"You're kidding me, Sora." Riku said, shaking his head.

"But it's true!" Sora replied, pouting a bit. There was no way he had just 'seen' that. Those four girls were real, heck! He even had Ventus, Roxas and Terra as witnesses.

Riku chuckled slightly. "Yeah. Sure." he said, folding his arms. "Now come on guys, we need to figure something out for this project. Besides, we've only got a little while more before we have to go back to the cabin."

Sighing a bit, the four walked alongside the one member who didn't come into the crystal cave with him, trying to think of something. They passed the groups who were already working on their assignments - it was almost embarrassing, especially since they had Terra with them.

Suddenly, the students looked up abruptly as screaming could be heard nearby. Sora's eyes went wide as he could see four hooded figures in the distance attacking girls that they knew.

"Who are they, Beat!?" Rhyme asked her older brother, trying to be heard over the screams of the students.

"I don' know, sis. But men don't run, men fight! You go-"

Ms. Farron had a word about this, taking most of the students inside with assistance from Mr. Highwind and Ms. Lockhart, but there was something that Sora noticed. Mr. Emans and Mr. Nasexm was not there.

Sora ran towards where the screams were coming from and with the flick of his wrist, the keyblade from before appeared in his hand as he ran. Roxas and Ventus followed, and once Ventus went, Terra went after them.

As they did, their keyblades appeared one by one - but Roxas was left even more confused when two keyblades appeared in his hands!

"How do you have two...?!" Ventus questioned, tilting his head as he ran towards the screaming.

"Never mind that...!" Roxas replied, bluntly.

There were four people in black coats, one of them were grabbing at Naminé and the black-haired girl, trying to pull them out of the water. Meanwhile, another was already pulling Kairi out of the sea and trying to knock her out by bashing her head on the rocks. Lastly; the remaining two were fighting against the blue-haired mermaid. This mermaid seemed to be putting up a fight, and a large one at that. Kairi slapped the person with her tail, making him give up on trying to knock her out and began to drag her.

"Hey! Stop right there!" Sora shouted, running and getting a hit on the guy, making him let go of her.

Terra felt anger sink in as he saw the person slapping the blue-haired mermaid across the cheek, before trying to bash her head against a rock. He walked towards the hooded figure and hit the person over the head with it, who simply teleported away, but he did not have a grip on the mermaid anymore. She summoned her keyblade and slashed at the figures grabbing her friends.

Ventus slashed at the figure multiple times. "Get off of her!" he shouted. Naminé cried out in pain as she felt this complete and total stranger clutching onto her, it felt like he was digging into her skin.

Roxas slashed at the same man alongside Ventus. Through the fabric, an 'x' was put into his side due to him having two keyblades. The raven-haired girl pulled as hard as she could, before being able to get some breath back as she swam under the water.

Once the hooded figures lost grip of the mermaids, they teleported away. The one who had grabbed Naminé and the girl with the black hair smirked at the four boys and said to them, "Don't believe this is over." they said. "We will have the pure heart,"

They exited through a portal that seemed to just have darkness in it, no light whatsoever. Sora turned to Kairi. "Hey, are you okay...?"

Nodding her head, Kairi looked up at him. "Yeah, just a bit dizzy." she answered, smiling a bit. "Oh! And thanks for saving us from them."

"It was no problem, Kairi."

"Hey, wait a minute!" Kairi said, pointing at Sora with a small grin on her face. "You never told any of us your names, so tell you what. If you tell us your names, we'll tell you ours!"

Kairi was aware that the boys did not know all of their names, only hers.

Smiling brightly, Sora put his hands behind his head, Ventus did the same.

"I'm Sora!"

"I'm Ventus!"

The two boys nearly did it in perfect unison. Now it was time for Roxas and Terra to speak.

"I'm Roxas.."

"My name's Terra."

Finding it fair, Kairi turned to the other mermaid girls. "Well? Tell them, you three."

Aqua folded her arms, but smiled faintly. "I'm Aqua," she said, finally looking at them properly. She wasn't glaring but wasn't properly smiling like Kairi was.

Looking over at Ventus, Naminé spoke up. "My name's Naminé," she said, softly.

There was a bit of silence after she spoke her name, as the raven-haired girl didn't say anything. She kept her head down and rubbed her arm, before eventually looking at Roxas and taking a deep breath. "I'm...my name's Xion." she said.

Aqua swam closer to Terra. "Terra? Thank you." she said, clearly grateful. "All of you."

Sora and Ventus beamed. Aqua found Ventus adorable, in a little brother way.

Before the conversation could be taken further, the four boys heard their names being called. They turned around, only for Kairi, Naminé, Aqua and Xion to return to their underwater world.

Soon afterwards, the four boys ran back to the cabin. Mr. Emans looked over at them. "Where were you." he said, as it did not sound anything like a question.

Sora, Roxas and Ventus were lost for words. Uh oh. How were they supposed to reply to this? That's what they were wondering. It was only Terra who knew what to say. "Some of the residents were being attacked, so they tried to help them." he said, making up a believable lie.

Ms. Lockhart turned to the boys. "That was very noble of you...but it was dangerous. Don't do this again, we wouldn't want to lose you."

They nodded, feeling a sense of relief that they would not receive too large of a punishment.

Nobody was allowed out for a bit, except to get things for their assignments.

"Hey guys?" Sora said as Group 1 went to sit at one of the tables in the common room. "I've got an idea! How about we study species here, you know, like what's in the water, birds, animals."

"Sounds smart." Roxas commented, before glancing over at the other groups. "And since the first idea was already taken, we've got no competition. Yeah, we should go with that."

"Sora, Riku; you know about some of the animals here, right?" Ventus questioned, tilting his head a little.

"Yep!" Sora replied, smiling. "So it's settled, right?"

"Right." the other members of Group 1 said in perfect unison.

The group soon began noting down what types of animals were on the islands. "Crustaceans, you should note that down. And before you ask, they're animals like crabs and krill." Riku said, glancing at Sora with a small, wry smile.

"Hey! What are you looking at me for?" the brunette questioned his friend, pouting a little.

"It's nothing." Riku replied, calmly. His smile faded when he saw Mr. Emans glancing at him, there was that smirk again! It was only for a split second but he could have sworn he'd seen it.

Since they weren't able to go outside, the group weren't able to do much besides noting, but it was something, right?

Soon enough, the hours of darkness arrived on Destiny Islands and Roxas couldn't sleep thanks to a certain spiky-haired brunette's snoring who's name started with an S.

Tired of staying indoors, Roxas sneaked outside to the beach, grabbing something from the kitchen's fridge. He was wearing his usual nightwear, a simple white shirt with gray sleeves, dark gray shorts and he went outside barefoot.

Taking in the air, Roxas heard a gentle splashing that broke the silence as he felt the sand curl around in his feet in a strangely calming way. That was when he saw her. That girl again.

Xion.

She seemed to be relaxing there, keeping her tail submerged in the water, her eyes fixated on the sky above her. "They say, that above here are tons of worlds, glowing down on us all like a thousand candles."

It was strange. It almost seemed like she knew he was there. In her hand, was a seashell known as the Thalassa. A seemingly common shell for her to see, yes, but she couldn't help it. Xion loved seashells.

That was when she turned her gaze towards the left, jumping a bit at the sight of Roxas. She looked away, closing her eyes. "Oh...you're...what are you doing out here?" she asked him.

"I couldn't sleep." Roxas stated, still standing up as he met her gaze. "Because...well, someone won't stop snoring."

Xion giggled slightly. "I have the opposite...I just have...well, oh never mind." she said. In truth; she had...well, strange dreams. Nobody knew that except Xion herself.

"Hey...I did sneak something from the kitchen you know." Roxas admitted, grinning slightly. He then revealed it - sea salt ice cream.

"What is that...?" Xion asked. "I've seen people eat that before on the docks, but I've never had it myself."

"It's sea salt ice cream, Xion." Roxas said, smiling a bit. She seemed, well, innocent. He actually found it quite...cute. "Well, here." Roxas handed it to the mermaid with the black tail.

She looked up at him, making Roxas do a head gesture, as if to say, 'Go on'.

Xion then tried it, she was silent for a few seconds as she tasted it. "It's brilliant...it's salty...but sweet at the same time...!" she pointed out. She smiled a bit.

"So...um...are you okay...? That guy didn't hurt you too much back there, did he...?" Roxas asked, looking at her.

Xion shook her head. "No, don't worry." she said to him. "By the way...thanks, for helping me back there. You didn't have to do that."

"It...it was nothing." Roxas replied, quietly. He took a bit of his own sea salt ice cream, Xion doing the same when she finished speaking.

She looked over at him. "So...is this your first time over here, Roxas?" she asked him, slightly curiously.

"Well...yeah, it is. I'm here with Crown Key Academy." Roxas answered, looking back at the cabin in the distance.

"What's it like there?" Xion inquired. "At Crown Key."

Roxas was silent for a few seconds. "Nothing really...interesting. I just usually hang around with Lea and have this after school,"

Xion was also quiet before she gave a reply. "It's better for you," she muttered, shaking a bit at a memory that she had.

"One day, my child...you'll realize that you can catch the stars..." sang a soft, soothing voice to a young black-haired baby.

Suddenly, there was the sound of shouting. Screaming. The mother's eyes went wide, she swam to a secret place, carrying her three babies in her arms. She closed it, before swimming out to find her husband. Even then - she could hear her mother screaming for help.

"You don't need to worry...about people, humans coming after you - coming for your own family. Your own species." Xion whispered, it was clear she didn't intend for Roxas to hear, but he did. Xion sighed a bit, but smiled slightly. "Thanks for the company, Roxas..." she said, this time it was easier to hear her.

"Don't mention it." Roxas said, smiling a little bit at her.

The black-haired girl then returned to the water, finishing the ice cream and taking the stick back with her under the water. Roxas watched where she had once been. He didn't know what it was about her, but something about her was...

Special.