The room was littered with different machination: pipes, keyboards, wires, lights. All lead to the center of the room; the importance of the very building, the very world. The young man could feel the strength of the protective barrier as he placed a hand to its surface. A large black door with red spidery veins flowing over its surface loomed over him. A broken heart. The heart of the world Footsteps called out to him from the entrance of the hall. He turned, dark cloak curtains swishing at his ankles. The Keyblade master had come.

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His eyes flashed open to a maroon sky. Steam billowed out of towers and streaked the sky like white tears. Riku rubbed his eyes in disbelief.

Where am I?

And then the memories came rushing back, flooding his mind. Closing his eyes to seek refuge with what he knew was familiar, Riku took a few minutes to calm himself down, although this brief rest offered him no less of a shock to his surroundings.

He was sitting upon a platform in the middle of a lake surrounded by massive waterfalls. These waterfalls, however, flowed up. Ahead in the distance was a huge complex: a castle. Tires and towers twisted out at odd angles from the building which was easily several stories high. Elevator platforms ran on invisible wires and flew around at timed intervals, working to the inner clockwork of the building. A huge heart emblem was splayed across the center of the building. It was cracked purposefully, and it gave Riku ominous shivers.

Better get a move on. Riku jumped up with gracefully ease to the nearest platform. In its center was a fountain. He had no idea what he was doing. Did he want to go to the castle? How could he even get there? Riku debated as he splashed his face with the fountain's cool, refreshing water. Sauntering over to the edge of the platform, he saw that it careened down to the unknown depths of the pounding waterfalls. He glanced forward and all he could see were pink clouds extending all around the falls. But ahead was the castle. Was there any plausible way to reach it? Would someone inside be able to return him home? His thoughts were answered in a whoosh of sound as an elevator swooped down for the castle. Riku looked on with hesitation at the mysterious device, but had no choice other than to step on and let the elevator take him to his fate.

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The castle was full of never-ending rooms. Riku had been walking for hours, meeting no one, hearing nothing but the steady rhythm of his own breaths and footsteps on cold stone floors. He had passed through numerous halls; all empty, but full of exquisite art and statues. Eventually, Riku reached the wide expanses of a hallway. Straight ahead was a cascading wall fountain and as Riku gazed upwards, he saw the ceiling reached another level of balconies. There were three doors in the upper level of the first floor, and he hesitantly entered into the farthest left. An extended library filled with books met his eyes. An inspection of a few showed that many were written in different languages and contained things beyond Riku's knowledge. The sensation Riku had after opening several books was not pleasant. Had he just gained the power to control elements? Riku decided to try out his theory. Randomly, he picked up a book from within a deep shelf. The cover illustrated a strange creature seemingly made of nothing but darkness with yellow eyes and searching antennas under a mysterious symbol and a Roman numeral two.

Closing his eyes, Riku imagined the book bursting into green flames. He heard no sound. But when he opened his eyes, the book was slowly shriveling into an emerald ball of flame. The flame dissipated in a matter of seconds. Shocked and disturbed, Riku quickly left the library. Perhaps it was for his benefit that he had not met anyone within the castle. He had no idea what could become if they so chose to attack and he defended himself with his newfound powers.

What interested Riku the most about the castle was when he passed through the rooms in which the elevators ran. The rooms always were open to a wide ceiling that continued up and up, possibly throughout the whole castle. Invisible fences littered the premises and Riku often got shocked. He couldn't continue and would have to turn back in search of another way.

For the tenth time after meeting such a block, Riku had entered the elevator room again, but this time he succeeded in finding the correct path. In front of him stood a giant door that eased open smoothly and silently. His eyes met darkness in the next room. Deeper in the room stood five shadows, each different shapes and quite possibly species, around a dais in green brazier light. About to take a step forward, what Riku heard next thoroughly convinced to stay where he was.

"That little squirt took down that Heartless! Who'd have thought it?" An angry tone met his ears. The man sounded annoyed, and Riku slipped further back in the shadows whence he came. And what were the Heartless he had mentioned?

"Such is the power of the Keyblade. The child's strength is not his own." This new voice sounded slithery like a snake. Keyblade? Sweat began to bead on Riku's forehead. What that the blade he had seen before the darkness took over him as he left the island? Questions came from every direction and Riku found it hard not to express his location just to get some answers.

"Why don't we turn him into a Heartless? That'll settle things quick enough!" A woman's voice. Riku could easily tell she was a conniving witch by her malicious laugh.

"And the brat's friends are the king's lackeys. Swoggle me eyes, they're all bilge rats by the look of them!" Another new voice declared. Who was this king? No king had ever existed in the world Riku knew. But I'm certainly not in my world anymore… he pondered.

"You're no prize yourself." A wicked chuckle emanated from a fifth person.

"Shut up!" Riku saw a flash of silver bounce off the walls and into the shadows of the strange light. A weapon? Would a fight break out? That could provide him with enough cover to slip away. But he was wrong. The situation could only prove direr. A sixth shadow crept out from behind the others with commanding an air of prowess. In the flickering light Riku saw the features to be that of a woman clothed in a black cape and carrying a cane. A hood adorned her head, horns sprouting from the base. Riku's blood chilled to the bone with an unknown recognition.

"Enough! The Keyblade has chosen him. Will it be he who conquers the darkness? Or will the darkness swallow him? Either way, he could be quite useful."

The meeting adjourned with this statement. Thankfully, the visitors left through another side door and did not spare a glance to Riku's hiding spot. But the commanding woman, the last speaker, stayed and watched an image appear on the dais. Riku's position was wrong to view what it displayed, but he could tell it was a trio of three people. One of them was carrying the mythical blade Riku had been denied. The Keyblade.

"I am graced with the presence of the true Keyblade master, am I not? Do not be afraid, for I hold all the answers you seek. Come forth."

The woman turned her head and gazed straight into the shadows to Riku's eyes. He knew those eyes had just grazed his heart, his soul. Challenging the woman with the same level-headed stare, he had no choice but to stride forward into her clutches.

"You must forgive me, for I am very tired from the strain of imbeciles and so must you be from your journey. Let's schedule our tête-à-tête for another time, shall we?" The witch turned her back to Riku and appeared to be gazing onto the dais once again.

"I refuse. I want some answers now." He shouted into the darkness. His words reverberated around the high ceilings, but the woman ignored him. Instead, her glance shifted to the door that her accomplices had exited through and nodded.

"You may take him now. Seek into his memories and altar his mind to fight for our cause, but do not take his heart. He will be more useful with it."

"I won't be taken anywhere!" A shuffling a many feet soon enveloped the sound of Riku's voice as thousands of shadows crawled along the floor straight to him. He turned to escape but before he could even call upon his magic, the creatures tackled him. A pair of yellow eyes flashed humorously in front of Riku and he seemed to hear a twisted sort of cackle before his mind went blank.