Chapter 4

Small dark creatures were beginning to show up in Radiant Garden.

They weren't Heartless and seemed to have nothing to do with the apprentices' experiments (though they were eager to study them when given the opportunity, and the four friends had to work harder to destroy their research), but they were a nuisance, and something Roxas and Xion could sharpen their skills on.

"I've got fifteen!" Roxas called as he cut through one creature with his keyblade.

"Seventeen for me!" said Xion as she fired a spell out of her own keyblade to destroy another.

Roxas let out an indignant noise hearing he was behind and hurried to fight more of the monsters.

As it was, Isa and Lea couldn't do much more than watch. Isa's baseball bat and Lea's frisbees didn't make nearly as much of a dent on the creatures as the keyblades did, something both weren't too happy about. Lea especially, thanks to the memories of being able to toast creatures like these with fireballs dancing in his brain.

Man, he wished he could still do that.

He was so caught up in future memories, he didn't hear Roxas or Xion cry out when one of the creatures managed to get past them and was lunging at Lea with sharp claws.

Acting on instinct, Lea swung his frisbee at it, hoping to at least knock it back so he wouldn't get slashed.

Only he was no longer holding a frisbee, and the creature disappeared as it was cut by sharp spikes.

The entire battle paused as the four friends took in the sight of Lea holding a familiar chakram in his hand that looked a little too big for him. Even the Not-Heartless things seemed to stop and stare.

After a few moments of shock, Lea's face split into a massive grin. "Oh yeah! That's what I'm talking about!"

And with that, he dove into the remaining monsters, determined to beat both Roxas and Xion's scores as they and Isa tried to make sense of what they were seeing.

Soon enough, all of the monsters were finally gone and Lea couldn't be happier with his new (old) toys.

"Now all we need is to get you a claymore," he said to Isa. "Then we'll really be cooking with fire."

"A claymore, huh," said Isa, looking at his bat thoughtfully. "I like the sound of that."

(High above them, Vanitas watched the two unknown keybearers with interest, especially the one that looked like Ventus.)

(He decided to say nothing to Xehanort just yet. It would be good to have a back-up plan.)

Lea was frowning in deep concentration as he and Isa walked through the gardens.

"What's wrong?" asked Isa.

"One of my future memories," Lea said, his brows pinched. "There's something kinda important that's going to happen today, but I can't quite remember what."

"More monsters?" asked Isa.

"There's a big one that shows up, but it's handled and that's not quite it," said Lea, scratching the back of his neck. "What was it?"

Catching sight of a familiar spiky blond head ahead of them, Isa said, "Maybe Roxas will know." He then cupped his hand to his mouth and called, "Hey, Roxas!"

The spiky blond head looked up, and the expression on the owner's face was annoyed. "Okay, seriously, who is Roxas? People have been calling me that ever since I got to this wor-er-here. I'm not Roxas, I'm Ventus!" cried a boy who looked remarkably like Roxas said in exasperation.

Finally, the event Lea had been trying to remember came rushing back. "Oh yeah, him, that's what it was," he said thoughtfully, confusing both Isa and Ventus at the same time.

Finally remembering how he'd made fast friends the last time around, Lea gave Ventus a grin. "Sorry, you look like our friend. That's Isa, and the name's Lea. Got it Memorized?"

Ventus seemed to calm down some hearing that, likely happy to finally have an explanation for being called the wrong name. "Oh, uh, hi. Like I said, I'm Ventus, but call me Ven."

Lea's grin widened. "Nice to meet you, Ven. Wanna join our rebellion?"

Ven could only stare at him in bewilderment, and Isa smacked his forehead.

Xion didn't know why the Not-Heartless monsters were attacking this little girl, but at the moment she was too busy fighting them to care.

The little red-haired girl hiding behind her let out a whimper, only strengthening Xion's resolve.

There weren't a lot of monsters, but it was difficult to fight them while also protecting someone. If she made the wrong move and they got around her it wouldn't be pretty.

Which was why she was very relieved when a blue-haired woman came running up and offered to fight them off, allowing Xion to get the girl to safety.

Once they were a good distance away, the little girl beamed up at Xion. "Thanks for saving me, your name's Xion, right?"

Xion nodded, "That's right." It seemed she and Roxas were gaining a reputation in the town.

The girl smiled wider and ran to gather a small bouquet of purple flowers and began weaving them into a flower crown. "This is for saving me," she said brightly, holding the crown out to Xion. "They're called shions. Like you!"

Xion gently knelt down to let the girl put the flower crown on her head with a smile. "Thank you."

The little girl looked around and said, "The monsters are gone. I'm gonna go give some more flowers to the nice lady."

"Okay, be careful," said Xion as she stood up again. "What's your name, anyway?"

"I'm Kairi!" the girl called over her shoulder as she darted away, leaving Xion staring after her, stunned she'd just met the person her very appearance was based on.

Roxas was practicing skateboard tricks on a railing when a voice called out to him. Or, at least, he thought it did. The name was all wrong.

"Ven?"

Roxas looked up to see a tall man with brown hair and bits of armor on his clothes coming towards him with a stern expression. "Huh? Me?" he asked. It had to be him the man was talking to. There wasn't anyone else around.

"What are you doing here? You were supposed to go home, Ven," the man scolded. "Come on, I'll take you home."

As the unknown man reached for him, Roxas employed one of Axel's earliest lessons on how to deal with people he didn't know.

"STRANGER DANGER!" he shouted at the top of his lungs and bolted away on his skateboard as quickly as he could.

Terra stared after him in shock, wondering what the heck had just happened. "What?" he asked bewildered.

The empty street gave no reply.

Ven wasn't exactly on board with their rebellion, but they did manage to convince him to break into the castle with them. That's when they caught sight of someone he knew skulking around where he shouldn't be.

"What's Master Xehanort doing here?" he asked.

Lea and Isa did a double-take at the name. The one apprentice they hadn't been able to mess with-er-rebel against. The one who started it all.

And the one they'd been most looking forward to prank-uh-rise up against.

Following Ven's gaze, they caught sight of the man in question. While the yellow eyes and white hair were familiar, everything else was all wrong. He looked far too old to be the man in Lea's memories.

"Guy must find a fountain of youth or something," said Lea as they watched him go up to Braig to talk about something.

"What?" asked Ven.

"Nothing," said Lea, never taking his eyes off the men as they left. "Let's follow them."

What followed was nothing short of bizarre.

"Who is that guy? Why did Master Xehanort let him tie him up? And who is that supposed to fool? Master Xehanort is a keyblade master, it'd take way more than chains to keep him locked up!" whispered Ven, who was clearly growing more confused by the minute. Their hiding place on an upper balcony had a clear view of what was going on, even if little of it made sense.

"Looks like a set up to me," said Isa dryly.

"But for who?" asked Ven, looking honestly stumped.

The answer came a few minutes later when a brown-haired man Ven identified as Terra arrived on the scene for Braig to taunt into a fight while Xehandort called advice down to him.

"Is- Is he trying to get your friend to use darkness?" asked Isa in disbelief at Xehanort's words. "Something we all know would probably end badly for him."

"He's setting Terra up!" hissed Ven, looking furious. "Why that no good-!"

Pulling out the bag of prank supplies they'd brought for their castle break-in, Lea held them out to Ven. "So how many things do you think we gotta chuck at the creepy old guy before he gives up the ruse and outs himself?" he asked with a smirk.

Ven, who was looking rather vindictive, grabbed a rubber chicken out of the bag without hesitation. "Bonus points if you hit his stupid bald head," he said, throwing it at the still tied up Xehanort. No one messed with his friends and got away with it.

The chicken was a direct hit! The rubber bird bouncing off his cranium stopped Xehanort in the middle of his darkness endorsing monologue and threw off the entire tone of Terra and Braig's fight.

It was then ruined completely when a small speaker that made fart noises followed a moment later.

Several headshots later, a very fed up Xehanort burst free of his chains with a wave of darkness (making it clear he could have escaped any time he'd wanted but hadn't) and his subsequent swearing of vengeance on Ven, Lea, and Isa had the three all running for the exit.

Terra, now very unlikely to trust anything the old keyblade master said, made his escape during the distraction to both find Ven and get an explanation from him and protect him from a now furious and humiliated Xehanort.

And just like that, the future was forever changed.

(Meanwhile, hidden in a dark corner, Vanitas was laughing his ass off.)

Ven stared at Roxas.

Roxas stared at Ven.

"Oh, that's why people kept calling me Roxas," said Ven.

Roxas scowled. "This isn't going to be another Sora thing, is it?"

Friends can be made in the oddest of circumstances.

But those ones are usually the best.

A/N Sorry this was late. Busy morning. Well, a good few things changed here. Terra and Ven now know ahead of time Xehanort can't be trusted and was tricking Terra. Maybe they won't fall for his trap and Xehanort won't possess him this time. Maybe Vanitas won't try as hard with Ven thinking he had another option in Roxas or Xion. Maybe Aqua finds out about this eventually. Kairi still probably got her Keyblade when she went to thank Aqua so that at least didn't change. Not sure if I'll ever expand on the fallout of these events or if I'll leave it up to your imagination. On the bright side, Lea can hit things with his chakrams again. He was still able to use them when he became Lea again in canon, so I figured young Lea getting them alongside Axel's memories was plausible.

Next Time: Axel promised them a beach day, and so a beach day they shall have.