"Miss? Miss?"
Someone was shaking her gently to awaken her. Elvie groaned and clawed at the air. She tried to mumble an objection, but found herself voiceless. This made her eyes snap open in horror as she reached up to clutch her throat. The being had said she would lose her voice…
"Miss? Are you all right?"
Elvie blinked and stared at the young boy who had been shaking her. He was so familiar, with his neat glasses and pensive, earnest face…
"Klaus!" she mouthed helplessly as she leapt to her feet. "Klaus Baudelaire!"
"She knows who you are," a different voice said, bewildered.
Elvie glanced over and realized that she was surrounded by a small assortment of heroes from all of her favorite storylines - Obi-Wan Kenobi was the one who had spoken. He must have used the Force to read her thoughts. He would undoubtedly be searching for Padmé.
Nearby them stood a blonde woman in a huge sparkly purple dress - Glinda the Good, Elvie thought. She would be seeking Elphaba, Wicked Witch of the West.
Elvie turned her eyes back to Klaus Baudelaire, who was either thirteen or fourteen. He would be looking for Violet. Elvie frowned in concern. "Sunny?" she mouthed.
"She wants to know where Sunny is," Obi-Wan translated, eyeing her curiously. "We're inside, Miss. The sun isn't out."
"Not the sun," Klaus said in awe. "My little sister. Her name's Sunny. How did you know about her? Who are you?
Elvie waved a hand and mouthed again, "Sunny?"
"She won't say how she knows of Sunny," Obi-Wan informed Klaus. "She just wants to know where she is. I think she wants to make certain she's safe." He paused briefly. "Her name is Elvie," he added.
"Elvie," Glinda said from her small corner of the room. "That's a pretty name. It makes me think of Elphie. That's who I'm looking for, you know."
Elvie nodded. I'm sorry. She turned to look back at close and tilted her head to the side slightly, mouthing for the third time, "Sunny?"
"She's fine," Klaus promised. "I left her with Justice Strauss. We were warned that only one of us could search for Violet."
Curious, Elvie thought, and then moved on to the rest of the group.
She spotted Faramir, Steward of Gondor, pacing worriedly behind Klaus. He would be searching for Éowyn.
On either side of them, two figures stood, huge space separating them. One of them was an amazing, hulking figure, a mass of muscles. Elvie guessed immediately that this was Mr. Incredible, although she was a little surprised that he would come looking for Mirage. Across from Mr. Incredible, a tall, lean figure stood. This was undoubtedly Raoul from Phantom of the Opera, seeking Christine.
Elvie curtsied to each of the members of the group politely, feeling ashamed that she could not say a word.
"She can't speak," Obi-Wan said softly. "Her voice was taken from her. I do not know by whom."
Klaus's eyes lit up. "You're the Key Wielder, aren't you?" he said. "You're the one that Dathro told us about!"
Elvie raised an eyebrow. "Dathro?" she mouthed.
"She doesn't know who he is," Obi-Wan says. "At least, the name isn't familiar. But I can see images of him in her head. They must have met."
"Well, are you the Key Wielder, or aren't you?" Raoul demanded, shifting restlessly. "We need to find Christine as soon as possible! We haven't got a moment to lose!"
Elvie glared at him a bit unkindly, but nodded shortly. She raised her hand and closed it around thin air, silently praying that her key blade would appear. She smiled when she felt smooth, cold metal grow inside her loosely closed fist, and at the gasps of appreciation from around the room.
"Well, what are we waiting for, then?" Mr. Incredible demanded, stepping forward. "We've got the Key Wielder - now all we have to do is find out where our captured friends are and bring them back."
Elvie felt as though another part of her was suddenly taking over. She shook her head and waved the key blade slightly to silence her compatriots. She turned to Obi-Wan and began to rapid-fire thoughts at him.
"She says it's not that simple," Obi-Wan began, staring directly into her eyes as her mind spoke for her. "As she has come to understand it, it is her duty to travel to each of our worlds - with all of us in tow - and save the worlds first, before our enemies overtake them. Once balance has been struck in each world, only then will we be able to move on to our final destination. She thinks, however, that there will be many clues on each world to help lead us to the missing people we love. She insists that it's very important we go to the other worlds.
There was a brief silence as the group took in her words. Finally, Faramir shifted and spoke. "And what," he said slowly, angrily, "About my betrothed? Is she to merely waste away in the confines of whatever prison this beastly Dathro has taken her to?"
Elvie glanced at Obi-Wan again.
"Dathro," he began, addressing her, "Is the hooded being who you spoke to before you arrived her."
Recognition dawned in her eyes, and she nodded, all the while keeping her gaze locked on Obi-Wan.
"She says that they are not rotting in a prison," Obi-Wan corrected Faramir. "She promises that they are all well protected." He stopped and stared at her in surprise as the next thought entered his mind. "She - she says they're behind the door," he faltered.
Everyone in the room gasped, and then began to talk at once. Elvie stared at them in confusion. Klaus, noting the expression on her face, quickly explained to her. "Didn't you know?" he asked. "We have all had dreams. The dreams are supposed to indicate who was chosen to go on this mission, or so Dathro told us. In the dream there is a door, and it insists that you - " Here he paused to point at her. " - Are the one to open it. It promises that there will be perfect balance between good and evil once the door has been opened and the final goal of the quest achieved."
Elvie nodded slowly, organizing the information in her mind. It really was like the Kingdom Hearts game, she reflected. Sora, the original Key Wielder, had had a similar dream indicating that he was the one to open the door to Kingdom Hearts.
Kingdom Hearts, Elvie knew, was a place that would supposedly yield extreme power to whoever could open its doorway. It was indeed a place of power; it was the key to controlling every world and keeping things at peace. It ruled the hearts of its people - and hearts are basically what make up the entire soul of a person. When darkness overtook someone's heart, that person would become known as a Heartless. The name itself was a misnomer, because the Heartless were actually solely hearts turned wicked. These would be the enemies that her small group would be up against.
Suddenly, Elvie remembered something else from her meeting with Dathro. She turned to Obi-Wan and mouthed, "Others?"
Obi-Wan looked briefly puzzled, and then a dark look flickered across his face. "Oh," he said. "The others. Yes, they're certainly here somewhere."
"Others?" Faramir questioned.
"In your case, Gríma Wormtongue," Obi-Wan said, disdain dripping from his voice. "In mine, Darth Maul. The villains, in other words, who are racing against us to find our missing heroines. She wants to know where they are."
"Why?" Mr. Incredible demanded. "We don't need them. We don't want them. You're here helping us, and that's all that matters."
Elvie sighed and closed her thoughts to Obi-Wan. Dathro seemed to be sitting inside her head, warning her that this group was not to know that she had been split into four to better serve her ultimate purpose. Just the thought of the second Elvie made her feel incomplete and strange.
"Don't worry about the villains," Klaus said comfortingly. "As long as we have you, there's no way they can get ahead of us."
But they DO have me, Elvie thought miserably. And I doubt they'll be nearly as kind when they wake me up…
- - - - - - - - -
"Intruder!"
The second Elvie came to with an attempt at a small cry, but of course her voice was gone. Dathro had somehow stolen it from her. Elvie Two imagined a scene similar to that from The Little Mermaid, with large, smoky hands reaching down her throat and ripping a ball of glowing light from her throat, and shuddered.
"Well?" the voice demanded again. "Who the hell are you?"
She glanced at the person to whom the voice belonged. He had one long eyebrow covering both eyes, and from her position on the floor she could see a tattoo of an eye on his ankle.
Count Olaf, she thought, but didn't say anything.
"She knows your name," a deep voice said from another corner of the room.
Elvie Two's head whipped around. Standing in one dark, shadowy corner of the plain, metal-covered room was a heavily cloaked figure. "Darth Maul!" Elvie mouthed, then covered her lips with one hand. She could not seem to remember that she no longer had the ability to speak.
"She knows me, too," the Sith apprentice said, perplexed. He stepped out of the shadows, pulling back the hood of his cloak, and glared at her. "Who are you?" he demanded. "How do you know of us?"
"She's the Key Wielder," another voice hissed from the shadows. Gríma Wormtongue seemed to suddenly appear as he stepped into the light, hunched over and eyeing her a bit distrustfully. "There is no other way she would simply appear here and know each of us."
With a swish of his cape, the Phantom of the Opera suddenly leapt down before her. "You will help me find Christine?" he asked, eyes fiery beneath his bone-white mask.
"No," Olaf interrupted, stepping almost protectively toward her. "She's going to help me find the pretty Baudelaire brat so I can steal her fortune."
"She," Darth Maul said flatly, "Is going to help all of us, if she is indeed who Wormtongue believes she is." He turned his burning yellow eyes to hers. "Prove to me that you are the Key Wielder," he snarled, and then his lightsaber had leapt into his hand, its blades spinning towards her in an arc of red death.
Elvie Two could utter no scream. Instead, she lifted her hand and felt enormous relief when the lightsaber shuddered to a halt. It had come in contact with the key blade, which had mysteriously appeared when her fingers had closed on thin air.
"Interesting," Maul said, sounding impressed despite himself. The blades of the lightsaber disappeared with a soft hum, and he clipped the weapon to his belt.
"Yo, people," a new voice said from the doorway. "I heard noise. What's going - " The voice stopped, and although Elvie Two was not looking, she got the impression that whoever owned the voice was pointing. "Who's that?" the voice demanded.
Elvie stood, brushing her jeans and t-shirt off, and turned to look at the new arrival. It was Syndrome from the Incredibles, his red hair standing straight up towards the sky. He was wearing his signature supersuit and eyeing her from beneath his mask.
"This," Wormtongue said with considerable satisfaction, "Is the Key Wielder."
"The answer to all our problems," Olaf said with a greedy grin. "If we have her, then the idiots who oppose us obviously don't."
Elvie Two almost wanted to laugh at them. Little did they know that she was the second of four Elvies, all of which they would undoubtedly meet along their travels.
"I dunno," Syndrome said, raising an eyebrow from under his mask. "She looks kind of like she's smirking. Maybe she knows something we don't."
"She knows many things that we do not," Maul conceded reluctantly. "But there can only be one Key Wielder. Dathro told us that himself."
Elvie tilted her head slightly. "Dathro?" she mouthed.
"Speak up, brat!" Olaf snarled at her.
"She can't," Maul said calmly. "She's mute. Another trick of Dathro's… a way to keep his secrets safe. No matter. I can read your thoughts as easily as a book. You can hide nothing from me."
Really? Elvie thought. We'll see about that. Now who is Dathro?
"Do you know nothing, human?" Maul snapped. "Dathro is the being who brought you here. I can see his image imprinted on your mind; you must know him."
Ah, Elvie thought with a short nod. I do know him.
"Good," Maul said shortly, turning away. "You will lead us to the Princesses."
I cannot.
Maul spun around, his front horn scraping her forehead. "Yes," he said in a deathly quiet voice, "You can, and you will, because I commanded it."
Elvie Two swallowed hard and shook her head, looking braver than she felt.
I cannot take you to them until we have gone to the your Worlds and sealed them, she thought. Only then will the path be opened to Kingdom Hearts.
Maul growled deep in the back of his throat, but he must have sensed that she wasn't lying. He turned away and stormed to the other side of the room, glaring at the wall.
"What is it?" Wormtongue asked a bit timidly. Elvie Two suddenly understood that he asked only because of his desperation to have Éowyn at last. Otherwise, none of them would have dared speak to Lord Maul in his current state of rage.
Somehow, Maul managed to control his anger. "She says that we must go to our different Worlds to seal them with her key blade, so that balance may be struck."
"Who wants balance?" Olaf demanded disdainfully. "All we want are the Princesses, for whatever benefits they may provide us!"
"The door to Kingdom Hearts will not open until all of the worlds are sealed," Maul informed his group. "I do not understand precisely what she means by 'sealed,' but I do know that she does not lie. Dathro will keep Kingdom Hearts closed to us until the very last possible moment. He knew that we would not passively follow the Key Wielder unless we had no other choice."
"How long will it take to seal the Worlds?" the Phantom demanded of Elvie Two.
She shrugged.
"She does not know," Maul said, in case the Phantom would somehow misinterpret her shrug. "But I cannot imagine sealing six worlds, with the others following us in search of the Key Wielder, will go quickly."
The Others? Oh. The Heroes.
Elvie Two recalled the game Kingdom Hearts and the creatures known as the Heartless. She cautiously attempted to telepathically communicate with Maul.
There are others, she said to him. The Heartless.
Maul glanced at her curiously. "Who are they?"
"Who are who?" Syndrome demanded. "You mean we have to fight people besides the so-called heroes? We have enough trouble on our hands dealing with them and protecting the damn Key Wielder."
The Heartless want to take over Kingdom Hearts, Elvie Two informed Maul. At least, I think they do. They'll be looking for me.
"Perfect," Maul snarled. "There are creatures called the Heartless looking for her. They'll get in the way."
Elvie Two shrugged apologetically, but Maul waved the gesture away. "There isn't much you can do about it, is there?" he said. He studied her with interest. "You didn't come here of your own free will, did you?"
Elvie Two shook her head.
Maul considered her a few moments longer while the others watched in silence. Finally, he said, "Do you have a name, Key Wielder?"
She smiled slightly.
Call me Two.
