Chapter 43

Boo

A small ding signalled that the elevator had reached the Scare Floor. After going past a couple of room in which they could only just see the odd angle or so, they arrived at one which said Scare Floor F. As they entered, they were swept away by how many doors there were in one room. The door had nothing to be attached to except for the metal bindings that were holding them upright by their sides, and ostensibly it didn't seem like the doors led anywhere at all and yet monsters of all kinds were visibly walking through them and not reappearing on the other side.

"Uh, sorry to walk out on you guys like this but I have some er- business, to take care of. Sulley, can you show them all the ropes while I'm gone?" Mike asked. He quickly handed Sulley something small.

"Of course, Mike, do feel free to er- do your… business," Sulley replied with a smile. It all felt incredibly fake and orchestrated but Luna said nothing. She had a pretty rough idea anyway about what they were hiding, and if she was right then she didn't want to say it out loud.

As per his word, Mike went back out the same way he came leaving Sulley with his guests. He led them towards his station meanwhile responding to everyone who walked past and greeted him.

"You're very popular, aren't ya? Then again you've been the top scarer ever since you first came here? That's pretty impressive!" Goofy said.

Sulley shrugged it off however with a simple smile. "It's all in day's work. Here, let me show you how it's done."

He held up a card-key to show them and slid the part with the magnetic strip down the slot on the panel. It did not take long before a door came down from the rail above and placed itself within the confines of the safety bindings.

"So you won't be able to see it so much, but just keep your eyes on that." Sulley pointed to a yellow canister on the side of the door that was labelled 'Scream Extractor'. "The energy that I collect from scaring the kid is converted into energy and goes straight into that canister which then gets shipped and supplied to whole city. It's a pretty convenient way of gathering energy, and it's renewable. Can't beat that!"

"Convenient, huh? Is it really?" Luna's voice was dripping with sarcasm but she hardly seemed to notice it. "So these doors lead to…"
"Children's bedrooms. When they're sleeping at night, they best be prepared for a fright as they say."

"I don't think anyone in the history of forever has said that," Luna said, clearly not impressed. Sulley seemed flustered at this, possibly wondering why her harsh tone. It took Sora to break up the tension.

"W-why don't you give us that demonstration? I'm really excited to see it!" he exclaimed a little too over joyously. It didn't matter how he had said it because it had done its job. Sulley was all too happy to step away from Luna's piercing glare.

"Well… wish me luck," Sulley said although if his credibility was really as authentic as it was claimed to be, he wouldn't exactly need it. He stepped into the door and closed it behind him, leaving the group by themselves for the short while.

"I must say, even though we end up having to break the rules because of it, I quite enjoy this Luna who rarely pops up," Sora said.

"Well I don't care much for scaring children just to make your own life more secure, no matter how many people benefit from it. Don't tell me you've never had the feeling that something was under your bed or watching from your closet before when you were a kid?"

"Well I proud myself on having a pretty active imagination, and I've had dreams of running away from giant teachers- oh, and a giant spider was in my room at one point and attacked me but those were just dreams. I can't say I thought of them as being real," Sora informed them.

"Don't worry, sis. I was afraid of the dark for a while but mom eventually told me I had nothing to fear," said Stephanie in an effort to cheer Luna up.

"Yeah, my mom used to tell me that too. She said that it was actually the monsters that were afraid of us because we had something that they didn't, something they couldn't understand… do you think that's why the Heartless go after people?" Luna asked.

"Because they're afraid? That's a bit farfetched, don't you thi-" But something stopped Sora in his tracks. He remembered a conversation that had taken place during his last visit to Traverse Town. "Actually, you could be right about that. Mitsuki Konishi, one of the Reapers in that dumb game of theirs, made me think of it. The Heartless can sense the true capabilities of the human heart and because of it they fear their lack of it or lack of knowledge anyway. It's weird to think that the Heartless actually fear us from the way they act but if they do then I was thinking that was something we could strive for. We can't always be there for everyone, we can't be in two places at once so why not make it our mission to teach people to not be afraid of them? It's the most powerful weapon we can give them, I think."

"Yeah, it was because of fear that those things in Traverse Town happened. The Reapers wanted to control human thought and emotions through fear and they would have succeeded if we hadn't stopped them. I never want to see something like that happening again," Luna agreed. "You must have been thinking of our conversation about the Notre Dame cathedral and how it must have taken so many people to build it."

"It was their legacy. So spreading hope will be ours," Sora said.

"Then if that's the case, you know that means starting here and now. How can we even condone something like this? I don't care if it makes this city happy, it's wrong!" Luna said.

"Luna, I don't think we know this world to the point where we can claim it's wrong. They might have no choice in the matter. Not that I'm defending it but we're in their world so we abide by their rules, even if we may not like everything they do," Sora said.

"I guess. It's true that I get a little riled up about it sometimes. It's just that when I see something that seems wrong to me, I want to change it for the better. I guess I've read too many books where the protagonists can simply change the outcome of whatever they want," Luna admitted.

"Hey, it's no worry. We're all like that. It's just that the world needs to breathe in order for it to change and the only way that can happen is if it occurs naturally. You can't force it otherwise you might as well be admitting that you give the people who live in this world too little credit. We have to have faith that they can change things themselves."

"Wow, you've suddenly become some sort of philosopher, huh, Sora?" Goofy said with a grin. Sora smirked before looking at the yellow canister. A hissing sound had escaped from the canister and they could see a red light filling up the scale on the canister all the way to the top within mere seconds.

Sully soon stepped out of the room, and they only heard the loud scream of a child for a second before the door was closed behind him shutting out the sound entirely. For a while, no one knew how to react. Luna was clearly appalled at this while Stephanie moved to hide behind Goofy. It would be very easy to lose it and start ranting at Sulley, drawing the entire attention of the room in the process, which is exactly why Sora had to put on a little show as quickly as possible.

He recovered from his stupor and started clapping. "That was great. I'm assuming that thermometer looking thing on the canister is the how much energy you've collected then?"

"Yup. While most employees can only manage to fill theirs about halfway on their first door, I don't usually need a second," Sulley answered.

"You haven't seen anything out of the ordinary lately, have ya?" Goofy asked. "Like strange creatures that you haven't seen before for example."

"Huh? Yeah… yeah, those have been popping up a lot for a while. They generally don't do anything though. It's kind of like they just come and go. Not sure what the deal is there," Sulley said.

"They don't attack? That's weird…" voiced Donald.

"I'm sorry to cut our tour short, but I need to find Mike and ask him about something. You're more than welcome to watch the other scarers at work until we're back," Sulley said.

Luna stepped forward and gave an innocent smile. "That wouldn't have anything to do with the intruder here, would it?"

The expression on Sulley's face froze in a most dramatic way. He blinked for a few seconds and then smiled falsely.

"What are you talking about? I don't anything about any intruder?"

Luna put a finger to her lips to quieten him before whispering. "It's okay. We can keep a secret. We can help if you'd like."

"Help? No, I couldn't ask that of you guys. You're just visitors," Sulley refused politely.

"We do more than visit usually. Trust us, it's no big deal," Sora said.

"It's kind of what we do even though we're not supposed to do it," Donald said, frowning at Sora.

Sulley seemed apprehensive at first but soon bent down and approached them with a low voice. "There's a kid, a human called Boo and she's somewhere in here. We didn't mean for it to happen, she just clung to my back as I was leaving her room without me noticing. Now she's somewhere in the factory and Mike's gone off to find her."

Sora crossed his arms and stared up at the ceiling. "Boo? Her parents can't be that cruel?"

"No, that's what we call her. Anyway, if Mr. Waternoose or the DNA find out about it, our gooses are cooked."
"She couldn't have gotten too far. She's only a child after all. Then again, because she's so small it might be harder to find her…" Luna pondered before turning to Stephanie. "It's okay Steph, you can come out. I have a question for you. It's pretty strange but if you were in a factory or a similar building and we were playing hide and seek, where would you hide?"

Stephanie stepped to the side of Goofy and gave a curious hum. "Well, when my friends and I played hide and seek at school, I would always hide in the boys' toilets."

"Uh… what?!" Sora, Donald, Goofy and Luna exclaimed in unison.

Stephanie giggled at them. "Hehe, just kidding. It was the girls' toilets. The stalls were always a good place to hide. Wow, you should see the look on all your faces right now."

"Uh huh… well, ignoring that weird joke you do have a point. Since we don't really know the layout of the factory, I think it's best if we stick together. Let's head to the toilets," suggested Luna.


The announcement that it was lunch time soon rang throughout the building. It was also the signal for Astra and Rhea's mission to begin. Having successfully located the doors in the early morning, all that was left was to check the doors out while the scare floor was vacant of employees and then somehow shut them down.

Astra looked down at her own hands. To her, they were her own, human and fleshy and all the other bits and pieces that made her as such. Supposedly to the eyes of the monsters native to this world however, she looked completely different. She couldn't begin to even imagine how they saw her or Rhea as, but the magic had been incredibly effective because no one had turned a suspicious glance their way since they had entered. Rhea's magic was definitely something else.

Once the last hint of life had left the room, Astra took hold of Rhea's hand and led her into the room.

"Are all the doors still there?" Rhea asked with her eyes closed.

"Yeah. Who knows for how long they'll all be gone so we have to act quickly," Astra said.

"You're the only one who can check them. Tell me what you see," Rhea said. Astra nodded and went over to the first door. She opened it up and described it exactly as she saw it.

It was a child's bedroom, smaller than Astra's own but that was to be expected, she had taken her grandmother's room after she had passed away and her previous room was not much bigger than this, in fact it was probably a little smaller. There were a lot of toys on the ground and posters of some famous celebrity that Astra's didn't recognize on their wall. There was a window nearby from which she could hear the crashing of waves.

Astra put one step in and stood on the tip of her toes to look at the child sleeping in the bed. What luck it was for Astra to recognize her as well, and the blue alien thing that was sleeping next to her. She wanted to laugh at the strange coincidence that this had been the first door she had opened but she remained silent, stepped back out quickly and closed the door for fear of waking them both up.

"So then they do lead to other worlds? The report was right," Rhea said after Astra had recounted what she'd seen. "Could you check the next… two I'd say, please? I need to confirm something."

Astra nodded having forgotten Rhea's blindness momentarily before checking up on the two doors following the one she had first picked and then reporting to Rhea.

"I see. So they're all children's rooms, or at least the ones in this room are," Rhea said.

Astra seemed confused by Rhea's hinting of something more. "What do you mean? It's a factory where they supply energy by using children's screams, right?"

"Ostensibly, yes. But things aren't always as they seem. The original report that Alfonso gave stated that there were hundreds, possibly even thousands of doors. I wouldn't be surprised if some of the doors led to places other than bedrooms."

"So we just need to find the place where all the doors are then. If it's even accessible from here anyway," Astra said.

"If we had some schematics of the building we would be better placed to act but since we don't…"

"Argh, Alfonso could have mapped down the building while he was investigating. It's a high ranking mission! Give us as little info as possible to go on, why don't you?" Astra ranted to herself.

"Astra, I hear something. Someone's coming," Rhea said. Her impressive range of hearing once again astounded Astra who hadn't even heard anything until after she had mentioned it. Then again, she had been too busy fuming to even acknowledge anything outside her field of vision.

Astra took Rhea's hand once again and led her behind one of the doors seeing as there weren't many other places they could hide. They soon heard at least the sound of three voices as they came into the room. Astra peered out from her hiding spot and took in the three figures. She recognized all three of them.

"Do not forget that this is my company! Do you have the slightest idea how many skeletons in the closet I've had to bury in order to maintain this company's reputation, the one that my father built with his own two hands?" hissed Waternoose, who Astra had seen a picture of next to his father early on while searching with Astra. "I will not let it all go to ruin just to ensure your silly plan goes through!"

"Did you not choose to sign up for KRONOS of your own volition? Oh do be sure that you will face a lot more than a reputation or two being ruined if you betray us now," warned Gantu with a finger pointing upwards. Astra had met him when she had encountered Sora on the beach in Kauai. It confirmed that the place had been infiltrated by KRONOS as well.

Waternoose scowled and looked away for a second before looking straight at the door Astra was hiding behind. Astra quickly tucked her head back in before he could spot her.

"Tough luck there pal, looks like you're stuck with us!" The other person who had been in Kauai, Pete, let out a laugh that lacked any sympathy.

"As long as you abide by your word, KRONOS will allow you to hold onto your factory," Gantu continued. "And you of course will naturally benefit without having to do a single thing. Just keep making sure that the doors are here at night and the Heartless will do the rest."

"No, you're not listening. There's only so much I can do right now. I'm being constantly monitored by the CDA and if they discover even a scrap of evidence linking me to this, they will shut this place down. That and the funds I've been getting from KRONOS have suddenly stopped."

"There have been some complications in that regard. The source where we got the original funds from has been… crippled, no doubt due to those cursed Keybearers," Gantu explained. "When I find them, they'll pay for what they did to me last time!"

"Just so long as you don't bring it here," Waternoose dismissed with a shaking head. He turned and made to scuttle back out of the room but paused and looked back at them. "I suppose you'll be making yourselves comfortable then until further notice?"

"But of course. Don't worry, we won't impede on your work. Just ignore us and it will be as if were never there to begin with," Gantu told him. Waternoose seemed sceptical as would probably any person but he kept his mouth shut and took Gantu's advice, walking out of the room as if he didn't even notice the two baddies following in his wake.

Astra waited for a few more seconds in case they came back and then guided Rhea out from behind the door once she was sure they were in the clear.

"So that's our confirmation right there. Well that was easy," said Astra.

"They mentioned that as long as the doors were here at night, the Heartless could do the rest. So that's when and how they get in," Rhea said. She had her eyes open again but the only thing she probably would be able to see is nothingness. When Astra had asked her about it while they were training, she had used an example of a person without blindness trying to see behind the back of their head. Whereas Astra had previously thought that Rhea saw only black, that wasn't exactly the case. She described it instead as being nothing rather than being black. In the same way that Astra could see nothing behind her if she didn't turn her head, Rhea could not see anything in any direction. Her brain could not process what black was and so she saw only nothingness. If Astra tried to close her own eyes however, she would see black because she was consciously aware of its existence. It was all incredibly strange to Astra and yet incredibly fascinating at the same time. No matter how hard she tried, she couldn't imagine what it would be like to know not a world of blackness, but one of nothingness instead.

"So what's our next step?" Astra eventually asked.

"Well I was thinking… if we destroy these doors then we'll have cut the entire power to this city. A lot of people will have suffered and that's something we want to avoid at all costs. There might be something we can do but I'm not sure how it will pan out in the end. You remember one of them saying that if a scrap of evidence was found linking him to corruption then this CDA of theirs would remove him."

"So we try to find evidence then? But he also said that it might close down the factory, right? Isn't that the same as destroying the doors then if there's no one to supply the energy?" Astra asked.

"While that is a possibility I highly doubt the CDA would immediately shut down the city's top energy supplier. My guess is they would instate an interim person in charge of affairs while they launch a full scale investigation into possible deeper corruptions within in the factory. That's usually what happens in these circumstances anyway," Rhea said.

"You the type who likes to get involved in corporate scandals or something like that?" Astra asked while grinning.

"Involved? No, no, it just seemed obvious is all," Rhea replied, returning Astra's smile.

Astra feigned a wince. "Ooh, madam, you may have just wounded me."

"I hope it's not fatal. I'm not exactly the best when it comes to stitching up wounds for obvious reasons." Rhea stuck out her tongue playfully. "We don't usually do spying missions at Moira's Crescent so I guess this is a first. Let's take this slowly and look for a window of opportunity to gather evidence."

"And then we shove it in their faces and call it day. Sounds good to me," Astra said.

"Also, if we can find out more about KRONOS' location that will be incredibly good progress made," Rhea added.

With their plan set, all they had to do now was supposedly dig up these skeletons Waternoose was burying. Astra was sure it wouldn't be easy but they didn't really have a choice in the matter. She very much despised the Heartless. She had watched Alexander go to the flames while the Heartless had taken the opportunity to attack and kill innocent people. If there was any way she could help in getting rid of them, she would take it.


Sora peered under the toilet stall and, having seen very hairy legs, immediately regretted his decision. He mouthed a silent apology and backed away from the stall before leaving the bathroom. Donald was waiting outside with an annoyed look on his face. He didn't really see much point in being here especially when they could be looking for Kefka as they had been asked to do so. Though Sora suggested that they might find clues to his whereabouts while being here, Donald was apprehensive to believe that, stating that the only thing that could arise out of a situation like this was Luna "doing something silly" to get the factory shut down because of her disagreements with how it was run. Sora was sure that he knew Luna well enough to know that she had learned to choose her fights carefully and quoted something she had said to him once in reference to her rashness of mind: "Thought is free". He had to say that Luna's thoughts were certainly as free as a bird and free was probably the safest place for them to be.

They left the bathrooms and regrouped with Luna, Goofy and Stephanie who had been looking in the women's toilets. Their search had also proved unsuccessful, or at least that's what they thought at first. They had only taken a few steps when they heard a giggling from behind them, or more specifically from behind Luna. Having not adjusted to her new furriness, she had probably not even realized that a human child had been clinging to her back until she had been alerted to the child's presence by the others.

"Now how did you even get behind me without me noticing?" Luna asked her after Boo jumped off her back. The girl seemed to be wearing some kind of costume, no doubt to disguise her true nature from the other monsters in the factory. "I'm guessing Mike and Sulley put that on you?"

"Makes me wonder… what do you think they dress up as Halloween?" Sora pondered. "Because they already… they already are monsters so that kind of eliminates the point so do they dress up as… other monsters?"

"That is… not important right now. Let's just hand the kid back over to Sulley and get out of here," Donald said.

"Donald, you need to let loose and have fun once in a while. It's not fun if we're not all enjoying the moment," Luna replied. Donald issued a scowl in response and looked away. Luna ignored him and watched as Stephanie made her way over to Boo and introduced herself.

"I think that concept is lost on Donald. Trust me, Goofy and I have been trying to teach him it since we first started travelling together… though he does have his moments," Sora said. "But he's right that we can't stay here or we might look a bit suspicious. Let's head back to the Scare Floor. That's where Sulley told us to wait for them after our search, right?"

Luna gave a humming nod and with that they made their way down the empty corridor, retracing their steps back to where Sulley last left them.

They turned a corner just in time to see a Neo Shadow pop out of the ground and aggressively spin and knock a familiar looking face to the ground.

"Astra!" Luna reached forward and summoned her Keyblade but the girl next to Astra had already taken care of the problem. Her fine and delicately crafted silver Keyblade glistened under the fluorescent tubes on the ceiling. Her eyes were also closed strangely enough, even after she had taken the enemy out.

Boo had started laughing and clapping, and they weren't so sure it was just a coincidence that the lights on the ceiling started flickering wildly at the same exact time while also stopping the moment Boo ceased laughing.

"Who just called your name, Astra? Maybe my magic isn't as good as I thought it was," Rhea said sadly.

"No, that's not it. You said people from this world could only see us like them so..." Astra said, her eyes looking from the weird cat girl to her Keyblade. "Luna? Luna… what happened to your face?"

Now it was Astra's turn to release a howl of laughter. Luna pursed her lips tightly and crossed her arms while nodding. "Yeah, yeah, let it all out why don't you."

"I'm sorry. I'm so… snrk… okay, let me compose myself for bit." Astra breathed in and out deeply and then froze for a second before letting out more laughter. "Okay, I just can't. Now all we need is for you to do some cat puns."

"Oh, you've got to be kitten me," Luna said with a feisty grin.

"Oh dear, me thinks I'm a very bad influence on you," Astra said.

"A bad influence indeed. And that's my catchphrase by the way, so you can go pick a different one," Luna said.

"I didn't know 'oh dear' could be patented, my dear Luna. Who would have thought we'd have run into each other in a place like this?"

"Yeah, it's crazy. Um…" Luna looked at the girl next to Astra with a curious look on her face.

"Oh, I should probably introduce us. Luna, this is Rhea, another Keyblade wielder. Rhea, this is my best friend, Luna… and her other friends, um…"

"We're Sora, Donald and Goofy. Nice to meet ya!" Goofy said. Astra flinched and looked to Rhea quickly but the girl hadn't moved even a muscle at the mention of his name. In fact, she was still smiling.

"It's nice to meet you, Sora, Donald, Goofy. Luna, I've heard so many things about you from Astra here. She can't stop talking about you," Rhea said.

"That's Astra for you. She's the kind that can usually go on and on about something. The complete opposite of me really," Luna said.

"That's not true. She's a lot more talkative than me actually," Astra interjected.

"Only when I'm with you and my friends here," Luna said.

"So why are you here then?" Sora asked them with a searching gaze.

Before Astra could talk, Rhea walked past her with her arms extended out. They soon found themselves around Sora's face and she started moving them around, much to the discomfort and uncertainty of the spiky haired youth.

"You don't see this everyday now, huh?" Goofy asked, snickering along with Donald while Sora could only blush and make incoherent noises as Rhea fondled his face.

Eventually her hand dropped to her sides and Sora breathed a sigh of relief. "Oh, sorry. You must think that extremely weird of me. I'm blind you see."

"Oh, sorry to hear that," Sora said.

"Don't worry. There's more to a person than their sight. I've learned to appreciate my other senses even more because of it," Rhea said. "Anyway, the reason Astra and I are here is because we think that the Heartless might be using the doors here to infiltrate other worlds. It turns out we were right. I suppose you could see this world as a conduit, one that allows many channels or paths into different worlds. This is certainly a world to keep an eye on, wouldn't you say?"

"I… guess?" Sora said. He was sure he knew who this person was and if so, why she was so interested in him specifically. If she wanted to gauge a reaction from him then the only way he could play it safely was to play dumb.

"Right. So we were wondering if you wouldn't mind helping us uncover the mystery of this factory. That wouldn't be a problem for you, right?"

Sora was sure of it then. She was definitely asking questions in order to learn as much as she could about him while sounding as innocent as possible. She wanted to know what kind of person he was, which she could judge from how he spoke and reacted to certain things. She had let slip the fact that because she was blind she had to hone her other senses. It was enough of a flag to make Sora realize what she was doing.

"Of course not, whatever we can do to help. So how exactly will we be helping then?" Sora asked.

"The head that runs this facility, Waternoose? He's apparently accomplices with KRONOS, or he very well may be part of their inner circle though nothing from the conversation Astra and I heard just a few minutes ago seems to indicate that. What we need is irrefutable proof that he's colluding with external forces. If we can somehow catch him in the act of doing something, then we'll be able to work more efficiently to stop those doors from being misused in the way they currently are."

"Aha! I knew there was purrobably something fishy about this place," Luna said.

"You were just hoping that, weren't you? And you can stop with the puns now. We don't need a repeat of what happened back in Wonderland, do we?" Sora said.

"Aw, you got me." Luna grinned before stepping aside and bringing their attention to the girl next to Stephanie. "We have a problem of our own. This cute little munchkin here is Boo, uh, that's what the guys who found her are calling her, and she somehow found her way into the factory. She probably escaped from one of those doors so before we do anything risky, I want to make sure she's found her way back."

"We can do that. The scare floor is empty right now so you won't have a better opportunity than now," Rhea said. "Why hello there, Boo. How are you?"

"Er, Rhea, you're talking to a wall," Astra pointed out. Rhea let out an awkward laugh and turned to face Luna, who she assumed was somewhere near Boo since she had made reference to her. Boo ran up to her and gave Rhea a firm handshake with both her tiny hands.

"Ooh, she's very energetic as well. You might even end up braking off my arm," Rhea said. Sora had been watching her throughout this, analyzing her actions, her smile, everything he possibly could about her. She was such a stark contrast to Desiree and even Astra that it seemed hard to believe she could be a member of that group. He knew he was generalizing, which wasn't a good thing, but after finding out they wanted him out of the picture, how could he not be?

After Boo finally let go of Rhea's hand, both Astra and Luna led the way back to the Scare Floors meanwhile conversing and updating one another on the things they had seen across multiple worlds. It seemed that neither wanted to bring up anything that could possibly cause tension in the group hence not talking about their individual experiences with Moira's Crescent. To that end, the conversation was also very self-aware and somewhat forced while still sounding natural.

"Sora-"

"I know," Sora whispered back to Donald. They were both trailing behind everyone else and Sora had caught the suspicious glances that Donald had given Rhea earlier on. "She's one of them. Just… keep an eye on her… and Astra too, for now."

"You boys are taking your sweet time. Sheesh, I swear my grandmother could walk faster than you, and she needed a walking stick," Astra said having noticed them a considerable distance apart from the rest of the group.

Sora apologized quickly and increased the speed at which he was walking. It was Rhea this time, who slowed down in order to wait for Sora to reach her. When he had, she continued walking alongside him.

"You met Kyle, sorry, you knew him as Abraxas, right? How was he before he died?" Rhea asked.

"I don't really want to talk about it," Sora answered after a short pause. He didn't even so much as want to think of him. The only thing he could associate with that man was nothing but painful memories that were hard to stomach.

"I'm sorry. If we had known where he was sooner, we would have stopped him. It was only after we realized that he took a particular interest in you that we thought that if we kept an eye on you we would find him eventually," Rhea said.

"And then your people just killed him like it was nothing?" Sora whispered angrily. "I wanted answers from him. I deserved them, and what I ended up getting was more questions instead."

"You might not want to hear this but he was like family to us. Even now, he still is. The truth is that Kyle had died even before Salome and Alfonso took him out. He had fought with every bit of strength he had but in the end, the fires that Xehanort left behind had consumed him and he became Abraxas. His pain became our burden to shoulder, not yours," Rhea said.

"You're right. I didn't want to hear it," Sora said. "You telling me about some tragic backstory doesn't change the fact that the man I knew was a monster. Go after me, fine. But he's the reason Yeul's dead. He's the reason Ansem the Wise is dead and he's the reason Luna had to suffer in the Realm of Darkness for months. If you want sympathy, you won't get it from me."

"I'm not asking for sympathy. I'm asking you to understand, but I shouldn't have brought it up either way. Apologies," Rhea said.

"No, it's not your fault," Sora lied. He honestly just wanted to keep his emotions in check so as not to create any potential strains between him and Moira's Crescent if it were possible. They didn't seem to have any hostile intentions and it wasn't fair to place the actions of one man on someone who didn't have anything to do with it.

Instead he put on a smile and changed the topic. "Astra hasn't been that much trouble for you, has she?"

"Why would she be trouble? Well, I suppose she did find it hard to integrate at first, or it would probably be more accurate to say that she didn't want to. I think there's a part of her that still doesn't want to fully assimilate either. In her eyes, the way she can remain impartial and faithful to both us and Luna is to stand outside the hourglass," Rhea said.

"Hourglass? Someone I know mentioned something about that," Sora said.

"It's a pretty simple concept to understand. Its origins date back to sometime after the war when the idea of Keyblade wielders was finally repurposed as a force of maintaining balance. As you know there are two sides of an Hourglass. The side with which time has started and the side where that time ends up. But like everything, anything can be interpreted differently when given a context. In our terms, the two sides of the Hourglass represent light and dark and each individual grain of sand an individual heart. It's not within our right to manipulate that hourglass because when you do, the balance of light and dark is sent array."

"You're right, but why are you telling me this? You're a part of Moira's Crescent, aren't you?" Sora finally decided to get to the heart of the matter.

"Right now I'm not. I'm simply me and you're you. Neither of us are part of an organization at this moment in time but belong to ourselves with our own individual wills driving us forward," Rhea answered.

"That's an interesting way of seeing it. Hold on a sec," Sora took hold of her hand and turned left to follow the others, guiding her along with him.

"Thank you," Rhea said with a gentle smile. It pained him to think that if they ever met each other as enemies, that smile would have to vanish from the face of the earth, or perhaps even his own. That thought kept him believing in her words, even if they were a lie.