I think this is one of the chapter I've really been anticipating to show you guys. Expect many many references.
Chapter XLVIII- End of World (Part 1)
Stepping through the Keyhole the group felt the darkness cloud their vision. The feeling was claustrophobic. They felt their bodies being pulled through the darkness. Next thing they knew the group saw themselves inside a small room, it looked like an attic. It was cluttered with music sheets, old furniture, and several instruments including a piano.
"Where are we?" Donald asked. He saw a window but it was obscured by all the stuff in the room.
"It looks like someone's house..." Sora said. He picked up a music sheet and read the lyrics. It sounded kind of catchy, he hummed the tune out loud.
"I don't get it, the Keyhole was supposed to take us to the world of the Heartless." Koga said.
"Maybe there was a mix up?" Goofy guessed. "We should ask the owners if they know where to go?"
They went down the stairs into the house's living room. It was pretty cozy looking, with a old television set, a formal style couch and a arm chair, a tea set on a small table, and a bunch of throw pillows around the room. The wall along the stair case was adorned with different sized portraits of dalmatians. Koga eyed the pictures with suspicion.
Sora cupped his hands around his mouth. "Hello, anyone home?!" He shouted. There was no sound except the creaking of the wood foundation.
"Wonder where they all went?" Koga scratched his head. He picked up a fallen picture on the ground and his eyes bulged out. "I don't believe it." The other's looked over his shoulder and gasped alongside him.
It was a picture of a man, a woman, two adult dalmatians, and 99 dalmatian puppies.
"Pongo and Perdita." Sora said out loud. "This was their home!" His brother shook his head, excitement on his face.
Koga looked at the man and woman in the picture, they must've been their owners. They smiled alongside the others, they all looked so happy.
Donald cupped his cheek. "But their world fell to darkness, then that means..."
Suddenly the house shook as the group stumbled in place. Portraits fell over and dust fell from the ceiling. And as quickly as it happened, the shaking stopped. Wasting no time they ran towards the front door. They stepped out and saw themselves in a neighborhood street. The strange thing was that all the houses looked completely different. For example, one was a apartment complex while another was a wooden cottage, there were three houses in a row each made of straw, sticks, and bricks. The sky above them was shrouded in dark clouds and lightning. The air felt cold and there was no wind, not even a slight breeze.
"This is it." Koga said. "This is where the remains of the fallen worlds go."
"Gawrsh, it's kind of spooky seeing such an empty street." Goofy trembled in fear.
"Huh, I didn't expect this to be what a Heartless world to look like." Sora said casually looking around.
"What were you expecting, floating rocks over a black hole?" Koga asked. His brother shrugged in response. The starry eyed boy looked across the street and frowned. At the end of the street he saw the street sign, it said Cherry Tree lane. Beyond that he saw nothing but sky. No other buildings or another street, it just ends. He walked towards the end and gasped. The entire street was floating in the air, a floating island. Below them they saw the rest of this world.
"Whoa..." Sora said bewildered, him and the others seeing what Koga was seeing.
If this conflation of a street was any indication of the state of this world, then the rest of said world was exactly what you would imagine. Chunks of land from other worlds mashed together with each other to make this amalgamation of a world. Other similar islands floated above the world. Forests, mountains, castles, cities, towns, buildings, and other assorted items from other worlds were mixed together. To point out every little detail of this place would take hours. Every once in awhile pieces of other fallen worlds would fall from above the clouds and crash into the world, becoming a part of this place and making it larger.
"So many worlds, lost to the darkness." Koga said quietly. He took a snapshot with his camera.
"If we defeat Ansem the worlds will be restored right?" Sora asked.
"That's what we were told." Koga said. "And I guess this world will be no more..."
"What will happen to us then?" Donald asked.
"I... I don't know." Koga said, slightly worried about what fate will befall them if they succeed and the world they are in vanishes.
"Don't worry fellas." Jiminy said stepping out of Sora's pocket. "No matter what happens we will find a way back to our friends."
Koga looked at the gift Kairi left him, the Thalassa shell with his face. He held it to his chest and smiled. He remember the promise to bring it back. And he intends to keep that promise.
"You're right, thanks Jiminy." He turned to the other's. "So, any idea how to get down there?"
"No, but I think they might." Goofy said pointing to the Heartless that appeared in the street. They looked like human sized Darksides with blue curled horns and long scaly tails. They floated in midair bearing a long blue sword. Out of all the Heartless they have seen these look the most demonic.
Invisible
The Heartless wasted no time, flying forward and swinging their swords. They fought furiously with their swords and dark magic. Koga jumped back and switched to his Keygun, blasting any Heartless he can see. Unfortunately some of the Invisible were able to deflect the shots.
Goofy tossed his shield to Sora who used it to block a dark fireball. He threw it along with his Keyblade at the enemies, the shield bouncing off of them and ending up back in the knight's hand.
Donald launched a large fireball at a group of Heartless, then a blast of ice, while they were frozen he struck the last of them with thunder. Soon all the Heartless were gone and with it, in the center of the street, a dark portal appeared.
"Guess that's our exit." Koga commented. Before any other Heartless could show up they jumped into the portal.
Falling out of the portal they saw themselves in an entirely new location. They were in some savanna landscape with dead acacia trees and large and magnificent rock formation in the center. Halfway across the dried grassland it suddenly changed to that of a woodland meadow. All across the area were debris from other worlds.
"This is a disaster..." Koga sighed. "Why did this happen? What is there to gain from darkness?"
"I wonder where that Ansem feller went?" Goofy asked.
"Well we aren't gonna find out gawking at nothing." Koga said. "Let's find another portal."
They walked across the plains, across ruined buildings and other things. They saw a ruined automobile painted red with the words 'Mr Toad' written on the front. They passed by a half buried cathedral, the bells from the bell tower made a hollow dead sound. There was a giant peach, past tense because it was eaten right down to it's core. There was also a ranch called 'Patch of Heaven'.
When they came across a collapsed carnival tent they noticed a snack stall knocked over. Sora peeked over it.
"Hey look, cotton candy!" Sora exclaimed holding up a large chunk of the sugary sweet.
"Ooh, are there any roasted peanuts in there?" Koga asked excitedly.
"Don't eat that!" Donald squawked. "It's probably contaminated by darkness, it's not good for you!"
"Donald, it's candy, it's already not good for me." Sora said taking a bite out of it. "Mmm, it's stale anyway." He said tossing it back. Only for it to land on a Heartless's head.
This Heartless looked like a taller, slimmer version of the Shadows with blue veins all over it's body. The cotton candy made it look like it had pink hair.
Neoshadow
Sora didn't waste a moment to slash through it. The cotton candy dropped to the ground with a splat.
"Nice job bro!" Koga said, mouth full of a deep fried powdered cookie, sitting on a stump of what looks like the remains of a giant beanstalk. "Mmm, I don't know what this 'Deep fried O-R-E-O' is but it's delicious! They never gave anything like this at the Destiny Island fair."
Then more Neoshadows appeared. Koga sighed and dropped the snack. "Let's get this over with." He said summoning his weapon.
These Heartless were tough, and very agile. They could sink into the ground like Shadows and instantly jump back out with a hard kick and swipe of the claws. Koga tried to take them out using Thundaga but it only hit a few of the Neoshadows, the other's sank into the ground.
"Stay on your guard!" Goofy said. He and Sora took them out as they come out of the ground. The Heartless vanished but Koga was still on his guard.
"It's not over yet." He told his brother.
"Who else is there, we already took care of the Hea-"
They heard a rumbling roar and a giant Heartless appeared. It was purple, bulky, with two crooked tusks and a single horn on it's head.
Behemoth
It growled at them, each step making a large booming sound. One wrong step and the group would be just a pancake.
"Okay, I believe you." Sora said.
The Behemoth leaped it's massive body towards them. They tried to attack it but it's body was impervious to damage. It shot dark lightning from the horn on it's head. Sora noticed every time it shot lightning it winched, almost as if it was cautious of it's horn, or cautious for it. Sora also noticed a large rocky hill next to the Heartless.
Sora turned to the others. "Donald Goofy, distract the Heartless for us while we climb that hill!" Sora said running towards it, his brother following him. Donald and Goofy nodded, spreading out and yelling at the Heartless getting it's attention.
"Over here ya big purple palooka!" Donald shouted waving his arms.
"So what's the plan?" Koga asked as they climbed.
"Remember how I beat Cerberus?" He asked, his brother nodded. "Well it's like that but with the two of us. Try to focus on that horn, it must be a weak point." They reached the top and saw the monster below them trying to stomp out their friends. "Alright, I'll go first, and then you go next." He took a deep breath and jumped. Falling towards the horn he pointed his Keyblade at it and charged his magic energy into the tip of the Keyblade which glowed with light. He focused on the Behemoth's horn and released a fusillade of light projectiles that homed in on the horn, all hitting it's target. Koga jumped next and powered up his Keyblade, pointing it downwards. He launched himself quickly and stabbed directly into it's horn, shattering it. The Behemoth roared in pain before it collapsed on it's side, the earth shook as it melting into darkness.
"The bigger they are the harder they fall." Koga commented. "Nice thinking Sora."
Another portal appeared where the Behemoth was.
"Alright, let's move." Sora said to the group as they ran into another portal.
They saw themselves in a dusty old basement. Against the wall was a high tech computer system. It didn't have a monitor, just a touch screen display. A light beeped on the display, probably waiting for input.
Sora was about to touch the computer when Koga grabbed his hand.
He shook his head. "I don't think so. Remember what happened last time you played around with a computer?"
The spiky haired boy chuckled rubbing the back of his head. "Yeah, that wasn't a fun day with the fire department."
"I'll handle this." Koga said. He may have only dabbled a little bit with computers but at least he is more careful with such delicate piece of hardware.
He cautiously tapped the screen. It lit up a text appeared on the screen.
SolarOS 4.0.1 Generic_50203-02 sun4m i386
A problem has been detected and system has been shut down to prevent damage to your computer.
If this is the first time you have seen this Stop error screen, restart your computer. If this screen appears appears again follow these steps:
d105635815FH$%##rtSG^T&*^(e# $#%? TD"G^
Error
Grid.C contents corrupt or missing. Please contact an administrator before usage.
Continue? (Y,N)
Koga nervously pressed the Y button. He immediately backed away when the terminal made a weird grinding sound and sputtered off.
"What did you do?" Donald demanded.
"I swear, it was already broken." He looked and saw the CPU smoking. "Anyone know a technician?"
"We're wasting time, let's get a move on!" Donald said walking towards the door out. He opened the door to reveal a narrow cave of multicolored rocks. They trekked through the cave. Sora inspected the rocks.
"Hey, I think this cave is made of gummi pieces." Sora said.
"Well it was what was blocking access to other worlds, so I guess it would end up here as well." Koga said. As they walked the cave slowly morphed to a stone tunnel with oil lamps lit along the walls.
Suddenly Koga stopped looking around. "Hey, do you guys hear that?" The rest of the group listened. Koga looked up. "And do you see that?"
For some reason music was playing in the air, figuratively and literally. In the air floated music notes, playing the tune that comes with each one. They followed the music notes to a dusty room. It looked mostly empty save for a knocked over book shelf, it's books were strewn across the floor. There was an axe in a corner and next to it was a dusty old broomstick.
It looked like the music notes were coming out from in-between the books. Donald picked the closest book up.
"It's some kind of music book." Donald said. He read the title of the songbook:
Toccata and Fugue in D Minor
He opened the book and jumped back when the pages lit up with a bright light. Shadows danced the walls but it wasn't Heartless or the gang. It was the shadows of unknown people playing the instruments that the group hears. The shadows faded and out of the book came abstract patterns of lines, shapes, and cloud formations. They watched in awe as the patterns reflect the sound and music.
"Huh, I didn't know magic can bring music to life." Koga said.
"I remember the King mentioning once something about this." Goofy said cupping his chin trying to remember. "Hmm, I can't remember what it was, I think it was before he became king."
"Well it's pretty fantastic." Koga said. He looked through the other songbooks. He saw one called Rite of Spring. He picked it up, wiping the dust off of it and opened it up. He screamed and jumped back when a T-Rex head popped out of the book and tried to take a bite out of him. He quickly closed it up. The other's looked at him concerned. "Don't open that book.
Goofy opened up a book called Symphony No. 5 and chuckled when geometric butterflies flew out and one tiny purple butterfly landed on his nose.
Sora looked around the books and paused when he saw one book giving off a aura of darkness. He picked it up, it read Night on Bald Mountain.
"Why's this one so special?" Sora asked himself as he opened it. He felt a strong zap as he instinctively dropped the book. A pillar of flames came out of the book and then was snuffed out. Everyone felt a strong gust of wind pulling towards the book. Everyone cried out as the wind kept getting stronger until it pulled them all into the book.
Their surroundings changed as they saw themselves in a stormy sky. They all screamed as they fell.
"Everyone gather up." Koga said reaching into his backpack. He pulled out a small bag. He opened up and threw it's contents all over the group. They halted their descent and floated midair.
"What happened?" Sora asked.
Koga held his bag out shaking it a bit. "Pixie dust. I got Tinkerbell to put some of it here in case of emergencies."
"Good thinking Koga." Goofy praised.
Koga chuckled but stopped when he noticed the surroundings. They were floating above a desolate village in the middle of the night. But overlooking the village was a haunting mountain. Looking at the top of the mountain gave Koga a cold chill of fear down his spine.
"There's something at the top of that mountain." He said plaining and started flying up towards the peak.
Suddenly sinister music started playing as they got closer and closer to the top.
"Uh Koga, I think there's something wrong with this place..." Donald said, shaking nervously.
"Donald's right. This place is giving me the creeps." Sora said.
Then the mountain rumbled as the peak itself started to crack open. Suddenly they realized that wasn't the peak of a mountain they were looking at, it was huge bat-like wings. Connected to said wings was a giant demonic figure. Skin as black as night, long horns, and glowing, petrifying, yellow eyes. It's legs were currently stuck inside the mountain, which was a active volcano. It's muscles rippled as it stretched its body and let out a mighty roar. The demon, Chernabog, turned it's gaze to the tiny group of strangers and gave a terrifyingly evil grin, exposing it's jagged teeth.
Sensing it's malice, the group summoned their weapons preparing for battle.
"Charge!" Goofy shouted as they all flew towards this demon.
Chernabog raised it's hands up and a orange light came from the inside of the volcano. The group cried out as the volcano erupted in flames that almost scorched them. It then threw it's hand back summoning a large ball of fire.
"Sora, Donald, triple blizzard, now!" Koga shouted. They flew close together and aimed their weapons at the ball of fire.
"FREEZE!" They shouted as they fired a unison blast of ice magic. It crashed into the monster's hand, snuffing out the flame and freezing the hand in a huge chunk of ice.
It let out a terrifying laugh as it crushed the ice with ease. Chernabog flapped his wings releasing a powerful gale of wind. The other's flew out of the way but Koga was too slow. He was about to get hit full on when Goofy flew in the way and put up his shield. He blocked most of the powerful gust of wind but the force knocked him back and he crashed into Koga. They yelled as they fell from the sky towards the village. They fell into a moat of an old castle, the water breaking their fall. Koga and Goofy bursted out of the murky water, gasping.
"Ahh, c-cold!" Koga screamed. They crawled to shore shivering and drenched. They looked up to Sora and Donald launching spells at Chernabog but the demon laughed it off. It then raised its hand and threw it over the village.
The entire area somehow felt darker as a shadow was casted over the entire village. Koga yelped when ghosts flew out of the ground. Some were specters draped in a dark cloak, other's were skeletal dressed in warrior armor, and other's were riding on skeletal horses. They all flew towards Chernabog circling him. Again the mountain exploded in fire. The two flew back up and rejoined the battle. Some of the ghosts tried grabbing them but Koga swiped them off with his Keyblade. At the rim of the volcano, a army of demons crawled out of the top like ants. Chernabog picked a handful of them up and laughed as he dropped them into the fire.
"Nothing's working!" Donald cried out. "How do we stop him?"
"I don't know but I'll think of something!" Koga said yelping as a harpy flew passed him, almost tearing him with it's razor sharp talons.
Chernabog continued to laughed at the group while it's minions danced like it was some kind of sick party.
Sora saw an opening and threw his Keyblade at it. The demon roared when it sliced right through it's left horn, cleaving it off.
Sora's eyes widened. "The Keyblade worked on it. It must be venerable to light."
"But with all that fire we won't get close enough to hurt him." Goofy said.
"Then this is my show now, stand back!" Koga said as he switched to his Keygun and fired at Chernabog. The ghosts flew in and acted as a body shield from the blast. Koga scowled. "...Well that's just unfair."
"Anyone else got a bright idea?" Donald asked, blasting a demon with thunder.
Sora eyes lit up with an idea.
"Sora if you say to use the power of friendship I swear..." Koga growled.
"I-I wasn't going to say that!" His brother stuttered. "I was going to say... we combine our strength and light in our hearts using... our bond and release it through our Keyblades."
"So, the power of friendship?"
"...Yeah."
The starry eyed youth rolled his eyes. "Alright, let's do it your way." Everyone flew in close together. They concentrated and their weapons glowed with light.
"All for one..." Sora said raising his Keyblade.
"And one for all!" The other's said as they all raised their weapons together. An orb of light appeared over their head illuminating the sky in all directions. Chernabog roared as he covered his face from the blinding light. The smaller demons and ghosts flinched at the light. But then the orb started to shrink as the light dimmed.
"Oh no, it's not enough." Goofy shouted.
Chernabog raised his hands as the spirits flew towards the group grasping them.
"We need more power!" Sora said. But where are they going to find someone else to add their light to this attack?
...
"Jiminy, we need you!" Koga shouted.
"Here I come fellas!" Jiminy Cricket said hopping out of Sora's pocket. "Time to give this demon what for!" He landed on the tip of Sora's Keyblade and raised his umbrella, light coming from it. Despite his small stature, his light was more than enough.
"Light!" They all shouted.
The orb grew in size and the light exploded. All the ghosts, demons, and harpies were vaporized by the radiance.
Chernabog roared in agony as he could not protect himself from the power. He exploded in purple fire burning away his very being.
Then everything went white.
The group opened their eyes and saw themselves out of the book. They were in some chamber made of purple rocks water dripped from the ceiling.
"Glad that's over." Donald sighed in relief.
"I'm gonna have nightmares for the rest of my life." Koga shuddered. "Would it kill those harpies to at least wear a shirt?"
"It's not over yet." Sora pointed to the end of the cave where there was a ornate set of double door. Something about it's simple design stirred a memory between the twins that felt so familiar, like they've seen it once upon a dream.
"This is the door to darkness?" Koga asked. "Thought it would be bigger..."
"I don't think this is it." Sora said walking towards it. "I think its a..."
"A what?"
Sora looked at his brother dramatically. "A regular door."
Koga facepalmed. "Thanks detective Sora."
"But really, I think there's something big behind it."
"Then this might be it." Koga said. "Ansem might be behind that door."
Sora looked to his friends. "This is it guys, no going back." He put his Keyblade on his shoulder and smirked. "Let's not keep him waiting."
"Ready when you are bro." Koga said twirling his Keygun in his hand he turned to the other two companions. "Right guys?"
"Yeah!" Goofy said. "We made it this far, we aren't gonna stop now."
"Let's get him!" Donald said with a bloodthirsty grin, for a cartoon duck.
Together they pulled the door open and stepped through it.
I really hope you guys like this, I really enjoyed myself making this version of End of World. I never liked how the game didn't emphasize on the fact that it's a amalgamation of the worlds lost to the Heartless. And there was also that weird part in the game where you revisited the worlds you've been to (whether it's a illusion or teleportation it's still weird).
So many Disney references...
Anyway stay tuned for the showdown between Sora and Koga vs Ansem.
Remember to leave a comment if you enjoyed the story.
Until next time...
HAVE FUN!