my index finger and thumb. I downed it twice for double the effect and my body snapped into the tiny size I was searching for. Cid's contraption quite suddenly looked like a real space ship in descent. With a bitter mood hanging over me, I began to head for the door. I looked dead at him. "Gonna open now ?"

"Yes, yes," He yawned and swung open at the twitch of his nose. Cid shrunk down once again and trailed after me. Another corridor greeted us, about the same size as the last one only it was on a smaller scale. Really warped one's mind when you thought long enough about it. I could see a light at the end of the relentless tunnel and was dying to go faster but I had heels barring that way of travel. It didn't take too much longer to find myself in a courtyard - literally. It was definitely a courtroom but in a beautiful garden.

"Seize him!" I heard a vicious woman scream and I was shocked to see several playing cards take hold of my limbs. "Bring him to me!" These...poker cards! They were moving! And they had me captive, no less! Wonderland was definitely a trippy place to be. I basically went willingly along side of them as they walked me up the alley and to a wooden stand. Before me was the judge's stand and the judge behind it was a very large woman with a very ugly face. Figuratively and sincerely. "Who are you?"

Was she really a woman, I thought. My jaw hung open before and after my answer. "Riku," I gaped. She slammed her gavel a couple times and I slammed my hands on my ears. She could crack the Earth with that power.

"I've heard of no Riku! Are you part of the conspiracy that involved that girl, Alice?" Who? What? Conspiracy? I was confused, to say the least. Dragged by inanimate objects before what seemed to be a queen by the looks of her outfit and crown - Wait. The door knob had a face! What the Hell! "ANSWER ME!" She boomed in my direction.

I jerked back into attention like a soldier under command and shook my head. "I don't know any Alice, ma'am!" With the look she gave me I realized Cid's intimidation level was nothing in comparison. She was Satan herself, this majesty of a poker deck. She tapped her finger in thought, deciding silently whether she should believe me or not. I almost died when she spoke again.

"Alright... It has been a very long time since she disappeared... But if I find out that you have anything to do with it, Riku, It'll be off with your head!" I gave a silent stammer of agreement and postponed any sign of fear until my back was turned. Just as my eyes got off her and I began to walk down the aisle, Cid's big mouth said,

"That's a one mean, huge bitch."

"What!" She yelled out after us. I turned to the machine as if it had lost it's mind and by the time I met the Queen's gaze, she had already been screaming to kill us both. I had wanted to avoid this, but I quickly ran for my dear, sweet life. Or what was to be left of it. The heels on my boots were definitely making me doubt my chances of survival.

"Cid! What the Hell was that!" I screamed at him. He slammed the machine into the back of my skull, nearly knocking me right over and to my inevitable death. I found the grass getting greener and the world growing more lush around me. Flowers and trees began to conquer but the cards did not relinquish their goal of capturing me for extermination. "I have nothing to fight with!" I wailed, and turned around to start ducking and dodging. I had hit a dead end of thick trees. I was trapped to be killed; the prey had been cornered.

I felt a rush inside of me. I thought I was going to vomit but it reminded me more like a thick pole jamming through my chest. No pain, just an undesirable feeling. I was doing my best to avoid getting my head knocked off my shoulders, all my mind screaming was to survive. Blaring to me, it would, if not roaring. I was afraid. The doubts and anxieties began to increase ten fold and my vision of the future was foggy. If it weren't for that ramming in the center of my breast and the consistent badgering my brain was persuing, I still believe I would have died. For I could hear his name. I could hear his voice.

Riku!

Sora.

Come on!

Sora...

That meant... everything to me... (1)

"I need to find SORA!"

It was a light. It wasn't like a bright light you see at the end of a tunnel or when you swear you're dying you reach for it's beauty and comfort. It carried an eerie manner to it, as if to say it was the darkest light to ever exist. When it flashes it cackles, when it fades it coos. A candle in the mist but without a radiance; A diamond without it's sparkle; A star that doesn't twinkle; a sun that doesn't shine. A very deep... dark light.

I imagined a weight was added to my arm, a new force swarming from my finger tips with each swing. The card had stabbed through the hat on my head only to find himself sliced completely in half on the Earth. My bangs flashed before my eyes and I just kept slashing, some how taking each enemy out with each heavy sweep of my arm. I felt more exhausted by the moment that passed through me, the sand grains of time exploding into millions of particles each millisecond I fought this battle. I had a desert at my feet for the eternity it had taken to finally be the last one standing.

"Ah ha!" Cid snorted through the speaker. "That army sucked! If a wussy kid like you could take 'em on.."

I snapped my attention to the machine to thoroughly chew him out before it quickly jerked back to the trees falling down behind me. Standing far taller than my shrunken body was a machine of unexplainable mechanics. Legs jointed like bones, larger than the other half of its figure. The arms dented consistently and, predictably enough, remind me of cards meeting at each end. With four heads of checker pieces stacked high upon it's torso, I felt pretty screwed.

"Cid!" I looked at him. "You need to shut the Hell up!" I shouted in surprise and leapt away when it suddenly came crashing down on me with it's purple bowling pin in hand. It wasn't going to waste time with my disposal. There was no way I could beat this thing without taking a severe trashing first.

But then I felt it.

Awaken!

There was a flare inside my chest. It was no longer pain but something like strength. Power. My cumbrous arm felt more and more like a feather, light but shifty, but similar to a sword, durable and deadly. My vision was distorted but I had never been able to see so clearly. My goal was beyond this monster and he was in my way.

With that, it ended before I knew it began. That awkward body was crumbled at my feet, broken and destroyed. So were a few trees around us but all they did was bury the corpses of cards I had left without graves. I found myself with my arm in the air, a defensive stance prepared for one final attack that never came forth. I swung my limb down and heard something smash into the dirt.

It was then I noticed that the weight of my arm was all being squeezed in my fist. Slowly my gaze went downward and I was in disbelief as to what I saw. In my hand was a long, black and white steel object. The handle reminded me of a spade, which made me feel a little sick over everything I had just destroyed. Within it was the bar I was clutching and on the white side, outlining the curve, was a molding of an erect angel wing. On the opposite side, in the same fashion only black, was a more jagged wing - Grotesque and bitter. The white and black swirled along the center of the staff, a spiral of chaos and tranquility until it's very edge. Yet another angelic wing curled and embraced the same disguting, dark one.

Forgiveness. It was forgiving the other. Cradling it despite its faults, comforting it despite its inhumanity. Just what on Earth was I holding? I then saw at the tip of the handle, swing and clinking against the metal, was a chain with a figure on the end of it. My heart stopped at the sight of it.

"Sora's crown."

Indeed, it was the same half-crown pendant the boy had given me hanging off the item I had just used as a weapon. Not a replica, not something close to it - It was the same. I could see the indentations of an "S" glittering at me. I reached for my neck... As suspected, it was gone. What had I just done? What was this thing? Was this what was bumping deep in my -

"OOOHHH! It's a keyblaaaaaade!" I screamed and swung the 'blade' toward the voice at hand. I whacked the head off a purple-striped cat. Inevitably I found myself screaming in panic this time. "Ooh, my, ooh, my. To behead is not useful if a head to behead is already heading off." Three words flashed into my head: No freakin' way.

He held his head in his arms, giving me a precarious look before rupturing a pleased smile. He had way too many teeth. My guess was it was definitely a feline just an abnormal color. I wasn't imagining things; I wasn't going insane. At least I had hoped I wasn't and prayed that I wouldn't be after the encounter. Despite my denial at what I was seeing, for I had seen everything else - I don't know why I bothered to freak out anymore - I took in the words he had scared the crap out of me with.

"A key-what?" I asked.

"Keyblade," He repeated. He swung his tail off his perch like a content tiger in a warm jungle, only this place was a miserable dark forest that made me want to burn it to the ground. He popped his head back on in a way it literally popped and reminded me of a doll. "You have it yet you don't know it? Unacceptable, said the Flamingo." I had no idea what he was talking about but I went with it regardless. He obviously knew something for being a weird cat.

"How do you know what a Keyblade is?" I questioned. He cackled; I cowered.

"Long ago, in a far off land that was two feet from where you stand, stood another child who looked just like you, only his hair was nappier and his face was completely different." I narrowed my eyes in intimidation. He didn't care at all as to what my expression had to say, though. "In his hand, he had the same keyblade as you, only simpler and less personalized." My eye twitched but I listened. "And he ran off with Alice to somewhere known but unknown to me."

Alice! The Queen had said that name. A boy with a keyblade ran off with Alice. Nappy hair, a child?

"Mister... er," I gave up trying to address him properly rather fast. "This boy. Was his name Sora?"

"Quite possibly!" He answered enthusiastically. My hopes had never shot so high. "But, in turn, quite impossibly." I gripped the keyblade with both hands, ready to cut down his tree to beat him to death. "But then it is unknown when one never has intentions to question another's nature. It's all about right questions in trivial matters - for each wrong one leads deeper into deceit. Each unasked is another unanswered and further is the spiral of confusion and hate."

The tip of the blade thunked into the ground, fading away into the same eerie darkness that had brought it forth. I felt the chain curl around my neck in return. The words the cat had spoken made no sense to me... at that time. I didn't realize how significant the ramblings of a crazy animal would later impact my life.

I had left Wonderland without any real clue to where Sora had been or where he was going to be. While I was happy to be out of those clothes, I couldn't help but feel a small chunk of my hope being yanked away from me, casted into the stars I had taken to travelling through. Cid stayed silent for once, probably fearing the ship would be blasted from the sky should he open his mouth once again. While I i was pretty angry at what he had caused, I didn't like the silence. I didn't want to think about the confusion the purple cat had riled up inside of me.

"Cid?" I called out. Only idle noises came through the speaker. I sighed and quickly gave up on bothering him any further. I actually regretted calling his name the moment I did but then I found myself feeling worse that he hadn't replied. I could be a professional emotion batter with the mood swings I was taking. I took my comfort to the window of the ship and allowed myself to wonder if it was everything Sora had seen. Did he enjoy it? He always loved the stars. We'd watch them for a long time together. Such as one time when I crawled to his window... (2)

The ship suddenly rumbled. I gripped the arm rests at first before snatching up the wheel. "Cid?" I called out again. I heard some clatter from his end but not before the ship started screeching wildly. "Ci - GAH!" My gummi ship had spiraled once upon the impact it had recieved, the wall reaching out for me.

"Riku! It's a meteor shower! Ri - Wat -!" He was breaking up but I knew what he was trying to say. He didn't have to have a clear reception to relay this message. I tried to keep my control and balance to the ship but not before it top-sized and began to descend. I could taste the smoke in the air around me, choking me till I was blue in the face and black in the eyes. I couldn't concentrate on any safety measures or emergency procedures that I had learned in general first aid and whatnot. My body's surprise had hit my mind's pause button.

I blacked out, my last sight a round, green object in the distance. It reminded me of my home only much more endowed with trees. At least I thought it was. I had fallen asleep before I had a second look.

(1) This quote may not be recognized unless you read the side story that comes before this chapter.

(2) This will be another side story. Side stories will more than likely be occurring every two chapaters! Yay!

Yes. I did a total cop out on the Trickmaster fight sequence. I don't like detailing fights in my stories. Unless they have significance. You've played the game. You don't need me to go through it!