Note 1: Sorry for having to post this again, but I don't own Kingdom Hearts or its characters, but I do own Ale and Nela.

Note 2: Chapter 4 will probably be the longest chapter in the series. But it's worth it. This chapter has important details, surprising… surprises, and most of all, action! Enjoy!

Chapter 4- Predicaments

As the Gummy ship blasted through the celestial bodies, Ale opened up the Invasion report. "It says here, Olympus Coliseum." He then moved over in his chair to large grid. He pressed a series of coordinates into the grid and spoke into a microphone "Launch submitted coordinates." And the Gummy ship made a sharp turn and headed in the direction at an even faster speed.

"The autopilot will take it from here." Said Ale to his friends who sat in the cockpit alongside him. "So how long will it take?" asked Nela, "About an hour." Replied Ale.

Cloud wondered for minute then asked "So how do expect to fight Sephiroth if you're just freeing worlds. You do want to fight him don't you?"

"Of course." He replied "And I do have a plan. Sephiroth doesn't just go out of his way to deal with any annoyance. We need to get him so annoyed and interfere with so many of his plans that he'll have to deal with me-or I guess us- himself. Luckily I've interfered with enough worlds' conquests so that it'll only be a few more worlds until he comes to try and stop us."

"I guess that'll work." Said Cloud. A few seconds later, Ale yawned "Maybe I should take a quick rest before we get there." He said sleepily. "For the Keyblade master, you're pretty lazy!" said Nela jokingly, "Maybe I should've gotten that Keyblade." Teased Cloud. "Honestly, I wouldn't mind if you took it." Replied Ale "I really hate this thing." "Why?" asked Nela "If I got a mystic sword that could save worlds I would be excited." Ale sighed "Well I thought that too at first, but after so many times having to stop Heartless and other disgusting beasts every day… well… I want a life."

"Why can't you give it to someone or throw it away?" asked Nela. Ale held out the Keyblade to Cloud "Take it." "But I already know the legend and I-" "Look just take it." Cloud took it in his hands, annoyed. Ale focused and the Keyblade reappeared in his hands. "Woah! Let me try!" Nela exclaimed. She grabbed the Keyblade in her hands. Ale sighed and put his hand out. He then looked down to find them empty "What?" Ale said in extreme confusion. He tried again and again only to find his hand without a Keyblade. He simply grabbed it. Ale said "Uh…uh… its faulty…?" "Never mind." Replied Cloud, "You're tired. You should rest." "Good idea." Said Ale, "Maybe we all should. Autopilot will take care of things and we'll know when we get there. Nela and Cloud agreed.

He took them to the back area of the Gummy ship and punched in a three-digit code into a panel on the wall. "Man, you have a code for everything on this ship, don't you?" Asked Cloud "Hey, it's SOLDIER, not me." replied Ale.

A door opened and in it were four beds extending from the walls, two on each side, one on top, one below. Ale jumped into the top right, Nela climbed into the bottom right, Cloud into the bottom left. They slept for the most relaxing hour they had in a while…

They woke up to the wound of annoying beeps. Ale mumbled "Come on, just a few more minutes!" Cloud moaned and Nela yawned. Unfortunately they had to get out. Ale yawned "Well we're here! Time to get that Keyhole!" "Yeah!" exclaimed Nela. "Lets go!" agreed Cloud.

They stepped out of the Gummy ship and the bright light stung their sensitive eyes. They had, after all just spent an hour in the dark depths of space.

They saw a huge patch a sand-looking floor. At its end was a door with two statues of gladiators clashing swords. They were almost as big as Darksides.

They walked up to the door and pushed it open. Inside was a room very small by comparison to the outside area. There were four trophies, two on each of the right and left walls. Directly in front was a passageway about as tall and wide as a doorway whose only obstruction was a sign that read "closed". To the right of that, writing something on a clipboard was a small and chubby creature that resembled a centaur with one pair of small legs. His back was facing the three of them.

"Hey!" called Ale to the creature. "I told ya already!" he exclaimed angrily "No pass, no games!". "What's it to you?" Ale yelled back. "That's it!" the creature said, holding back his temper. He turned and looked like he was about to charge but froze in position. "Ale!" he said happily. He walked up to Ale and shook his hand "Hey Phil! Been a while!" replied Ale "No kiddin." He replied "What's it been, like three years?" he asked, "Where've ya been?". "Well… some things happened, I had things to do."

"You know each other?" asked Nela. "Yeah!" replied Phil, "Ale over here was one of the Coliseum's best competitors! One of the few SOLDIER captains I actually liked! So Ale, you gonna enter a tournament? The crowd's missed ya."

"Sorry Phil," replied Ale, "but there's something we have to do here. Have you seen any Heartless?" "Oh man. I can't believe I almost forgot to say." Said Phil "Hades has been making Heartless! He's the one behind this! In fact Hercules is there right now on the job!"

Ale interrupted him "No Phil… SOLDIER's the one behind this…" "What?" asked Phil. Ale said, "Sephiroth makes the Heartless, not Hades. Speaking of which, you should stop opening this place to SOLDIER." Phil replied, " What about you?" Oh don't worry," replied Ale, "I quit SOLDIER a while ago."

Phil said, "But Hades has an artificial Heartless machine. And he's hooked it up to the Underworld's central spirit station so now he's spittin out more Heartless than SOLDIER was before, and they're stronger than usual!"

"Then we should hurry." said Ale. Phil started to say "But wait there's a-" "No time." Ale interrupted. He turned to Cloud and Nela "Hurry, we have no time to lose." Ale opened the door and walked into the center of the outside area. He put out his hand and a dark portal appeared. "You're still in tune with the darkness?" asked Cloud "Only slightly." Replied Ale "Now let's go."

They ran into the portal. Phil then came, running out of the inner area door screaming "Wait!" and jumped into the portal just as it closed.

They arrived in the Underworld. They were in the center of a narrow piece of land with three paths extending from it. One leading to a light staircase (must've been how Hercules got here), the other two each leading to one of two rocky walls with a crack down the center.

They turned and saw Phil come flying from the portal Ale had made and then saw the portal disappear.

"Phil," Ale said, "which way to the machine?"

Phil was panting heavily "I-I can't -pant- -pant- tell you! In the Unerdwor-" he was interrupted by the sudden appearance of a dark figure. The figure turned into a man with blue skin and blue fire for hair. "I am Hades! King of the Dead! Ruler of the Underworld!"

"Yeah yeah yeah, give me a sec ok?" Ale replied casually "What was that Phil-" "WHAT? You dare address me, Hades, Lord of the Undead, with such a casual tone? In my Underworld?"

Ale finally gave him his attention "Ok so you wanna be defeated again, huh?" Hades looked at him "You! Oh, this'll be good!" "What?" asked Cloud, "I owned this guy way back." Replied Ale, "Fine Hades, time to beat some info out of your dead, fiery ass! Here's the question: where's the Heartless machine?" Ale made the Keyblade appear in his hands. Phil stared "You're the Keyblade master? And you didn't tell me!" "Sorry." Said Ale "Forgot to tell you in all this." "If I may butt in," interrupted Hades, "the Heartless machine is in my chamber." "What?" Ale asked in confusion. "It's not like I'm worried or anything.

"That's it!" he exclaimed "You're going down!"

He tried to move the Keyblade…and nothing happened. "Hey!" he yelled in frustration. "What's wrong?" asked Nela. "I don't know. I guess in all the stuff happening before, I didn't realize that I can't feel my arm!"

"Yeah," said Hades, "in the Underworld, heroes are zeroes! Nice effect, don't ya think?" Ale thought of something "Ok Hades," he said "I was saving this for a rainy day!" he used the rest of his strength to move the arm without the Keyblade and yelled "Aquagun!" his supposedly 'fierce water spell just sent a trickle of water two feet ahead of him. "My magic!" he exclaimed.

"Now Keyblader!" exclaimed Hades, "Die!" Hades focused on conjuring a large fireball in his hand. It was about twice Ale's size.

"Cloud, Nela, Phil! Put your hands on my shoulder! Give me your energy!" they cooperated, since a blast that big would be extremely dangerous and they had no other plan to stop Hades. Ale stored in the little energy his friends had left.

"Die Keyblade master!" Hades released the colossal fireball at Ale. Almost immediately after he said this he exclaimed "Reflegun!" And with that a large half-sphere shield protected the four of them from the fireball. "Shatter!" Ale shouted. The shield broke into hundreds of sharp magical pieces. "Chaos Needles!" he exclaimed. The shield pieces flew towards Hades. He yelled in pain and was stunned long enough for the four to conjure a new portal and escape…

"What was that?" asked Ale, in the outside area of the coliseum, "I tried to tell ya!" Phil exclaimed furiously, "The underworld's dark energy takes away all power from people who reside in light! The only reason you could use magic at all is because you still have some darkness in you!"

"Then how is Hercules fighting down there?" asked Ale.

"He has the Olympus Stone. It counters the effect of the Underworld."

"Then that's it." Said Cloud, "We need the Olympus Stone."

"But more importantly," replied Ale, "we need Hercules."