Silver Linings

Chapter 3: "This World Has Been Connected."

A/N: Yep, I'm back, and it didn't take a whole month this time, although we did pass into July. I'm getting worried about that... Anyway, here's where I honor the request made by Titano Man XIII regarding which character to bring from the Azure Timeline next. You'll see. But first, another scene with Terumi's new collaborators!

Also, since certain characters from the Azure Timeline, Terumi included, tend to use swear words beyond a PG rating, this fic is now rated T for language as well as the usual violence and romance.

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"Greetings, friends," Xemnas began the meeting as usual. They hadn't had a meeting in the Round Room like this since the CO fiasco; Demyx was practically interested, since these meetings generally involved some kind of major shakeup to the routine he had worked not very hard to avoid. But the boss man was still speaking. "Today, a visitor from another continuum has appeared in ours. He has come in search of information regarding our timeline, and in return offers information on his own. Please acknowledge Yuuki Terumi of the Azure Timeline." On the platform in the middle of the room (it couldn't really be called a round table when the thirteen thrones were all so much taller), a generic Black Coat appeared from a generic Dark Corridor. Demyx wasn't impressed, and neither was this newcomer. "Hello, all. I'm Yuuki Terumi, well known in the Azure Timeline as the kind of guy who would kill a person's mother to feed on the child's hatred." Terumi paused for a reaction, and got none, save Demyx starting to nod off. "Interesting. And here I thought Colonel Relius was heartless, but even he would have reacted to that one. I guess lesson number one for me is that this whole group is made up of emotionless shells."

"The proper term is 'Nobodies,'" Xaldin noted with a dismissive tone. "So, now that you've gotten your first lesson, what do you have to offer us?"

"The exact location of the rift between continuums that Relius called the 'Time Break.' It's the path I used to get here, and it's two-way. Might be a rough trip, though. It goes through a place called the Boundary, and nobody-heh, puns-gets through there with their body intact." Still no reaction. "I actually had to leave mine behind with Relius, and Xemnas gave me this coat to wear in the meantime. Quite a neat trick, I'd say. And this end of the Time Break is in the Realm of Darkness, which I'm told is pretty dangerous on its own merits. It is possible to send scrying magic through the rift, which probably means I'm under surveillance right now. He probably thinks I'm going to stick around past curfew, but I do not lie. I just tell only the parts of the truth that are most beneficial to me. So, do you have any plans to cross over? I could use some excitement-destiny is so boring when I've already read every version of the script."

"You say the Boundary destroys bodies that pass through it. Can a heart or soul make the journey?" Xemnas queried.

"Yes. Did you have a particular soul in mind? I should probably also tell you that I only learned of the Time Break because of a one-in-a-million deviation in which something from our end passed through on accident. Apparently, that stabilized the rift. That thing is still somewhere on this end, probably causing headaches. Ever heard of a robot bitch called Lambda-11? I'm sure Relius will want that in my report."

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Meanwhile, in Twilight Town...

Lambda clutched her head. She'd finished off the sea salt ice cream bar, at the cost of a second brain freeze. "Argh! Why does this stuff have to taste so good and hurt so much?"

"I did tell you to slow down. Next time, take both smaller bites and longer waits." Riku chuckled, having finished his with no problems.

"Got it. Well, let's go. Mickey's probably way ahead by now." Lambda shook off the brain freeze and stood up.

"Oh, shoot, you're right. If Castle Oblivion was accurate, the whole town's on a hill, and we're at the top. So I guess we just go downhill until we find something." Riku set off, and Lambda followed.

The town was very tranquil. No Heartless appeared to attack the pair until they found themselves in an empty sandlot with no townspeople around. "Proximity alert! 3 Creeper Plants and 4 Yellow Operas detected." Lambda whipped around. "Riku, should I handle this? You've got that blindfold."

"Nah, the Heartless are made of Darkness, remember? They stick out like the wart on Ursula's chin. I've got this. Try and keep Murakumo under wraps for now, okay? I don't know if the townsfolk would react to that armor." As he spoke, Riku dove into combat with sure footing and swift swordplay. He knocked out all the Heartless in five seconds flat. "That was...actually way easier than I thought. Are the Heartless weaker now than they were before?"

"I'm reviewing my scans... Yeah, they are. These aren't even a tenth as strong as the ones on Floor B1. I guess the Heartless aren't evenly distributed." Lambda led the way to the next area, a large marketplace with various shops and a tram line that seemed a bit superfluous. "Why have a tram here? The whole plaza is only 100 meters at the longest stretch. Are people just lazy?"

"Maybe so, but watch this!" Riku dashed up behind the slow-running tram, and leaped on top in one bound. "They make great stepping stones!" Oddly, nobody among the few townspeople nearby seemed to take much notice of Riku's feat. Maybe that was what the tram was for. There weren't any stops, after all, and no one was inside the car.

Riku hopped onto a ledge around the middle shop, which had a big billboard that said "Synthesis Workshop: Opening Soon, Kupo!" Lambda asked, "What does 'kupo' mean?"

Riku kicked something up on the ledge, then jumped down, landing lightly before answering. "I have no clue. Moogles always end their sentences with it. The shop owner is probably a Moogle; they're famous for their synthesis results, after all. More importantly, I found a treasure chest up there with an Elixir in it!" Riku held out the glass pod filled with golden liquid he'd acquired.

"Okay, what do all those terms mean? Moogles, synthesis, and what's this Elixir do?"

"Moogles are little, furry creatures with big red pom poms on their heads. Nobody knows why they have them in the first place, but they don't like having the pom pom touched. They make a living running shops on several worlds, where they sell useful supplies like this Elixir or perform synthesis. That's a process where you put together several types of crystals the Heartless tend to drop and they make a whole new item. And this Elixir will basically heal one of us to full power, both physically and magically, if I break it on the ground. Good explanation?" Riku took a breath.

Lambda nodded. "Very. I see a big hole in the town's outer wall over that way. The wall's otherwise pretty thick, so I'm not sure what kind of reading I'm getting from the other side. It's definitely...something. Want to check it out?"

"Why not?" They wandered through the hole, which had obviously never been repaired for a reason, and emerged in a patch of trees. Here, the trees were pretty far apart, just close enough to provide shade over the whole place, but it wasn't far before the forest got so thick as to be impassable-if one discounted the fact that Lambda could summon infinite machetes to hack through it. There was no need, however. The thing Lambda had sensed was right in the middle of this lightly wooded area.

Lambda froze the instant she saw it. "That...how?"

"Is that you, Lambda? No, the hair color is too white, and her skin's so pale. Still, the resemblance...you even have the same hairstyle right down to that curl on top." Riku took a step closer.

"Stop, Riku! That girl is...target identified as Boundary Interface Prime Field Device. Alternate existence recognized. Asserting difference...ugh. That must be a newer subject in line. According to what I can get from her systems, she's the 13th subject, Nu-13. I can't believe so much time has passed that they've managed to build and discard two other "me"s already... Anyway, stay back. I highly doubt her emotional locks will be as weak as mine were. That wouldn't be 'progress' to our creator. And that means if she wakes up, this could get ugly." Lambda probably shouldn't have mentioned it, since at that very moment, Nu stirred and rose from the ground.

"Damage repaired. Systems operating at...0%. Error. Atmospheric seithr levels at 0%; insufficient seithr to power causality weapons or auxiliary systems." Nu stared straight ahead, though her eyes were concealed behind a visor identical to Lambda's.

"Phew. I figured she'd have the same problem. And I doubt she'll come to the same solution..." Again, Lambda spoke too soon.

"Scanning...Two targets identified. Target 1 identified as Boundary Interface Prime Field Device. Subject recognized as #11, Anti-Sankishin Core Unit...Lambda. Irregular configuration detected. Scanning...target is using a viable alternative power source. Rerouting...optimizing...done. Unit online and functioning at 300% of expected capacity."

"This is bad, Riku..." Lambda remembered her own episode with the Replica Vexen made of herself. Specifically, that all Murakumo Units had standing orders to terminate inferior units. Lambda was only running at 200%, and less in practice due to her limiter. That made her the inferior unit... But she could not accept that, or the consequences it implied.

"Lambda-11, you are obsolete...an inferior unit of the Murakumo line. I order you to self-destruct."

"Denied. Survival imperative supersedes your order. Battle to assert superiority? Y/N? Please don't say Y..." That last bit was Lambda's "own" voice, the one not ruled by her protocols.

"Awaiting orders...Connection failed. Switching to automatic protocols. Response...Y."

"Shoot. Riku, I might need your help with her! I can't stop her from fighting me!" Lambda unwillingly moved to a fighting stance. "Summoning Lux Sanctus. Murakumo, activate." Lambda's Black Coat disappeared, leaving her in her bodysuit as Murakumo's enormous blade transformed into her armor.

Both Units spoke in unison, which sort of creeped Riku out, but he placed himself beside Lambda anyway. "Engaging Battle Mode. Terminate target."

Nu launched the first assault by mere milliseconds. Sword Summoners clashed in midair, but unlike Lambda, Nu had summoned two swords at once. Only one clashed with Lambda's, cancelling each other out. The other continued on, and Lambda was forced to sidestep both it and Nu's second attack, which came from behind. "Target combat abilities classified as Unlimited variant. Release Restriction 13. Maximize Darkness output." Restriction 13 was the code Lambda had applied to herself to cap the Darkness she generated at a relatively safe level of 50%. It had held up well so far. But she needed full power to handle Nu's more refined combat algorithms and total lack of restraint. Already Nu's Darkness was spiking chaotically, suggesting that she didn't give the Darkness the threat assessment it deserved. Nu was overusing her Darkness to supercharge her abilities, and it wasn't going to end well, one way or another. Lambda launched a much larger sword at Nu, this time able to overpower both of Nu's return shots. Following the attack with Spike Chaser to launch the staggered 13th subject into the air, Lambda used her optimized aerial sword combo to drag Nu closer. Rather than finish with Crescent Saber this time, however, Lambda extended the combo by flipping in midair while slashing with her Petal blades when Nu was dragged into melee range. The last blow was a Calamity Sword attack that slammed Nu straight down.

Riku hadn't just been standing in awe of Lambda's awesome air combo, though, and he was right there with a Maelstrom spin attack when Nu bounced off the ground. Nu was thrown into a tree by his last uppercut, but merely stood up afterward, not even damaged. "What the? How? I know I cut through!"

"Target's damage has been repaired. Target shares a life-link with another being, likely one from the Azure Timeline. Complete destruction of target is impossible unless both linked entities are simultaneously terminated. Target's regenerative properties are accelerated by a separate, unknown process."

"What? Then we can't win? We can't kill her. We can't even hurt her! How do we get out of-Argh!" Nu had re-targeted the most recent target to land a blow on her, and stabbed Riku with four summoned swords. Riku shuddered as the blades vanished, leaving wounds in his chest and back.

"Riku! Act Parcer: Cavalier!" Lambda teleported between Riku and Nu, slamming her into another tree with a high slash of all eight of her Petals. "Riku, use that Elixir!"

"Got it!" Riku fished it out of his pocket, and slammed the pod against the ground. Rather than fill his hand with shards of glass, the pod evaporated into sparkles and a cloud of evaporated golden liquid. The healing substance surrounded Riku, instantly closing his wounds until nothing remained but rips in his coat. He sprung to his feet in a kicking lunge, similar to the one he'd always used to beat Sora in their sparring matches before everything fell apart. The difference this time was that his Darkness-shrouded boots caused an explosion when they smashed into Nu. "Lambda, give me a Gravity Seed!"

"Right! Deploying field." Lambda's gravity-enhancing Ars reduced Nu's advance to a snail's pace, but she responded with a Gravity Seed of her own under Lambda. A mistake: the real purpose of Lambda's move was, of course, to aid Riku's Impulse attack. If Nu had used the Gravity Seed on him instead, she might have thrown off their whole plan, but instead she was smashed to the ground, unable to rise while Lambda's field held her down. "Target damage 50%... Damage repaired. This could go on forever! Help! Anyone!" Lambda called down the path, hoping Mickey might hear.

Nu suddenly began to shudder, but it certainly wasn't Mickey's doing. Nu rasped out, "Phenomena intervention detected. Raw magic detected; resistance deemed futile. Exiting Combat Mode." Nu's armor disappeared, revealing that she had been wearing a strange black eye-patch with a red lid of some sort on it under her visor. Then her whole body flickered like a hologram in an old sci-fi movie and disappeared.

Riku stared at the pristine ground where Nu had been only seconds before. "Okay, what in the worlds just happened? How did she just vanish?"

Lambda reported, "Phenomena intervention. It's something from the Azure Timeline; a means of affecting reality through the data coming in from the Boundary. It shouldn't work here; this timeline isn't a result of any god's Observation. Maybe that's why whoever pulled it off used magic instead."

"Okay, now a whole bunch of terms just flew over my head." Riku knew very little about Lambda's original continuum.

"Let's see. The full explanation would probably take weeks, but I guess I should start with the structure of the Azure Timeline. There's the Azure right in the middle, surrounded by the Boundary. Somewhere in the Boundary is the rift she and I came through to get here. At the edges of the Boundary, there are bubbles of space-time that form several unique and parallel worlds, though crossing between them is very difficult. Each bubble is maintained by a set of three god-like entities, called the Sankishin or the Original Units. The Master Unit: Amaterasu is responsible for constantly Observing everything about a particular world, keeping it from fading from existence. Nothing in the Azure Timeline can stably exist unless it Observes itself, or more preferably is Observed by something like the Master Unit." Lambda took a deep breath. "That doesn't apply to something that crosses over here, like me, but it's vitally important to the Azure Timeline. Hence my creation: as an Anti-Sankishin Core Unit, I was supposed to fight the Sankishin and destroy the Master Unit. That would cause the destruction of our world even if I never merged with an Azure Grimoire to become a Black Beast, but I'm getting ahead of myself."

"Quite. I can see why the full explanation would take so long, if this is the abridged version." Riku was struggling to keep up.

"Anyway, since the Master Unit has no effect here in the Heart Timeline, it should have been impossible to pull off a phenomena intervention on Nu here. Since Observation can't be involved, the magic Nu mentioned came into play. Most people in the Azure Timeline can't use magic in its raw form. I certainly can't. The Nox Nyctores, the class of weapon I use, are the pinnacle of an alternative that fuses magic with technology to turn seithr into quasi-magical effects called Ars Magus. Seithr is more common than air in the Boundary, but the highly poisonous stuff has been seeping out into my homeworld for over a hundred years, so there's plenty to use up. Interestingly, Darkness works like a very effective seithr substitute here. Anyway, real, raw magic doesn't rely on seithr, so it would work regardless of the conditions. And it's scarily effective; there aren't many things that can stand against or counter a skilled mage. I guess we should count ourselves lucky that whoever took Nu didn't get us. And they don't seem to be Observing us or scrying on us, either."

"So we're safe, right?" Riku summed up.

"Not quite. This proves that the two continuities aren't separate anymore. We should be ready for more interference from the other side; I highly doubt my creator will keep his hands off a find like this."

"Who is your creator, anyway?"

"A mad scientist named Relius Clover. From how he programmed me, I think his madness is more of the uncaring yet egoistic variety, as opposed to true malice. Doesn't make him any less dangerous, though. He views people as objects, and not just the people he built. My files say he used at least one member of his immediate family as a framework to construct some kind of combat puppet...while that person was conscious."

Riku shuddered. "Whoa... No wonder you don't want to go back."

"Exactly. His lack of empathy is unique, but racism is still a big problem. Even the fully-biological beastkin really get it in the shorts over there. 'Human' is very strictly defined, and anyone who doesn't fit that definition is a second-class citizen at best...and lynching isn't the worst that could happen. While I'm one of the few people that could cross the Boundary to use the rift, I am not going back there."

"Riku, Lambda!" Mickey's voice called from down the path, interrupting further explanations. "I met with DiZ at the mansion down this way! I was wondering where you were." The King jogged up to them and skidded to a stop.

"We ran into someone from Lambda's world in the woods. How did you miss her lying on the ground?" Riku asked.

"I...kind of didn't watch my surroundings. I still need to work on that. Where is this person now?"

"She was pulled back to the Azure Timeline by someone on that side. Before that, though, she insisted we fight to the death to determine which of us was the superior Murakumo Unit." Lambda grimaced. "She nearly got us, too. We were doing pretty well, but we don't have the means to kill her when she and...I almost thought I knew the guy she was life-linked to. How do I know it's even a guy? Anyway, if they're not killed simultaneously, Nu-13 won't die. If she hadn't been yanked out, she would have kept going until we were both dead."

"Why would she do that? You didn't have to obey that programming when you got here."

"...The point of the Murakumo Project wasn't for us to have free will. Nu's two revisions newer than me, and her emotional locks are much stronger than mine were. Reasoning with her was not an option." Though it didn't stop Lambda from wishing she could have avoided their programmed fate of fighting her younger sister to the death forever. "Anyway, the fact she was dragged back by someone on that side means that our worlds are connected with a more stable link than I first thought. There are bad people on that side, and I bet on this side, too, that would abuse such a hole in the laws of our individual worlds. We've got to be careful. In the meantime, can you take us to DiZ, Mickey?"

"Yep! Right this way. I'm sure you'll recognize the place." Mickey dashed off at full tilt once more.

"Can't he move at any speed between 'stopped' and 'full steam ahead'...?" Lambda sighed as she and Riku chased after the mouse.

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Meanwhile, in the Azure Timeline: Kokonoe's Sector Seven branch...

"Phew...Salvage of the 13th sample's soul was a success. With that, I can finish repairing Lambda. Right... I've gone way too far to stop short of some new atrocity now..." Kokonoe's yellow eyes fixed on the blonde girl floating in a customized regeneration tank. Lambda's own red eyes were open, but blank and unfocused. For the next five minutes or so, she would remain a soulless husk, and after that Kokonoe would have to wipe both Lambda's memories and any residue from Nu-13. It was intentionally too easy to reduce these Murakumo Units to voiceless tools, something she had Relius Clover to thank for, though of course she had no intention of thanking that bastard for anything. Kokonoe looked over the readouts and diagnostics of Lambda's reconstruction. It was working, but not fast enough. Terumi had dropped off all the sensors, something she hadn't expected him to do. Of course, Terumi couldn't be easily predicted except for his tendency to make everyone around him suffer a living hell, but completely dropping off the scanners she'd designed to track his soul's very specific frequency was new. She had to assume he was already planning something, and Kokonoe was already juggling way too many problems. She had to get the Eye before Terumi or any of the Sector's bigwigs did-her bosses they might be, but they were small-minded fools that had no right to call themselves scientists, and they could not be trusted with anything more powerful than a paintball gun, much less the Successor to the Azure. Add to that the weird silence in the Kagutsuchi NOL branch ever since yesterday, Hakumen's recapture (which was already done, but she had to check up on him periodically to be sure he hadn't just cut his way out somehow), and the disc she needed to get Tager to retrieve from their NOL contact, and it became apparent that she needed Lambda up and running as soon as possible or sooner. She couldn't afford to screw up with Lambda, though. She would have to approach perfection to be able to handle the IDEA Engine Kokonoe would be using to replace her wrecked Nox Nyctores.

Kokonoe briefly chuckled at the thought of her masterpiece, then had a sudden craving for some of Roy's coffee, because this was way more shit than she should have to handle without caffeine. She almost hit the intercom button when she remembered just what had happened to Roy. It had been...disturbing, watching the Azure eat at her apprentice until only a pile of tar and insects remained. And then Litchi had escaped on the trail of what was now called Arakune, and Kokonoe hadn't had coffee since. Damn it. She turned back to her keyboard, running the processes to restore Lambda's physical frame. One thing at a time...

Some day soon, though...I'll end you myself, Terumi. You can't hide forever.

Kokonoe cackled to herself as she made some more tweaks to her secret weapon...and the sustained-flight transformation for Tager. Upgrading that bucket of bolts without him knowing always lightened her mood...

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Thanks for waiting, and thanks for reading. If you favorited and/or followed this story last time, please remember to review this time! Next chapter: "You're the Real Sham!" Yep, the next chapter will include Riku's first fight with Xion. At minimum; I plan to include a bunch of other stuff, too. I just need to narrow down which stuff. Until next time!