crystalfeathers: I don't know much about nobodies, though they talked about them in Chain of Memories. Yes, readers, I have CoM. I got to the last of my first set of map cards in Riku's story by the time I updated this. Meaning, of course, that I will be purchasing Kingdom Hearts 2 soon. Boo yah!

kingdomhearts soar: I didn't even notice his pants. … Wait, that came out VERY wrong.

Rike-sama, where are you? I need you to review!

Chapter 6 - First Battle

So many questions... So few answers. Was the Dark Love going to affect me? Was it just a mind trick? Would White Cherry turn to evil and turn me in? And... what had her true name been?

More than anything, though, the words that Midnight had spoken were constantly coming back to me. "I don't just kiss any Imperfect." Even after remembering the way he had killed Coral, something still didn't seem right. What did he mean? Did he kiss me because I had powers and wanted them preserved? Or was he an Imperfect... who loved me?

The next thing I knew, someone's arm was wrapped around mine. I looked up to see Midnight, gripping me firmly and giving me a cold stare. Before I could scream, he covered my mouth and lifted me into the air.

"You're coming with me," he growled, dragging me out the door.

"Hey, what are you doing?" I tried to shout, but my words were muffled.

"Be quiet or be destroyed!"

I took the first choice and let the Black Fungus drag me down the hall. Well, looks like all my questions are about to be answered, I thought as his quote came back to me for about the millionth time that night. I saw several Heartless, including Mauve, peek out of their rooms to watch me be dragged away. I knew that if it had not been the greatest Imperfect hunter of all time, my new friend would have jumped to the rescue the moment they saw me. I understood why he did not want to take his chances, and I did not want his life on the line just so that he could save me.

But why is Cherry not curious about this? I thought. Her room's nearby here, isn't it?

Midnight pushed the castle's main doors open and carried me outside. It was still pretty dark, and the sun would not be up for a few more hours. Most importantly of all, the Heartless that patrolled this area would not be on duty for a while. Thank Walt.

"You're one very unlucky mushroom, Lilac," Midnight hissed as he continued to force me closer and closer to the castle's end. "Both you and your White Cherry friend."

By now, my mouth had been released from his grip. "What are you talking about?" I demanded.

A few steps further, Midnight knocked on a certain part of the wall with his free hand. I looked up to find the source of the whirring that had begun and gasped. A mechanical arm jutted out of the wall, and a cage dangled on the end of it. As the arm lowered the cage toward my captor and me, I saw that the girl inside it was none other than Cherry!

"No!" I half-shouted, watching my dismayed friend stare at me with her innocent eyes. "Let her go!"

"This is the only way," Midnight stated, releasing me. I ran over to the cage and wrapped the ends of my arms around the bars.

"Cherry, are you okay?" I asked, panting in fear for my best friend.

"Yeah, I'm fine," the White Mushroom replied. If her mouth had been visible, she would have been giving a poor excuse for a smile; that much I could tell by the tone of her voice.

"Lilac," Midnight began, causing me to wheel around and face him, "since you now know that the work of Dark Love is a mere illusion, this is the only way to get you on our side." He narrowed his eyes as the mechanical arm lifted the cage again. "Either you surrender your heart to Maleficent, or your little friend here gets to go 'swimming.'"

I gasped as the cage was positioned over the edge of the castle, right over the water that seemed miles below. "You… You wouldn't!" I cried, shaking my head. Not only would a fall into the water from that height prove to be extremely painful (if not deadly), White Mushrooms could not swim due to their lack of legs! Pure panic overcame me. Was this it? Would my heart finally be devoured by darkness for the sake of my best friend?

"Make a choice, Miss Imperfect," Midnight taunted. "Either your heart… or your friend!"

No… No, this can't be. I began mentally sobbing. "You're a… a monster!" I growled, clenching what would be my fists had I possessed hands. "Only someone as low as the underworld (1) itself would do something like this!"

Midnight laughed. "You have exactly sixty seconds before I choose for you. Better hurry up!"

That… was… it! I bent down and began fanning myself, earning a look of confusion from Midnight. A second later, I sat up, ice shooting out of my hands. The Black Fungus shouted in shock before running out of the line of fire… err, ice.

"You'll regret that, you fool mushroom!" Midnight shouted, jumping in my direction. He bent down and shot poisonous gas at me. I turned away and plugged my nose and mouth to avoid breathing any of it in. When I turned back around, Midnight was readying to knock on another spot on the wall, obviously to send Cherry to her doom. I froze in place for an instant, and Midnight did the same thing as I regained my mobility. Thank goodness for Stopra spells.

"And you'll pay for kidnapping Cherry," I muttered, hanging my head and letting a light shine over me. I threw my arms into the air and summoned lightning from the sky to strike down on Midnight. He shouted in pain and fell to the ground. I walked over to where he lay and was about to cast another spell, but he quickly stood up and turned to stone. He jumped into the air again and exhaled another puff of poison gas. This time, I was a bit too late to dodge it and ended up inhaling a good bit. I threw myself down onto the ground and began coughing, hoping that it had not been enough to hurt me.

"LILAC!" Cherry shouted from above, her voice full of worry.

Midnight chuckled softly and hovered over me, his body back to normal. "I told you you'd regret attacking me, you fool. Not only have you injured yourself, but your friend is about to take the plunge as well." I slowly felt my strength being sapped from me. Why could I not cast a Cure spell? "You refused to accept my offer," Midnight continued, "and now you're going to pay the price. Both of you shall regret the day you began your rebellious ways!"

It became harder for me to breathe. Was I… dying? Or would my heart simply collapse (2), leaving me as a true Heartless? Either way, I was doomed. But I refused to go down. I closed my eyes, summoning every last ounce of strength I had left. It had to work… I had to live! I had to rescue my best friend! Finally, I found the strength to pull myself off the ground until I was straight up again. My vision was a blur, and I wobbled slightly.

"I would force you back down," Midnight began, "since it looks like you're about to do that yourself. Do you really think you can get out of this alive? Give it up!"

"No…" I whispered. "I won't give up." A new force entered my voice. "Cherry is my best friend in the world. I don't care if I die trying, but I'm going to rescue her! Even if it takes all I have, I'll make sure that you never hurt her again!" I held up my hands and moved them in an arch shape like I had done with I first discovered my powers. Bells appeared over my head, and my strength returned. Breathing became easier for me, and my heart began beating with power that it never had before.

Midnight seemed to have entered a state of shock for a split second, but he recovered and resumed his evil glare. "Fine. You want to fight, then we'll fight!"

"We already were fighting," I growled, taking a step forward. "And this is one fight that I plan to finish!"

"Try me, stupid mushroom!"

"Gladly!"

I began to spin around in circles. A defending whirlwind, also known as Aero (3), appeared around me, prepared to block back anything he had to throw at me. Midnight turned to stone and jumped at me, only to be knocked back into the wall by my Aero spell.

Suddenly, the robotic arm above us began to move, and it brought the cage holding my friend away from the water. It lowered to the ground, and the door swung open.

"What the?" Midnight gasped, backing away. He looked over at the wall and growled. "I don't believe this." (It was right about here that I noticed that he had not been stone for several seconds.) "How did you manage to get me right where White Cherry would be free?"

"Lilac!" Cherry called, running to me from her cage. She embraced me with joy. "I knew you could do it!"

I turned to Midnight. "Ha!" I laughed, putting my hands on my hips. "Now you don't have a hostage! Looks like you've lost this round, Midnight!"

"I may have lost this round," Midnight muttered, "but this battle, this war, is far from over!" He charged at us, holding out his hands to send poison our way. I held up my arms to cast another Aero spell, but something had already jumped in front of Cherry and me.

Something orange.

To be continued…

Ha HA! Ended that one on a cliffhanger, I did.

Anyway, it might be a while before I update this again. I need to finish uploading Behind the Mask and work on Shalla's Legacy as well as my other storiesn that I HAVEN'T canceled.

By the way, feel free to guess whom the orange figure is.

Few Author Notes:

I changed the first genre to Action/Adventure since there's going to be some more… uh, action and adventure in the story. Also, this story's rating may be changed to T if it gets any more violent.

(1): I would have used a stronger word here, but I figured since the Kingdom Hearts world's devil is going to be Hades, I might as well say "underworld."

(2): I realize that there's nothing simple about a heart collapsing, especially compared to death itself.

(3): I KNOW that there's a stronger version of this, but I was too lazy to look it up.