Chapter 2:
"You made it, huh?"
Sora snapped his eyes open after clenching them shut while running through the white flash. He pulled his head back in surprise as instead of a white void, he was suddenly in a very dark and ominous place. He felt the rain a moment later but could not focus much on it or on his surroundings while faced with the dark figure in front of him whose presence intimidated him while also filling him with a strange sense of recognition. "Do I, know you?" Sora asked.
The man wearing a black cloak in front of him opened his eye a bit wider in surprise at the boy's question. Then he smirked and shrugged his shoulders, leaning back and saying smugly and in a knowing voice, "Who knows? The question should really be, do you know you?"
"Huh?" Sora tilted his head to the side. He shivered and glanced down, then his hands shot in front of his lower half as he tried to cover his bare body up. "Whoa! Wait- where am I?" Sora started looking around, taking in what was happening around him in different stages.
"You're in the World of Waking, kid," the man before Sora started. He continued to grin while lifting a hand towards the teen, and Sora stepped back only to look down in surprise as his body illuminated in a flash and got covered in a dark cloak similar to the man's. A black cloak with a silver zipper down the middle of it appeared on his body, and Sora felt clothes appear below it as well which warmed him up and started drying out the rain that had covered him. "You're welcome," the older man standing in front of him said as Sora looked himself up and down.
"Yeah, thanks," Sora lifted his head back up and said with a small nod. "So, the World of Waking?" Sora looked around at the rubble and ruins of huge buildings. There were dark mountains in the distance ahead of him, and it seemed like they were standing on a road between lines of destroyed skyscrapers. There was a dark ash coating everything and the ground was getting soaked which made the ash stick to Sora's feet before though now it was hard to see considering the black shoes he was wearing the same color as the wet ash. "It's, very…"
"No need to sugarcoat it," the man in front of Sora said with a laugh. He stepped to the side and leaned up against a broken chunk of wall on the side of the road that had its own wet coating of ash his glove smeared around. The man had his hood down showing his long wet grayish-black ponytail, he had an eyepatch over his right eye, and there was a scar below his left eye that jagged down across his cheek to his jawbone. The man turned his head and looked through his one good eye out into the distance, down the road towards the black mountains his golden eye narrowed at the sight of. "This place is going to shit. Won't last long now."
"What, is this place?" Sora asked, looking around at the strange dark world. The rain was pouring down but he did not see any clouds above. The buildings were all destroyed and decrepit, and it did not look like there was anyone there other than the two of them.
"You don't recognize it?" The man before Sora asked, turning back from the distant mountains to the boy in the middle of the road. "Not at all?"
The teenager with wet spiky brown hair shook his head slowly, frowning at the question which made it sound like he should. "I can't even remember, who I am. I don't know what's… Do we know each other?"
"Hahaha, hahahaha," the man leaning on the wall started laughing and when he stopped himself he wound up just letting out another round of laughs. "Well, let's just say," he stopped laughing while the boy was frowning at him in a more angry and still confused way. "I know you."
"You seem to know everything," Sora said, his eyes narrowing a bit like he thought the man already knew all the answers and was just messing with him with his vague questions and answers.
"Not everything," the man replied, and he pushed off the wall to take a step back Sora's way. "I have no idea how you managed to make it back again." Sora's eyes widened and his frown lifted as the man did not look to be lying about that. "My guess though," the one-eyed guy continued, and he looked at Sora carefully while lifting up the right corner of his lips into a grin. "Is you managed to grip onto something. When there was barely any of you left, just as there still doesn't seem to be much of you up there. Am I close?"
"'Something?'" Sora repeated, and he started to frown again as that just sounded like another vague thing. Then his eyes shot open huge and he whispered, "Her?"
"Of course," the man said, nodding like it was the obvious answer. "Well, I should have guessed you wouldn't be gone for good. This place though, it's not holding up as well as you are."
Sora had opened his mouth wanting to ask again what the man knew after speaking like they knew each other well, but that second part made Sora's eyes dart to the left and at a building down the road that started falling inwards towards the street. It was breaking apart as it fell, and chunks of it that broke off were turning completely to black masses that seemed to merge with the dark floor when they collided. "What's happening to it?" Sora questioned, as he glanced around at other buildings around that looked unstable and close to collapsing.
"It's what already happened," the older man replied. "See this world is just like you. It's supposed to be gone. In fact, this world never should have been in the first place, so the fact that it's still holding on is pretty impressive if you ask me."
"Never should have been?" Sora repeated softly, getting even more confused and also a strange feeling of sadness at how the man said it.
"The World That Never Was," his companion said. "That's what this place is."
"I thought we were in the World of Waking?"
"We are, but a lot of stuff passes through this world. Things trying to come back to the realms above. This place is about to fade for good though," the man said it and sighed, but his expression steadied and with that look the world rumbled and made Sora stumble with his arms sticking out for balance. "See, I'm all that's holding this world together."
"You are?" Sora spun and asked. He froze after doing so, and he turned his head more in the direction he had come from. The light that had come with him when he emerged out into that world was gone, leaving the road behind him empty so he could see farther into the city. Past all the dark and crumbling buildings, Sora looked through the rain and saw a castle crashed into the city far behind him. There were some towers of the castle floating up in the sky, but one was dropping fast and it crashed into half of a standing skyscraper, taking it down while more towers of the castle started to fall. "What's happening?!" Sora shouted, stepping backwards as the floor below his feet shook. The shaking was not from the collision of the castle with the city, but from something bigger.
"This world held on, and my guess is because there's a piece of my heart that holds some nostalgia for this dump." The word 'dump' left the man's lips and a crack split through the road between Sora and the destroyed castle.
The rest of the floating pieces started to fall, and Sora realized that the man had done that with his words alone. "What are you doing?" Sora spun and shouted at the guy.
"Sorry kiddo, but I just don't care enough for this place any longer," he replied with a shrug and lifted both hands up like there was nothing to do. The man stepped to the side, moving away from a widening crack cutting through the ground. Sora started to calm down a bit as the man did not seem to be doing this intentionally for any specific reason. The guy with the eyepatch looked back into his eyes and said, "Thing is, a place like this should have fallen into nothingness a long time ago. There were people who used to think of this place as home though, and the worlds themselves try not to disappear completely as long as there's still one person like that out there. I'm the only one left though, the last of the ones who actually lived here who cared. 'Cause of all the places I've been to, I actually liked this place a lot."
"So why, let it leave your heart?" Sora asked.
"Haha, ha you sound like him alright," the man laughed and made Sora's mouth curl in annoyance again. "I just don't have the room for it though," the man continued, responding to Sora's question this time and making the boy's eyes widen in surprise at it. "My heart's not big enough… Once you've been around, as long as I have, you have to decide what's worth keeping in your heart and what doesn't really need a place." He looked back towards that castle further in the city where he had once lived, then he looked closer at the kid staring at him with some sadness in his eyes. "Don't worry, I've got some room in there for you. So I won't leave you here completely screwed."
"What, do you mean?" Sora asked. He glanced around and then moved more towards the middle of the road as other buildings were breaking apart around it. The cracks were spreading, and the world shook again from something big that had Sora tensing up.
"Well, the thing is," the man started scratching the back of his head through his soaking wet hair. He cracked a small grin and turned around, looking down the road in the opposite direction as the crashed castle and into the distance outside town again. "I can get out of here just fine. You, on the other hand-"
"Take me with you!" Sora called out. "You, know the girl don't you? The one I need to find! The one, I promised… Who I promised I would…" Sora tried hard to focus on what he was thinking about, but his voice trailed off and he stared past the man who was not looking back at him. Sora stepped forward hesitantly while staring out past the city and at the dark mountains outside it, the dark mountains that looked closer now than they were before. The bad feeling he had intensified and he gulped while stepping to the side of the other man in a black cloak. "What is-"
"The World Eater," his older counterpart replied before he could finish his question. Sora glanced to the side at him and then back at the mountains that he just noticed were getting closer, as distant as they looked. They were in motion, and getting bigger in size. "I was originally wishing this world would just, fade away. I held on a little longer though, so that I could use it as a bit of a sacrifice."
"You're sacrificing the world?" Sora asked nervously. "While we're in it?"
"Oh, I'm going to be long gone by the time that thing gets here," the man said in a smug way. He also used 'I' instead of 'we' which Sora noticed and tried not to start panicking over while he stared at those dark mounds in the distance. "But it's better this world, weak and without anyone on it, or even anyone who really cares about it, than any other world out there. Wouldn't you agree?"
"I, guess," Sora started. "But what is that thing? Why is it- it eats worlds? That's crazy!"
"You're telling me," the older man said, and though his tone was the same joking one he had been using the whole time, it actually sounded serious for once too. "Told the old man that completing it might have unforeseen consequences, but I probably would have tried something else if I knew this thing would wake up. Been a long time since it's been up, and it's not going to be satisfied with just this world."
"You mean, it'll go to other worlds after this one?" Sora asked.
"You must be a genius," his companion replied. Sora took a step back on his side, as another dark mound appeared back behind the closer ones. In the dark distant horizon, Sora realized that most of the distance he was seeing actually was just another mound much much bigger than the ones in front closer to him. "It's smart to be afraid there, kid. Last time, we had thousands of Keybearers to help stop that thing." Sora's eyes bulged and he spun to the man on his side who continued while looking out at the beast in the distance, "We're not in as bad a place as a few years back, actually a nice handful of us again instead of just a single 'chosen one.'" He smirked while glancing back at Sora who in turn looked down at his hand that he made his Keyblade appear in.
When Sora's Keyblade emerged, the entire world trembled and Sora's heart fell at the noise he heard echo through the entire World of Waking. It was a roar mixed with a shriek, and the voice alone hit the shaking world with giant earthquakes. "What did I do?!"
"It remembers the Keyblade!" The man next to Sora shouted while stumbling back and forth himself. "My guess is it's still pissed that we locked it up!"
"Well how do we lock it up again?!" Sora exclaimed.
"Sorry, that's not a job for two people," the older guy said with a laugh. The world started to settle down, but Sora swore he saw those dark mounds start speeding up in the direction of the city. The older man let out an impressed whistle as he looked out with a hand to his forehead, "Luckily though, it's not something we have to do today. Even this wreck of a world will hold it over for a bit." He leaned back and lowered the hand from his forehead, and he turned fully to the teen at his side who nervously turned back to him though he kept darting glances back in the direction of the beast.
"Listen," the man began, holding up a palm as he started up an offer. He hid his smirk and reached up, putting his black hood over the top of his head before continuing, "I could just tell you how to get off this world, how to escape the beast, but it's not going to come cheap. I've got to think about the long term, kid. How I'm going to stop this guy so I can get back to what I was doing before."
"Just tell me! I have to get back to her- and I have to get off this world!" Sora exclaimed the second part in a more hurried voice as a crack split the entire street to his left and widened enough that a building started crumbling down into it.
"I'll need your help fighting that thing when the time comes," the man started. He nodded his head to the right and in the direction of a monster that looked much bigger than the city they were in.
"That thing eats worlds!" Sora exclaimed back. "How can we-" he stopped shouting, and the face of the girl appeared back in his mind. Then what the man in front of him said about this thing going to other worlds echoed in his head, and Sora's fists started clenching at his sides with his right gripping harder around the yellow hilt of his Keyblade. "Which means, she's in danger too."
"That's a good way to think about it," his companion said with a nod and a smirk. "But I don't need the you who's here right now. I need you to get your power back, and you're going to need more than ever for this. It's why I said there's gonna be a cost. That fine with you?"
"Yes!" Sora exclaimed back.
Should really be more careful to what you agree to. Not that you've got much of a choice in this situation. Luxu grinned big and he held his right hand out to the side, and in it formed a long black Keyblade that he swiped across his body and made Sora stare with big eyes again. "Only way you're getting off this world is through using darkness. You don't have a lot of time to master it, but you've got to make a portal on your first try or you're getting sucked up by that thing when it gets here, oh I'd say, in a minute."
"A minute?!" Sora exclaimed, and he spun back but the beast did not look much closer than before. Yet those dark hills did seem to be moving faster, and he gulped while looking back at the one-eyed man who nodded at him before snapping his fingers on his left hand and making a black portal appear behind him. Sora stared at the portal in shock and he stepped forward, but Luxu held out his Keyblade and aimed the tip at Sora's chest which kept him back. "Hey! Let me in with you!"
"No way," Luxu replied. He smirked at the kid's angry look at his response, then he leaned forward and slashed down at Sora's right arm. He cut through the black sleeve the boy was wearing and cut his arm too, and Sora stumbled back and fell on the floor with blood gushing out of the wound.
Sora grabbed at his right arm with his left hand and gasped out in pain before clenching his teeth and snapping his head up to glare at the man before him. "Why would you do that?!" Sora shouted angrily.
"You mad?" Luxu asked. "Well I'm about to leave you here to die, so be mad at me. And use that anger, and the fear of the beast coming for you, the despair of knowing you'll never see her again…" Sora's left hand clenched into his bloody right arm even angrier as the man taunted him with knowledge of the girl he was searching for without giving him answers as to who she was. "Take all those dark feelings and accept them. That's the power of darkness. Decide that you're not afraid of it, when you feel those dark and icky emotions pulling at your heart, and use them to get out of here before you're killed. As strong as your heart is, I don't think you're coming back again when all you've got right now is a half-cocked goal and a face you're searching for."
"I will find her!" Sora yelled, leaning forward and getting back up on his knees. The man he yelled it at turned around though with a humph and a big smirk cracking across his face. "And I- I- Don't leave me here!" Sora yelled, cutting back on the next thing he was going to shout strongly and his voice actually cracking as the man was leaving him behind. He started moving for the portal of swirling darkness, but it dropped down into the floor and disappeared a second later leaving Sora all alone with a deep gash in his right arm and a monster in his peripheral vision that he just noticed was much bigger than the last time he looked that way.
Fear took hold and flooded through Sora's body while he scrambled up to his feet and backwards. He turned and started running farther into the city towards the castle back behind him, but that castle was losing its light color and getting sucked up by the darkness covering most of the world. Black rain continued to fall all around him and Sora was panting as he gripped at his right bicep and felt blood spilling between his left hand's fingers.
The pain hurt. The feeling that the man who he had actually started trusting had betrayed him hurt more. Not just hurting him bad, but leaving him there to die. He could see that man's smirk, and he could hear that screech from before that still echoed in his mind and flooded him with fear. A glance over his shoulder and he saw darkness breaking up into the air, like the ground of the world was ripping apart around the huge dark mounds racing towards him. The world started to shake, and whether it was from the beast bearing down on him or the fact that the man who had been there lost all love for this world, he did not know.
How do I get out of here?! Damn it! I just- I want to see her again! I have to get back to her! I promised I would! I remember, making her that promise. She's waiting for me! That girl… She's out there, and I'll never see her again. I can't get out of this world, and I'm going to lose her… I'm going to let her down. Sora slowed down and he brought his left hand from his slashed sleeve over to his chest. His fingers curled into his chest at the feeling in his heart, and his knees started to shake like he was going to collapse at how much it hurt. Why'd I even come back? He said I was gone, but I came back so I could be with her, and I messed that up. I couldn't even do that right. It hurts!
Sora turned his head while still gripping at his chest. He looked behind him and his terror shot to new heights at the beast he saw just outside of the world, rising up so high that his chin slowly rose and his eyes trembled at the sight of the monstrous form towering over him. His right hand rose up and grabbed at his chest too, despite all the pain in his upper arm as blood continued to flow from the wound. The rain stopped pouring, as Sora's head lifted straight up and he stared at the beast covering it all.
Accept it. It hurts though! But, but to get out of here, he said I- I need to accept these feelings. They're so dark… but that's the point. It's the power of darkness! That's what he said! In the corners of Sora's eyes, he watched as all the buildings started collapsing and getting knocked over by the flood of black liquid covering the world. It rushed down the street at him like a flood while the monster dropped down, covering him and the entire world in nothing but black. He felt himself getting sucked in, and the shape of a mouth appeared before his eyes that made his heart race so much harder behind where he was gripping his chest. Then his shaking lips flattened out and his eyes turned dark, and though he could not see them, the blue irises in those eyes started to change color.
An even deeper darkness arose as Sora was getting sucked forward through the black flood. Darkness erupted around him and all the dark feelings he had filled his heart and mind with so much power. His hands gripped tighter into fists, then his bloody right hand opened up and his yellow Keyblade appeared in it while he spiraled through the darkness. Chunks of world spun around him and he could not tell if he was underwater and drowning or if he was just holding his own breath. Through the darkness on his side though, he could see black wisps surrounding the yellow hilt of his Keyblade and twisting around it.
Black patterns covered the yellow that got darker to a deep gold just as his eyes were. The patterns snarled around the hilt and up the entire silver blade that turned darker until the steel was a cold black with only a silver highlight on the inner sharpened edge. His eyes narrowed through the darkness and he reached out with his left hand, grasping at something in front of him while still feeling unable to breathe. He heard a roar behind him that filled him with fear, fear that intensified the dark feelings in his chest, and he yelled in his mind, I'm not afraid of the darkness!
The World Eater devoured The World That Never Was before it could ever return from the World of Waking. Then the beast moved on, though much slower and quieter once again. It devoured the world that Sora had been in, but the boy himself escaped by a much thinner margin than he knew. Having already been partly devoured but escaping from within the World Eater's incorporeal "mouth" that it ate worlds with. Sora slipped through another portal though, right into a dark passageway that he spilled out of with dark liquid flooding out with him. He coughed up a few buckets of black that just disappeared into the dark floor below his hands and feet.
Sora bowed his head down between his hands, gasping and panting for several seconds in exhaustion and anger. Then he rose his head up and glared ahead, his bloody and black fingers curling on the floor sending pain coursing through his body. His vision was hazy, not that there was anything to se in this completely empty world. In that dark passageway too, Sora could feel the dark emotions already filling him feeling so strong and eating away at his heart. World Eater, that guy, they're my enemies. I'll beat them with the Keyblade! I- I can… Her! What am I- Sora's eyes bulged and he started pulling himself forward with a terrified look on his face. I forgot about her for a second! No, longer! I wasn't even thinking- I have to get out of this place! He said that I could get to another world using the darkness, but I'm just stuck- except I'm not stuck! There has to be a way out of here! A way back to her!
Sora pushed himself to his feet, and he grabbed at his right upper arm again as blood continued to come out of the deep gash that still hurt him a lot though it was feeling more numb now. He wanted to run forward, but he moved pretty slowly across the dark realm. Focus. Her face. If I think of it, and only it, maybe I can open a portal to… Except, I have to use the darkness to get to her. I have to, feel so angry and dark- and there's no way I could while thinking of her. I don't want to feel that way while thinking about her. I don't know how to think that darkly though, if I might forget about her! Am I not strong enough to use the darkness and find her? That guy, seemed to think I am. He said I was strong before, and that he wants me to be strong again. This power feels so strange though, so new. It feels like I've never…
Sora stumbled forward and fell off his feet. Crap. I think, I need to get out of here. I have to get to her. And I have to, stop the World Eater. Right? I have, a Keyblade. That thing, eats worlds… He said, the Keybearers, could beat it… I'm so tired. Focus. Try? To just… get out… dark thoughts. Anger. Hate. Fear… I'll never see her again- I have to accept the dark feeling that comes with that, even if I won't accept it's true! I'll never see her again. I'll never see her again. I'll break my promise! Sora's heart wrenched and he hated every second of it, but his expression was determined despite those thoughts he repeated to himself in a mantra over and over on his way to fading into unconsciousness. And right as he was finally losing it, one last portal opened up below where he lay, and he fell through.
A/N Thanks for reading. Sora and Luxu talk this chapter in the World of Waking about the World Eater! I played the KH iPhone game for a bit, still don't get much of what that plot is or how they're going to continue it in whatever the real KH4 is actually going to be. That's decades away though, so hope you guys enjoy the start of my KH4! Luxu gets Sora to use the darkness, wanting him to get stronger to be able to face the Dream Eater when the time comes, though with the sacrifice he gave he hopes they have some time before having to face it again. Sora escapes at the very last second though he undergoes some changes, and we'll see where he heads off to next chapter as he leaves for another world!
redlox2 chapter 1 . Feb 14
I know about the ending right? to end Sora adventure (at least this part of it) that way? Will this story be exclusively be from Sora POV or will it change perspective back to Kairi and the former Guardians of Light? Did you personally think Sora was there in the ending or was it kairi heart basically saying goodbye to Soras?
I cant wait to read more!
YEAH! Got me so frustrated, I was shouting at my tv lol. Idk about only Sora's POV yet, but no spoilers either way about what direction this story is heading. Personally, I thought we were seeing Kairi saying goodbye to Sora. It looked like all the others were happy and having fun despite Sora not being there, implying to me that they know there is no way to get him back so there's no point in even trying, and they're going to just keep him in their hearts or something (really unfulfilling to me). It was a happy ending for everyone except the one I wanted to have the happy ending and just... gah. Well, that's my take on it anyway. Thanks for reviewing and hope you enjoyed the new chapter!
cyber chapter 1 . 9h ago
at least the worlds where cool
I agree the game looked beautiful and each world was like a movie in itself. It was awesome and I loved the game. It's got its flaws though and didn't live up to my 10 year hype train on it, but hey that's what my imagination's for! Can always add in some more when I'm not fully satisfied... also glad to see you reading this story too! Thanks for the review!