Asleep at Dawn
Chapter 9: Actual Sleep
-"Your Actions Are Totally Illogical."-
A/N: So, my birthday went by...a while ago.
Wouldn't you know it, Xenoblade Chronicles 2 had ANOTHER huge update recently - apparently the last one. There's a whole new story mode, starting from Level 1, so of course I found there was lots of grinding to be done. Still, I crushed it in a week. I can't excuse the two months between my birthday and the update, though...
Thanks for waiting! Hopefully I managed to make this more entertaining than a rest break has any right to be. Like, extreme action-packed sleeping.
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Midnight Town: Town Square...
The party appeared back in the park at the center of Midnight Town. Lambda mused, "Now, where would the inn be?"
Hazama answered immediately, "I saw it on West Street while I was swinging around, before heading east."
Kairi blinked. "Really? But didn't you go off swinging to the north?"
Hazama dialed up his usual smugness a bit more. "Naturally, an officer of the Intelligence Division must maintain a keen situational awareness at all times. I highly recommend it for everyone, actually. More often than not, keeping an eye out will save you from nasty surprises."
"I've got that covered for her," Namine replied. "It helps that I don't have to focus on moving in combat or anything, and I can see in all directions. So please put the knives away, okay?"
"Good to know at least one of you has your nose to the grindstone. Ding ding ding! You pass!" Hazama responded as he took his hands off the knives in his pockets. "Anyway, it's not like the 'inn' was hard to spot. It's more of a luxury hotel, and it's so huge, you can almost see it from here. Just look for the big neon sign that says 'Inn Name Only'. It's pretty close by."
"Wow, that pun..." Kairi rolled her eyes, then let out a big yawn. "Pun or not, though, I really need some sleep. Let's go."
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Midnight Town: West Street...
Hazama wasn't kidding; the hotel was only a few doors down the street from the intersection. Even so, the party passed several enticing stalls featuring various kinds of games.
Hazama side-eyed a tent with a large sign in front, featuring a mildly anthropomorphic dog playing an acoustic guitar on a tiny island, along with a speech bubble: "Play all day on DJ K.K.'s Cray-Cray Cay! Dodge all the flying music note balloons to win up to 800 TP!" The ex-Captain smirked. Win easy money, and look smooth while doing it? They won't know what hit them...well, what they didn't hit.
Lambda focused on the food court. There were so many flavors she hadn't gotten a chance to experience yet! Those chocolate oranges look yummy!
Xion had her eye on "Test Your Might": the easily recognizable carnival game involving a squeaky hammer, a button, a pole, and a bell. A few prizes in plastic cases surrounded the pole, ranging from tiny stuffed kittens for the "80% Wimp" tier all the way up to an Orichalcum Ring ("Plus 4 Magic, Plus 2 Strength") for the "100% Mighty" tier. While Xion was confident in her ability to win the game, she also wondered if she could form a new weapon, such as a hammer, out of her memories of Sora's special moves, adding to the four unique weapons she already had. Wait, I have five weapons, counting the Keyblade. I've gotta remember, this whole place is for Keyblade training. But since only Xion had this unique ability, then shouldn't she try to strengthen it, too? After all, they had plenty of time. Hmm, "Impact" is a pretty good name, actually. I hope it works tomorrow.
Kairi, meanwhile, was interested in "Spring Falls: Final Mix". It seemed to be a virtual reality arcade based on the Training World she and her friends had just conquered...but with the difficulty raised through the roof. The prize for completing all eight remixed levels (meaning the party was allowed to stop very early in the actual Training World) was listed as a whopping 20,000 TP! Challenge accepted, Kairi thought to herself.
Namine cautioned, "I think you should wait until tomorrow to try it, Kairi. That game looks brutal."
Kairi jumped a little. She asked aloud, "Wha - Namine, you heard that?"
"Yes. I can't hear anyone else's thoughts, though, just yours."
"But you could use your memory-reading powers to get the gist of most people's thoughts with a slight delay, right?" Hazama deduced.
"...Yes, I could," Namine admitted, "but I'd rather just ask if I can. I try to leave you all at least some privacy. Besides, most of us usually think out loud anyway...and you're still immune, Hazama."
Hazama shrugged. "The more you know..."
"Well, I don't know about the rest of you," Lambda spoke up, then yawned loudly before finishing her sentence, "but I don't plan to do any thinking for the next several hours. We're here."
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Midnight Town: Inn Name Only...
The interior of the hotel was just as huge and fancy as the exterior. Marble floors, mirrored walls, and a golden chandelier hanging from the ceiling high above seemed to make the whole place glitter. A few expensive leather couches were arranged in the middle of the lobby, but these just made a point of how comfy the actual beds must be.
The party looked to the other side of the room, where there was a counter with a single NPC standing behind it. His nametag read "Innkeeper". A sign next to him listed "30 TP per room per night, any size". Lambda noted, "Whoa, for such a classy place, that's really cheap! One room is barely more expensive than a meal at the fast-food place across town!"
The NPC greeted them. "Hello, ladies and gentleman, and welcome to Inn Name Only, the best and only choice of lodgings for off-world travelers in Midnight Town! How many rooms would you like?"
Kairi answered, "Um, two will be enough, I think. Lambda, are you okay with sleeping on the couch?" She was still getting over the fact that the NPC was actually named Innkeeper.
Lambda shrugged. "I'll be fine."
The NPC accepted 60 Shared TP and gestured to a door beside the counter. "Good, good. Your rooms are right down that hall. You may feel some slight disorientation as the hall rearranges itself to lead only you to your rooms."
Xion nodded; no wonder the hotel was so big despite not having any elevators or stairs. "Good to know; that'll also help keep the rooms secure, right?" Terumi wouldn't be able to sneak in and stab them in their sleep here.
"Our hotel has the best security TP can buy - your sleep is safe with us. Good night, esteemed guests." The girls nodded and walked down the hall.
Hazama tried to follow, but the hall stretched out before him, pulling the girls ahead until they were out of sight, and only then was he allowed to move forward. He shrugged and opened the door to Room 666 at the end of the hall, then snapped his fingers to shift his outfit to a simple set of white pajamas, complete with a floppy nightcap - a natural extension of the trick he used to re-summon his fedora whenever he lost it. He flopped into bed and fell into a dreamless sleep.
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[Realm of Sleep] [Kairi's POV] Prankster's Paradise...
It took Kairi a moment to realize she was dreaming...even though what she was watching was too over-the-top to be real.
As a floating, invisible presence, she saw that Sora was there flying over an endless ocean...by riding on top of a giant bubble that contained a live whale! From the muddy recollections she'd gathered from inside Sora's a year ago, Kairi recognized the whale as Monstro, a denizen of Jiminy Cricket's homeworld who was the size of an entire world by himself. The bubble encasing Monstro rushed forward much faster than Kairi expected from an object of its size, in hot pursuit of a giant, crustacean-like monster - one of the Dream Eaters Yen Sid spoke of, a boss-level Nightmare: Chill Clawbster.
Sora weaved left and right to dodge volleys of energy rings and lasers as the Nightmare desperately tried to literally burst his bubble. In the end, though, Sora got close enough to finish the fight by exploding the bubble, which blasted himself over the horizon on a spray of salt water as a side effect of the attack. Monstro was now free to eat Chill Clawbster with a vengeful roar that sounded like it shouldn't have come from a whale. The boss was large, but it simply couldn't compare to the world-sized sea mammal. Like everything else Monstro wanted to eat, the Nightmare went down in one gulp.
"That was crazy," Kairi murmured to herself, "But at least I know Sora's still doing well at his own test!"
Her dream then shifted into a more normal kind of nonsense. Something about tickets, diamonds, and a horse...
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[Realm of Sleep] [Xion's POV] Prankster's Paradise: Inside Monstro...
Xion realized immediately that she was dreaming...about being inside Riku's dream...which was inside Sora's dream...which was inside Pinocchio's world's dream. "How should I even describe this?" A muffled foghorn could be heard from some boat outside the surreal walls of Monstro's innards, making a distinctive BWOOOHN noise. "...Yeah, that about sums it up."
Riku, standing a few feet away, couldn't hear her. He was focused on the person in a Black Coat leading the puppet boy, Pinocchio, deeper into the Bowels. "Who are you?"
The guy stopped, turned around, and shoved the living puppet toward Riku. Then he removed his hood and smirked.
The dream world's Jiminy Cricket and Riku reacted the same way. "What?!"
Riku soon realized what was happening. "...Oh, it's another one. I gave in to the Darkness once, and ever since, it's followed me around in one form or another. Ansem - er, Xehanort's Heartless...a puppet Replica made from the shadows in my heart...and now, I'm fighting me."
The exact duplicate of Riku, but with his hairstyle from a year ago, grinned wider. "Sorry, not quite. After all, you're you. Isn't that right, Real Thing?"
Riku was taken aback. "Then...you really are the Replica from back then? How are you here, though? Come to think of it, I never even went through Monstro back in Castle Oblivion. Are you here because I skipped it somehow?"
The Replica shrugged. "First: don't think about Castle Oblivion's floor plan too hard. It changes all the time; even the Organization could never figure it out. As for why I'm here, all I know is that you were right. My heart did go to the same place as yours. And your heart is right here."
"What are they talkin' about, Jiminy?" Pinocchio asked in a whisper. "I'm all confused."
Jiminy scratched his head. "I'm sure I have no idea, Pinoke. Let's just get you back to your father. Things will make more sense there." He bounced back up the tunnels, and Pinocchio loped after him.
Riku clenched his fist, too lost in his own memories to pay attention to the residents of this world. "But I annihilated your body! You were dead! I mean, I'm not opposed to giving you a second chance, but aren't people supposed to stay dead after you ram a sword through their guts? I wasn't even using a Keyblade! How were you able to come back?" Riku tried to focus on how little sense this made, rather than on whether or not he should be feeling guilty about killing the Replica in the first place.
The Replica chuckled. "Have you forgotten? This whole world is a dream. Reality is...iffy here, and I noticed one of the dream figments was a shadow of you, so I stepped out and took its place. I don't know for sure if I'll still exist after you move on from this little world-inside-a-world, but unlike you, I don't look gift horses in the mouth. I want to make the most of this second chance."
The Replica was suddenly shrouded in a sphere of Darkness, which vanished just as quickly to reveal the boy clad in a familiar skirt...er, suit. "After all, you look like you could use a reminder of how strong the Power of Darkness is." The Replica summoned his Soul Eater sword in a threatening manner...but then extended a hand for a handshake. "Want to take on the Dream Eater in the next room together?"
The real Riku grinned. "Sure...uh, what should I call you now?"
The Replica shrugged. "Well, as things stand, I'm the only Replica that actually looks like my original. Vexen said Xion was a more successful subject, but on different standards. I say I'm the only 'Replica' there is! I'm going to take that loaded label and clean out all the bias against it!"
"Then it's good to have you back, Replica." They shook hands firmly, and turned toward the sound of roaring from the next room with identical confidence.
Xion smiled as the dream faded away. "I can't wait to meet him for real, but I bet Namine would be even happier about this."
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[The Training Worlds] [Namine's POV] Inn Name Only: Room 601...
Namine was dreaming about a memory of what had happened to Roxas in the virtual Twilight Town. Frustratingly, when she got to the part where DiZ and Axel started yelling, "Roxas! Roxas! Roxas!" the whole scene just got stuck in a loop and stayed there until she woke up.
Namine came back to consciousness with a headache, so she manifested herself to keep any pain from being shared with Kairi and waking her. As she appeared in the hotel room, she caught sight of Lambda leaving.
"What's she up to...?" Since Lambda was already too far away to ask, Namine reached out to read her memories. After she finished checking Lambda's memories from the last few minutes (including the resource logs), Namine was satisfied that nothing particularly shady was afoot. She laid back down to sleep, looking forward to enjoying those mini-games with the rest of the party the next day. Her dreams were vague, but pleasant.
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[Lambda's POV] A few minutes earlier...
Lambda had fallen asleep on the couch easily enough, but she woke up almost immediately. Checking her logs, she found that she'd been subjected to a powerful Cure effect as soon as she fell asleep in this room. The thing about Cure spells, though, was that they recharged Lambda's energy reserves as a side effect, as she'd learned in the aftermath of a particularly stressful battle against a Dustflier during the previous adventure. She woke up when she got back to full charge by force of habit. She rolled her eyes in the dark, then finished defragging her mind and archiving yesterday's data, which took only a few more minutes.
Now Lambda had a lot of extra time on her hands for training. She left the hotel and picked a Heartless-infested alleyway at random.
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Midnight Town: Northwest Quadrant...
As a gaggle of boring Soldiers materialized to attack Lambda, she realized that she should have left a message or something for the others. That gave her an idea for a new Option. "Comms Option!" The new drone had the appearance of an old-school movie projector, but with the film reels on the bottom like wheels. The Comms Option moved by floating, just like all the others, so wheels weren't strictly necessary to add, but Lambda liked the look. She tested it, and was able to link her senses of sight and hearing to the lens on the front of the Option. With this, she would be able to scout distant areas with more detail than her long-range scanning protocols could provide, and it could project a hologram of Lambda's image and voice to converse with people far away. However, the Comms Option lacked any weapons of its own, making it risky to use as an S.O.S. signal, and it definitely couldn't travel to other worlds for her.
Lambda sent the Option back to the atrium of Inn Name Only, then focused on wiping out the Soldiers with magic. A few Fire and Blizzard spells broke them up for a while, giving her time to dismiss Elysium, dig into her Pouch of Holding, and pull out the book Hazama had given her back in Spring Falls: There Goes a Keyblade Glider!
The childish-looking book had only a few thick, cardboard pages, but it contained several amazing revelations about the nature of the Keyblade. Apparently, all Keyblades could transform into at least one different weapon type. With sufficient skill, most of them could then progress to a more powerful weapon for a devastating combo attack. Beyond that, a lucky few Keyblade designs had the ability to transform into something called a Keyblade Glider: a flying vehicle that could open portals to the "Lanes Between" and allow a Keybearer to travel between worlds.
"Well, I probably shouldn't open a portal to the Lanes Between from the Training Worlds, but the Glider itself..." Seeing no reason not to check if she could do it, Lambda put the book away and re-summoned Elysium. Holding the Keyblade at her side, she tossed it behind her. It flew away over the roofs of the buildings, twinkled among the stars in the perpetually-darkened sky, and returned in two pieces.
The new shapes zoomed back to Lambda and latched onto her legs, lifting her into the air via small green thrusters along the backs of her legs and from the bottoms of her pointed feet. With delight, she recognized her old Battle Mode's leg blades! These weren't quite the same as the ones that came with Murakumo's armor, though. For one thing, they had a black paint job with glowing green borders at the joints. For another, they had vastly superior mobility. Where Lambda's old Battle Mode could slowly hover in midair or dash along the ground, Elysium's Glider form was capable of full, omnidirectional flight.
"Ha ha! Goodbye, clumsiness and slowness!" Lambda did a few loop-de-loops above the skyline. She was finally able to appreciate the rush of freedom that made everyone else seem to love moving so fast.
"Look out below!" She then swooped back down into the alleyway and punted a newly-spawned Soldier into a wall. Spinning in place with her right leg out, she launched Fire spells from the tip of her foot to burst a squad of Shadows all around her, then backflipped repeatedly to kick a Large Body into the air and shred it like a buzz-saw.
"Yahoo! This is exactly what I wanted!" She summoned a basic Option to her side and strafed over the next alleyway, slaying a whole squad of tiny, Soldier-like Deserters before they could flee.
"Hmm...custom design finalized. Gravity Option!" Her summoned Option transformed into a tiny, boxy satellite, complete with wide, rectangular solar panel wings. This Option constantly projected a translucent, purple column of increased gravity comparable to Murakumo's Gravity Seed technique or a Gravira spell. A squad of multicolored spellcaster Heartless was squished to the ground below her as she returned to the hotel, more than satisfied with her progress.
As she landed and dismissed Elysium, she mused to herself, "Huh, I must have expanded my mana pool a lot recently. That was way more spells than I can usually cast."
Meanwhile, in a dark alley Lambda had passed over without looking earlier, Terumi hissed in displeasure. "You are so lucky that my new power-up isn't ready yet. C'mon..." Raw Darkness continued to gather at his feet, sucking in and assimilating any Heartless that dared to spawn near him...
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[Kairi's POV] The next day... Inn Name Only: Room 601...
Kairi woke up easily, feeling well-rested. Namine was still snoring, though. With a shrug, Kairi dove into her own heart to check up on her.
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The Station of Clarity...
Kairi touched down on the well-lit stained glass that represented her heart. Namine was there; the dream bubble over her head showed her drawing a portrait of Hazama, who was holding a pose as if saying, Draw me like one of your French Grimoires. Kairi giggled at the scene. "Even in dreams, he's always so dramatic."
Kairi tiptoed over and nudged Namine's shoulder, causing her to jolt awake. "Kairi?! How did you get here?"
Kairi raised an eyebrow. "Um...it is my heart. Am I not supposed to be able to dive into it?"
Namine shook her head. "I've never heard of anyone being able to visit their heart's Station at will before. Then again, yours is completely different from most people - even the other Princesses of Heart have a different design on their Stations of Awakening. The difference might be because you have a Keyblade."
Kairi shrugged. "I suppose, although I don't know when you would have seen the other Princesses' Stations."
"Sora's Keyblade test took him to several of them," Namine answered.
"Huh, weird. Lambda just had her own Station in several colors, right? As for me, this place is...The Station of Clarity? So that's what it's called."
Namine blinked. "Did you hear that voice again?"
"Yeah. But you know, we really should be getting up."
"...Oh, right! I'm sorry for sleeping in."
"Don't worry about it. I'm glad we had a chance to chat in private, at least. See you soon, Namine."
"Anytime, Kairi."
Kairi created a save point at her feet and disappeared back to the waking world.
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Back in Room 601...
Xion was still asleep when Kairi returned from the Station of Clarity. Remembering what happened last time someone shook Xion awake, Kairi opted to take a shower and hope the Replica woke up on her own...but looking around, there wasn't any door that could lead to a bathroom. "What gives? How am I supposed to wash up or use the restroom? ...And now that I'm thinking about it, why don't I need to do either of those things?"
"Just another convenient magic trick of the hotel, I think," Namine answered, before recounting what she'd learned about the hotel from Lambda's memories and activity logs.
"I knew it!" Kairi exclaimed, in response to the news that sleeping at the inn meant full healing. She was loud enough that Xion groaned and woke up while Namine was still finishing up the explanation.
"Hey, Kairi. What's got you so excited?" Xion rubbed the sleep from her eyes, stood up, and slipped on her shoes, which she'd left by the foot of the bed. She opted not to change the phrase on her T-shirt yet.
Kairi shrugged. "We just found more video game comparisons...I'm sorry for shouting. By the way, did you have any...weird dreams? I dreamed that Sora put Monstro in a bubble to chase a giant crab with it. I think that's what he was doing in the Sleeping Worlds." Kairi couldn't quite remember her other dream, but the one with the giant Dream Eater definitely happened.
"I think you're right. My dream was sort of similar..." Xion recounted her dream about Riku's Mark of Mastery test, which was still perfectly clear in her head.
Namine manifested herself to express her surprise. "The Riku Replica came back, too? I...wasn't expecting that."
Xion grinned. "Yep. Isn't that great, Namine? This means everyone who got messed up at Castle Oblivion last year is back to normal!"
"Yes. It's a huge relief... Finally, all the people I hurt back then have been healed!" Namine smiled brightly, but a few tears escaped her eyes and sparkled out of existence as they fell.
Kairi frowned at her. "Namine, you know none of that was really your fault, right?"
"I believe it was partly my fault, but don't worry. After this, I feel like I can finally forgive myself."
Xion changed her shirt to say, "#ReplicaLivesMatter". She mentioned, "We should find Lambda and tell her the good news. She went out training, right? I hope she didn't run into Terumi or anything..."
"Hey, girls!" Lambda walk into the room right at that moment, saving everyone the trouble of searching for her. "Did you all sleep okay?"
Kairi nodded. "Yeah."
Namine shrugged. "Kinda. I woke up early and saw you leaving the room, so I checked your memories. I hope you don't mind."
Xion grinned excitedly. "We're better than okay! Wait 'til you hear this...!"
Lambda and the others shared what they'd been up to.
"...So in conclusion, everyone's doing great, we're all getting stronger, Riku made a new friend, and it's time to play some minigames!" Kairi pointed the way and flung open the door back to the hotel lobby. Namine vanished back into her heart as she marched out.
Lambda mumbled, "...Minigames? Okay, I think I can guess what she means." She and Xion followed behind Kairi.
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Midnight Town: West Street...
The girls met up with Hazama on their way outside and exchanged reports, although Hazama's night was completely uneventful - no weird dreams or anything. (Kairi and Namine giggled to each other at that news, for some reason.)
Kairi announced, "Okay, gang, let's split up and check out the minigames!"
Xion held up a hand. "Hold your Gummi Ships, Kairi. You should never split up the gang if there's a villain in the vicinity."
"Oh, right!" Lambda exclaimed. "Let me check on Terumi. Scanning...Observing...what in the worlds? All I'm getting is a bunch of cloudy Darkness."
"That must be related to the 'power-up' he mentioned last time," Namine guessed. "Is your Observation still stable enough to work, at least?"
Lambda checked to make sure. "Running checksum...no errors found. It looks like we'll be okay. And with all the power he's giving off, it wouldn't be too hard to find him and re-establish the Observation directly if it becomes a problem."
Kairi added, "Plus, he's giving himself a serious elemental disadvantage against most of us. What's he thinking? He must know he can't beat Roxas, myself, Sora, or Riku with Darkness, right?"
"Then do you think he's going to go after Lambda or me, despite the reasons he can't kill us?" Xion asked.
"I can't wait to find out." Hazama licked his lips in anticipation. "Remember, girls, it's my turn to humiliate him this time!"
Kairi laughed nervously. Hazama was acting kind of creepy. "If you say so. But since Terumi seems to be busy at the moment, we have time for minigames!" She dashed off to the VR arcade.
"Okay! I'll have some cool things to show off when I get back!" Xion approached the Test Your Might pole and did some stretches.
Hazama gestured to D.J. K.K.'s Cray-Cray Cay. "You'll probably find me still winning at the one over there."
"Ooh, that smells good..." Lambda mumbled as she headed to the food court further down the road.
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One hour later...
Everyone reconvened in front of Inn Name Only after playing/eating their fill.
Hazama arrived first and sat down on a bench by the sidewalk to read a little more of The Official Prima 'Kingdom Hearts' Strategy Guide. Most of the info was a year out of date, but there was a sizable bestiary of Heartless and a list of useful-looking spells and abilities in the appendices. Perhaps there was something worth adding to Hazama's already-impressive skill set.
Xion arrived a few minutes later, wearing an Orichalcum Ring and hugging a giant stuffed Moogle. "Hey, Hazama! I thought you'd still be winning at the dodging game with the long, rhyming name." She sat down next to him on the bench.
Hazama smirked. "Oh, I would've, but the auto-tuned puppy singing the background music started to grate on me. Still won a cool 800 TP, though."
Kairi approached the bench, grumbling to herself. Xion asked, "What's wrong, Kairi? I don't think I've ever seen you this ticked off before."
Kairi's grumbling slowly increased in volume until the others could hear it. "Stupid freaking unfair cheating obnoxious PLATFORM HELL! If it's not the pop-up spikes, it's the platforms disappearing. Or the enemies knocking you onto the spikes. Or the enemies knocking you onto other enemies, and then they knock you into the pit! Or the buzz-saws trailing around thin air right where you need to jump to the next platform, or... *Grumble grumble...*"
Lambda called out as she approached, "It was that bad, huh?"
Kairi took a few deep breaths and clapped her hands against her cheeks, suddenly seeming less angry. "Whew! Calming down...okay. Yes, it was that bad. But I almost had it! I just need a little more practice to get through without taking too much damage so I can beat the boss."
Xion nodded. "Okay. Wait, do you think it's possible to beat the Violet Toadstool with just one party member?"
Kairi rolled her eyes. "Please. The Violet Toadstool was a quarter of the way through. After that it was a nasty red guy that looked like a Defender. That Eliminator was a real challenge; I went through ten plays at 10 TP each just because of it. The third boss was Ansem...er, Xehanort's Heartless. He was easy."
Lambda shrugged. "Just call him Ansem. You can call the original Ansem DiZ. But it's a good sign that you were able to beat him so easily!"
"But what if Ansem the Wise is my dad? Anyway, I beat 'X-Heartless' without breaking a sweat, and by then I was really good at dealing with the unfair platforming. But then the last boss was Anti-Sora! Let me tell you, Sai'x was lucky to fight Final Sora instead. Anti-Sora was brutal - fast, strong, maneuverable, and when he got me with just one claw attack, I was suddenly stuck in a huge combo that killed me in seconds." Kairi hung her head in defeat.
Lambda pet Kairi's shoulder and assured her, "Don't worry, there's a solution. You'll just have to boost your speed! I found a shop called Food in the Buff that was selling Power, Magic, Defense, and Speed Boost items! The problem is, they cost 500 of your Bonus TP apiece, so you should probably save up for your unique bonus item first, whatever it is. I spent the extra Bonus TP I got from training last night on a Magic Boost and a Speed Boost, but I wasn't allowed to buy a Power Boost, probably because I gave up the sword in that dream. I'll be way faster in our next battle, though!"
Kairi considered it. "Hmm...sounds intriguing, but I don't know if those boosts would carry over into the virtual reality game. It changed a few things, such as having an HP bar's worth of hits I can take before instant death instead of making me feel pain or break bones. I'll have to look through the shops on East Street to find out what my unique items might be, too."
Xion nodded. "Good plan. Let's all do that, then."
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Midnight Town: Town Square, one shopping spree later...
After a few hours spent checking every shop on East Street, the group figured out what bonus items were available for each of them.
Hazama found a set of beam knives on sale for 2500 TP at Blades 'R' Us. His reaction: "Shit, I came up just short. Smart-ass shopkeeper doesn't have any blind spots in his store, either."
The only bonus item available for Namine was the Memory Flasher she saw earlier at Seers, and she was still far from being able to buy it. "...And I'm still not even sure if I want it."
Lambda found a strange hair accessory in Ms. Wardrobe's Wardrobe called a "Braid Beam", which could hold a braid together and take advantage of Lambda's prehensile hair to aim and shoot laser beams. "Rats! if I hadn't bought those boost items, I would've had enough TP!"
In the same store, Kairi found an advertisement for something called a "Very Special Outfit", with the following description: "These extraordinary garments, crafted by the good fairies Flora, Fauna, and Merryweather, contain very special powers that allow you to contribute your own power to your friends!" There was no telling what that meant, although Xion and Namine thought the wording seemed familiar. Either way, Kairi was just a little lacking in Bonus TP, just like the others.
All of this left Xion quite pleased that she was able to afford her own bonus item: a little book from Good To Know titled Armakinesis for Dummies. From it, she learned a few mental techniques to control her weapons with her mind like the other members of Organization XIII. Minutes after purchasing it, she could make her weapons float in midair around her while summoning a new set of weapons...and levitate those, too! Now she was no longer limited to a single weapon type at a time, which meant she could use her Keyblade and her wings at the same time, just for starters. However, achieving good reaction speeds with more than a few of them at a time took a lot of concentration.
Xion summoned all of her weapons at once and arrayed them around herself as she left the bookstore. "Check it out, I'm a walking armory!"
Namine clapped...which was kind of weird when she wasn't visible "Impressive!"
Hazama gave the display a thumbs up. "Adaptable...lethal...I like it!"
Lambda shrugged. "I've seen more. This is definitely a huge improvement, though."
Kairi's eyes glinted in determination. "I'll catch up, just you wait!"
Xion grinned and dismissed her weapons. "I guess our break is over, then. Let's head to the next Training World!"
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The Training Worlds: Hub...
Roxas was there to greet them when they returned. "Welcome back, everyone. You know the drill; the next Training World is through that door over there. It's supposed to help you get used to worlds with unusual vehicles and other methods of transportation. Some worlds are more spread out than others, after all."
He pointed to the next door in line:
Training World 4:
Sky of Battle
"Your target is a massive flying enemy, of course. Do your best!"
"Sounds cool!" Xion opened the door.
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A/N: And there we go. Another one down.
I had to change the notes up at the top three times. At this snail's pace, KH3 will be out long before I'm done.