Oh wow chapter 20! I never expected to get a fanfic up to that many chapters. But of course I have to give thanks to my co author TheDeadGirlRisen for all the help! And of course all of you guys for reading!

Ch.20

Sora groaned as his thoughts started to come back to him. He slowly opened his eyes to bright lights. Everything felt disappointed and his head still ached slightly. Sora rubbed his head as he tried to remember what had happened.

"Guys?..." Sora muttered in his thoughts.

'We're here, we need to talk to you about something.'

"What is it?" Sora questioned.

"You okay?" A voice asked causing him to look and see someone standing nearby.

Sora blinked a few times as he looked at the person. He tried to focus his eyes, but he still felt rather out of it.

'Be wary, we don't know who this person is or what they want with us.' Vanitas cautioned.

Sora slowly sat up as he rubbed his eyes. He realized at least that he had been laying on a bed. He tried to look at the persona again as his eyes slowly came into focus. He could tell the person had short hair at least, but the lighting in the room still made him feel a bit disoriented. His body as well felt a bit sore upon waking up.

"I think so…" Sora finally replied.

"Those creatures that attacked you are after the Keyblade. But it's your heart they really want, because you wield the Keyblade," the person said again, Sora course at least tell now it was a female voice.

He blinked a few more times until his eyes finally focused on who was in front of him. For the briefest moment he thought it was Kairi. Though he wanted to be sure as he shook his head and rubbed his eyes once more. Before him stood a young girl with short black hair, and she was dressed a tanktop and rather short shorts.

"Who are you?" Sora asked.

"Me? I'm the great ninja Yuffie," the girl boasted with confidence.

Sora was about to respond when a sharp pain ran through his head. His body still felt a bit sore and Sora figured it was probably because of all the dodging and fighting he had done before.

Yuffie looked right at Sora before turning around. "I think you might've overdone it, Squall."

A man stepped through the door and it was none other than the man from before. He sighed as he crossed his arms. "That's Leon."

'Keep an eye on him. We don't know what he is up to.'

'But.. it seems like he brought us here and they are helping to heal Sora.'

'He may be wanting Sora as a prisoner, we have to be cautious of strangers.'

Ventus didn't say anything in response.

Sora looked at the two in the room with him, but didn't say anything to them. He just kept quiet as he tried to think of what he could do. A second later Yuffie took a small blue bottle out from a chest that was on the table. She handed it towards Sora. "Here, drink this. It's a potion. It should help with any pain you still have."

Sora stared hesitantly at the potion. "Do you guys think I should?"

'I recognize it, the potion is a health potion. It doesn't look like it's been tampered with.'

'Only take a sip of it at first. Wait a moment and if the pain starts going away then drink the rest of it.'

Sora reached out and took the potion. He didn't say a word though as he did. He looked down at the small potion before he slowly took a sip from it. Much to his surprise it had a rather sweet taste. Right after one sip the aches and pains from his body started to fade away. Though he then puckered his lips as it left a more bitter aftertaste.

As he slowly drank from the potion he finally thought he might as well ask the question that was on his mind. "What… What do you guys want?"

"Well we were hoping to get you to a place to talk to you safely. We wanted to do that as well as just get the keyblade away from you for a short bit to keep the creatures away from you. But," Yuffie rolled her eyes as she glance at Leon. "Leon here didn't wanna play nicely and made things a bit more difficult."

"What do you mean?" Sora asked with narrowed eyes.

"We wanted to get the keyblade from you because the Heartless are basically tracking it, which means they are tracking you."

"Hopefully though they can stay away for now even though you are holding on to the keyblade still," Leon said as he stepped forward. "Still hard to believe that you of all people are the chosen one." He paused for a moment as he stared at Sora. "Hmpf, I suppose beggars can't be choosers."

Ventus hissed inside his mind, and Vanitas seemed surprised by how Ventus was acting, 'Jeez, what is up with you?'

'He keeps insinuating that Sora is not strong enough! Our Sora is strong! He'll be able handle the Heartless with ease!'

'Sora will just have to prove him wrong then.'

'Yeah!'

"I… I don't understand though. What are you guys even talking about?" Sora asked, looking at Leon and then Yuffie. He did feel a bit hurt by Leon's words, but he knew he had Ventus and Vanitas to give him confidence. But he still felt a bit uneasy about it all. "I don't get any of this…"

Leon gave a sigh and muttered sarcastically, "Great… we got a smart one here."

"Be quiet Leon, you're not helping," Yuffie said as she glared at him and he just shrugged without a word.

Yuffie then took a seat next to Sora on the bed. He scooted away from her, and made sure to keep an eye on everyone in the room. Yuffie gave him a quick confused look, but then continued on with what she was going to say. "So to start, you may have figured out by now but there are other worlds beside your own."

"Obviously," Sora said raising an eyebrow. He and his friends had been trying to get to other worlds after all.

"Generally, people aren't really suppose to know about that kind of stuff. Because the worlds are not connected and stuff."

"That is until more recent times," Leon added in looking down at Sora. "Once the Heartless started to show up, everything changed."

"The Heartless. The shadowy creatures, right?" Sora asked, thankful he already had a small bit of knowledge about them from Ventus and Vanitas.

"That's right. The Heartless… Those without hearts," Leon replied.

'Yes thank you for the summary genius, we had no clue what Heatless could have possibly meant.' Vanitas commented with a scoff.

"Yes, Heartless… it's kinda in the name what they are." Sora said dryly agreeing with what Vanitas had said.

Yuffie gave a small cough as she spoke to move on from Sora's comment. "It's the darkness in people's hearts, that's what attracts them, the Heartless."

"And there is darkness within every heart," Leon added again, while he closed his eyes for the moment.

Ventus chuckled as he said teasingly, 'Well obviously Vani is the darkness in your heart.'

'Oh what are you then? His light?'

'Hmm… Yep!' Ventus agreed with a nonexistent grin.

Vanitas just scoffed, 'Idiot.'

Sora wanted to chuckle, but he knew he was in the presence of other people. People who had no idea about him or anything. He had to remind himself to not look weird or strange in front of others. So instead he took in a deep breath as he waited for Leon or Yuffie to speak up again.

"Hey, so… have you heard of someone named Ansem?" Yuffie asked him as she glanced over at him.

"Guys?" Sora asked Ventus and Vanitas as the name wasn't familiar to him.

'Hmm, doesn't sound familiar.'

'I got nothing either.'

With neither Vanitas or Ventus knowing Sora shook his head. "No I haven't."

"He was someone who studied the Heartless," Leon started off. "He had recorded his findings in a detailed report. But…" he trailed off.

"The report got lost. Scattered over different worlds somehow," Yuffie said, filling in the rest.

"So I guess I should keep an eye open for those pages." Sora muttered not looking forward to the idea of a scavenger hunt.

Leon snorted. "The weapon you were holding earlier is a keyblade."

"I know that." Sora responded narrowing his eyes at the man.

"Oh, go on then tell me what you know about it." Leon taunted.

Sora tensed slightly before frowning as he thought about it. "I know that it's a special weapon, with the power to open locks." Sora answered after a moment of thinking about the name, if Heartless was that obvious than hopefully the keyblade was that obvious as well.

"Hmph. Lucky guess," Leon muttered as he crossed his arms.

Sora was about to retort when Yuffie spoke up, "Just ignore Leon. He's just being grumpy. But can you show us the keyblade at least?"

'Ask them why they want to see your keyblade.' Vanitas told him.

Listening to Vanitas, Sora repeated the question out loud. "Why do you want to see my keyblade?"

"The keyblade, it's something that is really important. It's pretty much… well the key to everything," Yuffie replied.

Sora could feel the unimpressed looks that both Vanitas and Ventus must have had. "Un-huh, you know I have one, yet so far you haven't given me a good reason to show you," Sora told them, deciding that if Ventus isn't trying to curb Vanitas being suspicious, than he had best be cautious, besides these people were complete strangers. Only an idiot would trust them right away.

"Just thought it would be easier with explaining things" Yuffie said with a shrug. "It's okay if you don't. Just know that it is the key."

"The Heartless though, they have a great fear of the keyblade," Leon said as he walked closer to the door of the room. "That's why they'll keep coming after you no matter what."

'As if some Heartless can stop you.'

'Vani and I will help you, the Heartless won't stand a chance!' Ventus cheerfully encouraged.

"Let them come then. I have to find my friends, and I won't let the Heartless stop me," Sora said in a determined voice. Then thinking of his friends again… a feeling of worry washed over him. "But wait… I still don't know where they are or what happened to them…Riku… Kairi…"

'We have an idea about Kairi, we'll tell you when you aren't in the middle of a conversation.'

"Alright that's great!" Sora thought enthusiastically.

"That's great you are determined," Yuffie said with a smile.

"More like arrogant," Leon muttered.

"Hey, sounds like you sometimes Leon," Yuffie replied with a bit of a smug grin.

Leon crossed his arms and harrumphed, not wanting to say anything else.

"Well anyways," Yuffie said, moving on to the next point. "It's good that you at least know some stuff about the keyblade. With the locks and stuff."

"Sooner or later, the Heartless will find you again. You'd best prepare yourself," Leon spoke ominously, actually sounding a little more invested in the conversation.

"Prepare myself? For what?" Sora asked cautiously.

"To fight for your life. This isn't going to be something that is easy. Are you ready?" Leon asked.

'Why would he want us to fight for our lives?'

Thinking that was a good question, he looked at Leon and questioned, "Why do you want me to fight for my life? You've been nothing but rude, and you attacked me."

"Because… the Heartless won't stop. As I said before, they are going to keep coming," Leon replied.

"And I'll fight them if they get in the way of me finding my friends," Sora responded. "I don't see what that has to do with me being ready though. In fact I should be leaving to find my friends now."

"You can't leave yet, we've been waiting and looking for the one who has the keyblade," Yuffie insisted.

"So you're keeping me here?" Sora asked narrowing his eyes.

Yuffie shook her head. "No of course not. We have others though who need your help, and we were going to go meet them after we talked with you."

Sora paused in thought before shaking his head, he didn't want to go with these people especially since that Leon guy had attacked him, "I have to find my friends, after I find them then maybe I'll help."

'Sora… we don't know how long it will take to find Riku, we also don't know where to start to look. We can help them and look for Riku at the same time.'

"But… they attacked us, they're practically trying to force us to help them," Sora protested.

'Much as I dislike them, it would be beneficial to work with them as they may be useful in the future,' Vanitas said.

"Fine."

Sora huffed. "All right I'll help you guys out."

Leon nodded. "Let's go meet up with Aerith. She should be in the connected room with the other visitors by now."

Just as Leon was about to open the door, Yuffie jumped up from the bed and pointed to the corner of the room. "Leon!"

There in the corner was a ball of darkness forming, and from it a Heartless popped out. A bit different looking than the small shadowy ones Sora had seen before. This one stood up on its legs and had bits of armor on it. Leon ran forward and stood in front of Yuffie.

"Yuffie, go!"

Yuffie nodded before running through the door connecting to the next room over. Leon then summoned his gunblade and held it out in front of him. "Sora, let's go!"

Without another word Leon slammed his blade into the Heartless, shoving it back through the window. He then ran out the window and jumped down carefully to the alleyway below, before striking down on the Heartless.

Sora stared at what he had just witnessed. Despite getting off on the wrong foot with Leon, Sora was at least a little impress with what the man could do. But he didn't think or say anything on it, he just kept it to himself.

"So we should follow him then?" Sora asked as he approached the window.

'Yeah, we probably should…' Ventus replied after a pause.

Sora took in a deep breath before he jumped down into the alleyway. Now that Heartless were starting to show up all over, Sora finally decided to summon his keyblade. Leon gave him a nod. "You don't need to bother with all the small fry. Find the leader. Now let's go! I'll go back and check on the First District!"

Sora started fighting the nearby Heartless, as he made his way over to the Third District, he runs down the stairs to the main level where he sees another group of Heartless. Sora hears a loud crash and a scream and he quickly rolled to the side on instinct and as he leapt back up to his feat he saw two strange… animals… people? They laid on the ground partly dazed.

He hesitated and then asked them. "Are you okay?"

The two of them looked up an blinked a bit before both of them shouted, "The Key!"

Plot is moving along. Sora is of course a bit more hesitant towards others still. So how will things go later on? Let's find out!

Thank you all so much for reading!