ATUHOR'S NOSE:

Me, a fool: If I make a habit of writing every day without fail, I'll surely get back on my typical pace for my ongoing longfic!

Also me, enlightened: Wow, I have so many barely-started projects I suddenly feel inspired for!

And that's why it's been 38 days.

...

Also also me, who loves terrible puns way too much: I will never apologize for anything, ever.

"No, he was definitely at the beach," Marco said. "We saw him a few times and he's never been anywhere else. I think he might live there now."

I frowned. "But their plan... was to camp at the Point... to make fighting them a pain. Why is Demyx doing a different thing?"

"I dunno," Marco said. "Go ask him when we're done with this, I guess."

A direct approach. Simple and to the point. I immediately hated the idea.

"Well, we'll think of something," I said evasively. "In the meantime..." I looked up at the huge... "... what's this kind of rock formation called?" It was circular, about half the size of a football field, went pretty much straight up, and it looked like it had a flat top. (I mean, I wasn't sure from this angle. But probably.)

Lea frowned. "A butte, I think. Why does that matter?"

"Because I'm going to complain vehemently about having to climb this thing in my journal, and I want to use the correct word for it."

"And we are gonna have to climb it," Star said, returning from her perimeter check. "Your radar thingy was pointing directly thataway the whole time," she added, pointing to the summit of the butte.

"Can't we just fly up there?" Marco complained. "You're flying right now, Star, surely we can figure something out."

"Cloudy can't carry seven people, Marco! He's just a cloud!" ("I'm doing my best!" Cloudy interjected, ignored by all.)

"Well, no," I said, "but I can turn my Keyblade into a vehicle, and I know Aqua can, and I suspect Mickey can, and..." I paused, frowning. "There's no particular reason for Naminé and Lea not to have learned too, but I don't know if they actually did it."

"I've had a Keyblade for two days," Naminé said. "I haven't learned that particular trick yet."

"And I've known about that trick for two days," Lea said. "Nobody's had time to teach me."

"Huh. We should fix that when we get a chance."

"Like now?" Naminé said.

I thought about that. "Heck, why not. If Demyx is hanging around at the beach, there can't be anything pressing going on up there. ... He is still hanging out at the beach, right?"

"Yup," Star said, showing us the scene through the All-Seeing Eye. Like she said, Demyx was just hanging out on the beach, drinking a smoothie and playing his sitar.

"That's so weird!" I said. "It's like he's not taking this being-evil thing seriously at all."

"Not really," Lea countered. "Demyx never took anything seriously, other than harassing Sora when he thought that might bring Roxas back." Lea frowned. "Actually, on reflection, that's pretty weird of him. Guess we can ask him about that, too?"

"That is... certainly a thing that someone could do," I equivocated. "Anyway. Glider time."

XXXXXXXXXX

"... It's a pond?" Star said, sounding disappointed.

"Why and also how is there a pond at the top of a butte?" I wondered, approaching the pond.

The pond rose up and became a giant water-golem-thing.

"Oh," I said, leaping out of its pummeling range and summoning Voice of the Well. "Amazingly, that answers both things."

"Can you cast the spell from here?" Mickey asked.

"Oh, sure, if the water thing is stuck in the pond and has no ranged attacks whatsoever." A beat. "... Okay, I said that sarcastically but it seems to actually be the case? Who designed this encounter?"

"Demyx," literally everyone retorted.

"Oh yeah. ... Wait, literally everyone? The water creature too?"

"Yyyep!" it(?) said in Demyx's voice. "And I've got good news for you - my sentinel does have a ranged attack!" Which it immediately demonstrated - its left arm turned into a cannon and blasted an orb of water at me.

I blocked it, but I must have miscalculated something, because it still managed to knock me flat on my ass.

"You okay, Tempe?" Star said.

"More rattled than anything," I said, getting back to my feet. "That hit way harder than I was expecting - did you put a rock in there, Demyx?"

"I knew my water affinity wouldn't give me the level of power I needed here," the sentinel said, (or Demyx said, through the sentinel?) "so I teamed up with Lexy to make sure it had a solid foundation, you get it?"

("Was that... a pun?" Naminé asked. "Yeah, but it was a bad reach. 2 out of 10, would not repeat." Lea answered.)

"Ahh, Lexaeus again? I've yet to win a fair fight against that guy..."

"Well, I figured, who better to stop a storm than a bulwark?"

("Cheap name reference, tortured metaphor. Referencing the rivalry they apparently have is a good move, though. 4 out of 10. Actually, 4.5.")

"Mm. Cool. Listen, any chance of stepping aside and letting us seal the Point without a fight?"

"Ah, about that - in addition to talking about its apparent lack of ranged options, the other trigger for my sentinel to go into offense mode was if you had attempted the sealing spell."

"... which you can identify because Lexaeus saw it."

"So really, you were screwed either way. Have fun! Demyx out. Sentinel, get 'em."

And with that, the sentinel's other arm turned into a cannon and it started blasting everyone.

While the rest of us were running around dodging water blasts, Marco had the sense to move toward the thing and give it a roundhouse kick. Which splooshed and didn't really have much effect. "How exactly are we supposed to fight something made of liquid?!"

"I dunno!" I said. "I'm used to video game logic where I can just hit 'em until they die!" While I was saying this, the sentinel turned an arm into a hammer to knock Marco into the air, to conveniently land right next to me. "Cure, also."

"Thunder," Aqua intoned, striking the beast with a burst of electricity. "Magic. The answer is that we use magic. We all have it."

"I don't!" Marco protested.

I glanced down at my Keyblade. "Y'know what?" I unclipped the foxfire candle Keychain and let it revert to a Kingdom Key. "Borrow this," I said, holding it out to Marco. "It should hit the thing fine." Also, dear spirits of whatever, if I can make this count as a proper Bequeathing just by intending it real hard, please note that I am doing that.

Marco took hold of the Keyblade, but hesitated. (Just in case, I focused on my intention again while we were both holding it.) "You sure? Then you won't have a weapon."

"I learned how to cast magic without that, I'll do fine," I said, letting go of the handle so Marco was holding the Keyblade entirely without my assistance. "Barrier," I added, summoning a shield to block a water blast the sentinel had fired at us while it thought we were distracted. "See? I'm fine. Let's fight this thing instead of standing around."

"Hey Tempe," Star interrupted, "didn't you say these Points explode if there's an epic clash between good and evil on top of them?"

"Light and darkness, technically, but..." I frowned. "I could feel it straining, last time." Something pinged in the back of my mind and I reached out toward the water sentinel. "Libra. ... Yeah, this thing isn't light or dark. We can pummel it freely."

"Sweet."

XXXXXXXXXX

The battle that followed was truely epic and legendary and someone else will have to write about it because I can't do combat scenes. I wouldn't do it justice. Yep. That's my story and I'm sticking to it.

"Y'know," Star said, brushing fragments of rock out of her hair, "I've been wondering since the moment Lea said this rock formation was called a 'butte'... What kind of rock is it made out of?"

"Beats me," Marco said, "I'm no rock expert."

"Looks... metamorphic," Naminé said, inspecting a good-sized chunk. "I think. Kinda stripey?"

"None of us know much about rocks, do we?" I asked. Nopes all around.

"So..." Lea mused. "The Points in other worlds... weren't they just in random nondescript places?"

I counted on my fingers as I listed them off. "Radiant Garden's was some plaza garden thing, The Neath's was some random island," (Lea nodded, as these supported his statement) "Shibuya's was at CAT's mural, the mural where several important things happened," (Lea started as this did not continue the pattern) "and this one, in some random wilderness dimension on some random butte. So, three out of four."

"Three outta - first off, Tem, my thought was that a butte isn't all that random and nondescript," Lea responded. "And second, this is not just a random wilderness dimension. Haven't you been looking around?"

"Not in the slightest," I admitted, looking around. "Why?"

Lea paused a moment, presumably to give me a chance to see it myself. "Ruins. Long, long reclaimed by nature, but ruins nonetheless. There used to be people in this dimension."

Looking around, it was a lot more obvious now that I knew it was there to see.

"Y'know, that makes sense. Didn't Nox's Report say something about people being subconsciously attracted to these Points...?"

"You're asking the wrong guy, Tem," Lea said. "Dunno who Nox is, but I haven't seen their reports."

"Right, right." As far as I knew, Luke and DiZ were the only ones other than me to even know those reports existed. ... Until just now, I guess. Well. I don't think they were an actual secret. Actually, their significance was completely lost on me at the moment.

"So..." Marco said, "... what's the significance of this, then?"

"I haven't the foggiest idea," I admitted. "Let's just seal the Point and go back to Echo Creek."

"And talk to Demyx?" Aqua asked.

A beat. I sighed, defeated. "Yes, I suppose we can just talk to him."

"Why are you so averse to that idea, Tempest?" Kairi asked.

"It's too simple! I was hoping to come up with something..." More complicated, I didn't say. "... more effective."

XXXXXXXXXX

I flopped down onto the empty beach chair next to Demyx's. "Hey there, guy. ... Is 'guy' accurate? I shouldn't be assuming." I added as an afterthought.

"Eh, maybe," Demyx said. "Stuff I've been through and stuff I expect to be through... who knows what effect that has on a mind?"

"Very cryptic. Hey, speaking of cryptic, what exactly was the deal with this?"

Demyx shrugged. "Can't a may-or-may-not-be-a-guy want to take a day off at the beach sometimes?"

"Half-assing it like this goes against every possible motivation I'm aware -" And then I halted abruptly as I realized I had used the word motivation to refer to Demyx. "Actually, strike that. It all makes perfect sense now."

"Ah, good." Demyx sipped from a smoothie that I was pretty sure hadn't been there when I initially arrived. "So, my mission here is officially remains on until y'all actually leave the world. D'you mind staying for another day or two? This is a really nice beach."

"We kinda really do want Roxas back as soon as possible," I said.

"Ah. That's a shame."

"Buuuut, I don't think it'd be a problem if I lagged behind for a bit. I can think of a thing or two I'd like to do here before leaving. That 'y'all' implies what it sounded like, right?"

"Yep! My higher-ups might tell me to get my rear in gear if they find out I'm interpreting the order as an excuse to slack off, but only if they notice."

"Nice... Feel free to take any excuse you can find to slack off."

"Oh, I've been doing that for longer than you can imagine."

XXXXXXXXXX

Later that night, I got a text from Lea.

It consisted solely of a link to the Wikipedia article for "Gneiss".

The pictures in that article looked remarkably like the rocks the water golem had been firing at us.

I facepalmed as another text came in.

The *really* annoying part is that that's just geologically normal enough that I don't feel justified yelling at a hypothetical creator for manipulating the universe in service of a bad pun.

Same, but for my part, I'm gonna do it anyway.