The Road to Dawn
By Ariana Aislinn
Chapter 17: Old Friends

What can I say? I have no excuse. I'm sorry I haven't updated in so long. I will try to do more soon, but I've hit a bit of a rough spot. I can't promise another chapter soon, but I will certainly try. Remember, though, I do absolutely swear I will finish this story! So worry not, it may take forever, but I won't abandon it.

Standard disclaimer: Kingdom Hearts and its characters are the property of Square-Enix and Disney, not me.

"Where did they come from all of a sudden?" Sora panted, slashing through another Shadow so that it disappeared in a spray of vanishing darkness.

"Gee, I dunno!" Goofy struck one with his shield, resulting in a faint clang. "They sure weren't here a moment ago…"

"Maybe they followed us?"

"Less talk, more fight!" Donald scowled as he cut Sora off, casting an ice spell on another nearby Heartless.

It had started with just a couple Heartless. Since their arrival in Gateway two days ago, Sora and his friends had been camping out in a shady copse just outside town as they tried to arrange for passage, preferably offworld somehow…but most ships would only get them to different parts of this world, and a gummi ship was prohibitively expensive. This morning they'd awoken and breakfasted, then started into town while discussing their options…and that was when the Heartless attacked.

The Heartless, simply weak Shadows, had nevertheless grown rapidly in number. Every time Sora dispatched one with the Keyblade, two more seemed to replace it. Now he paused a moment, looking around; they were completely surrounded by a throng of Heartless two rows deep, and growing in number as more rose up from the ground. "Think we can make a break for the city?"

"I don't think so," Goofy said doubtfully. "Besides, they might follow us. We don't wanna put other folks in danger, do we?"

"I guess not," Sora sighed in frustration, slashing through a few more Heartless. A third row was forming now, fencing them in.

"What're we gonna do?" Donald cried out in alarm, barely zapping a Shadow in time as it dove toward him, claws outstretched.

Sora didn't answer, focusing for a moment on fighting off the attack. Not only were the Heartless growing more numerous, they seemed to be acting more aggressive, as well.

In the midst of his concentration and focus on the battle, Sora did not immediately hear the low hum and whoosh of air that gradually came nearer. He only looked up when the sound grew loud enough that he could no longer ignore it - it was then nearly overhead. Slashing the nearest group of Heartless, he looked up, trying to brush his light brown hair out of his eyes.

"A gummi ship!" Donald shouted. And indeed it was - a particularly streamlined and aerodynamic ship, all white and silver with rounded features and a few decorative swirls. They watched, sparing only enough attention to beat back their attackers, as the ship descended and hovered nearby, almost directly above them.

A panel slid back to reveal a wide doorway, and a familiar face looked out at them. Short black hair whipped by the wind from the gummi ship's engines framed a cheerful, round face, at the moment looking somewhat hurried. "Hey guys! Climb aboard - hurry!"

"Yuffie!" Sora grinned and turned toward the ship. As he ran forward, more Heartless leapt at him, their ferocity rapidly growing. One was in midair, its yellow eyes inches from Sora's face, as he struck out with the Keyblade and vanquished it. He eradicated a few more Shadows as he darted for the gummi ship. The young ninja dropped a short, rope ladder down for him. Sora grabbed on and began climbing, looking back to make sure that Donald and Goofy were following. Goofy took hold of the ladder, almost missing it, just as Sora heaved himself over the edge of the doorway. Donald turned to let off one final thunder spell before following.

As soon as all three were safely aboard, Yuffie turned and cupped a hand against the side of her mouth. "Hey Cid! We've got 'em - let's get out of here!" As she spoke, she turned and grabbed the door, sliding it shut. It closed with a loud slam, and the sound of the wind died away. Sora and his friends lay in a heap on the ship's metal floor - the cargo bay, apparently - and tried to catch their breath.

"Yuffie…" Sora gulped for air, then grinned at the ninja, attempting to blow his bangs out of his eyes. A faint sheen of sweat glistened on his forehead. "Where'd you guys come from?"

"We picked up a tip that you were here." The new voice belonged to a tall, solemn young man, entering from the area of the cockpit. Leon's boots thudded heavily on the cargo bay floor. He looked rather intimidating, his arms crossed in front of him and a stern frown on his face as he looked the three up and down. After a long, appraising look, however, one corner of his mouth turned up, and his eyebrows smoothed out, softening his look slightly. "Heh. Good to see you're okay. Guess we got here just in time, didn't we?"

"Leon!" Sora grinned, stumbling to his feet and holding out his hand to the man, who clasped it firmly. "It's great to see you!"

"You guys look a little the worse for wear, though." Yuffie grinned and arched an eyebrow.

"What, us? Nah, those Heartless were nothing!" Sora grinned with almost cocky confidence, clasping his hands behind his head.

Yuffie gestured toward Sora's front. "Oh yeah? Seems like you had a close call there."

Looking down, Sora realized that the front of his shirt was torn in one long, diagonal slash, strips of red and white fabric hanging in tatters. Beneath the shirt he could see faint, pink lines on his skin. His face turned slightly pale, seeing how close he apparently had come to a serious wound without ever realizing it. After the initial reaction, he turned a bit red, laughing in embarrassment. "Uh…guess I was kinda reckless, huh?"

"A bit," Yuffie snickered. "But don't worry, I think we can get you some replacement clothes soon enough."

"Where are we going, Leon?" Donald asked, looking over himself and his companions to make sure everyone was all right.

"Hollow Bastion. Safest place right now, and we can get you fixed up and resupplied while we talk about our next course of action."

"Oh yeah!" Sora grinned. "Hollow Bastion's okay now, isn't it?"

Leon shrugged. "Mostly. It's…complicated. Maleficent - and Ansem - did a lot to the place to mess it up, and we're slowly working on restoring it to the way it used to be. But aside from that…well, you'll just have to see." He shook his head.

"Uh…Leon, whatcha talkin' about?" Goofy scratched his head.

"It's the visitors." Yuffie nodded for emphasis. "Well, refugees, really. They've just started pouring in, and we're not sure where they've all come from…but we think it might have something to do with the barriers going down."

"Really? They're really down?" Sora sighed, looking downcast. "Of course, they'd have to be if you were able to come find us…but…we restored them!"

"That's right, we did! So uh…what happened to them?" Goofy frowned, perplexed.

"Maybe our journey meant nothing after all…" Donald looked tired and frustrated.

"Nah!" Sora grinned suddenly. "Not nothing. I mean, even if the barriers are down again…we did get rid of Ansem. That's something! And we saved a lot of worlds, too!"

"Including Hollow Bastion," Yuffie pointed out. "If you hadn't, we wouldn't be able to provide food and shelter to all those people."

"Not that that's easy." Leon grunted. "And I don't know about the bargain we made with that Setzer guy. Doesn't seem trustworthy to me at all."

"Then why'd you make the agreement, Squall?" Yuffie caught herself. "I mean, Leon."

"What choice did I have, Yuffie?" Leon spread his hands, looking frustrated. "Not like we've got enough resources to support everyone, when we're still trying to fix up the castle. And the town itself is still in ruins, you know that."

Yuffie sighed. "True." But then she brightened. "But we didn't pick you up just to depress you with our problems! Sora, how've you been? Where have you been?" She grinned. "It's just so great to see you again!"

The grin was infectious, and Sora returned it. "It's great to see you too, Yuffie! And gee…where do we start?" He glanced at Goofy and Donald, who shrugged. "To tell the truth, I'm not even sure exactly what's happened to us…a lot of it is kind of muddled."

"Well, start with when you left us at Hollow Bastion and go from there." Leon nodded. "Maybe we can help fill in the holes."

It took a long time to tell the whole story of their journey to Ansem's darkness-wrought world, of the Door to Darkness and what lay beyond it, of Riku's disappearance behind the door along with the king, of the restoration of the worlds and how they had become lost on the world of Gateway and Castle Oblivion. As they talked, Yuffie and Leon scrounged up some food for them - packaged sandwiches and bottles of water from the gummi ship's stores.

"What I really want to know now, though -" Sora took a gulp of water to wash down a mouthful of sandwich - "is what caused the barriers to go down. And if refugees are showing up in Hollow Bastion, doesn't it seem like the darkness has something to do with it? And how is that possible, if we sealed off the Door to Darkness?"

Leon shrugged. "Just because you sealed it doesn't mean the darkness is gone. Darkness has been among the worlds for centuries. Hollow Bastion has legends about it - how long ago the light disappeared into darkness and had to be brought back by those few who still had pure hearts."

Yuffie nodded. "Ever since then, this universe has been mix of both light and dark. You can't have one without the other, and both are intermingled - at least until the day that the Door to Darkness or the Door to Light is opened. And then…there's no telling what might happen."

"If you believe the tales, that is." Leon shook his head. "I'm really not sure what's true and what isn't. But I think we can be sure that the danger isn't over. By sealing the Door to Darkness, you prevented a huge influx of darkness that probably would have washed away every speck of light in the universe, eventually. But just because you sealed it doesn't mean it can't ever be opened again. I don't think that's happened, not yet."

"But just because you stopped darkness from covering everything doesn't mean you got rid of the darkness that was already here," Yuffie pointed out.

Sora sighed, hanging his head slightly. "It's so frustrating."

"Well, yeah, but don't you dare start feeling sorry for yourself, or I'm going to have to pound some heads." Yuffie grinned.

Sora chuckled. "Yeah, I know. Oh well! It just means we have to figure out a way to lock up the darkness permanently. So, where do we start?" He stuffed the rest of his sandwich in his mouth and licked the crumbs off his fingers.

Leon gestured toward the cockpit. "Well, like I said, Cid's got us headed back to Hollow Bastion. We can meet up with Aerith and the others there and come up with a plan."

Goofy frowned at Leon, scratching his head. "There's just somethin' I don't get, though. How'd you fellers know to come lookin' for us here?"

"Now that's something really weird. This guy showed up in the front hall along with the latest group of refugees, but he didn't look like any of them. He seemed kinda…purposeful, you know?" Yuffie cocked her head to one side. "Not to mention he was wearing these red robes, and his face was covered in red bandages."

"Red bandages? What for?" quacked Donald, looking confused.

"No idea! Maybe as a disguise, maybe to hide some scars or an injury - I don't know. All I could tell about how he looked was that he was kind of tall, and he had bright golden eyes and kind of tanned skin. I think. He was wearing gloves, too, and I couldn't see much through the bandages. Majorly strange."

Leon sighed. "If Yuffie had any ability to get to the point, she'd tell you that this man introduced himself only as DiZ, and he said you needed a ride. Then he gave us a navi-gummi, and he left."

Yuffie stuck her tongue out at Leon. "Well, if you want to give them the short, boring version, yeah."

"Wonder who he is? Not to mention how he would know we were here." Sora laughed. "I don't even know what we're doing here!"

Leon frowned thoughtfully. "That's right, you said you lost your memory. Another mystery."

Sora shrugged. "I suppose we'll find out the answers sooner or later. I'm not too concerned about it right now. I'm more worried about the darkness spreading across the worlds again…and Riku, too. Kairi's all right, I think - I hope. I know she went back to the islands, so she's gotta be okay. And it sounds as if Riku and the king somehow managed to escape from the Realm of Darkness, but we still don't know where they are."

Yuffie grinned and patted Sora's shoulder. "Well, I'm sure you'll find those answers soon enough, too, and you'll meet up with your friends again. But for now, there's an even more pressing question."

Sora blinked, frowning slightly. "What's that?"

Yuffie's grin turned devious, and she held up a deck of cards, waving it at Sora. "Can you beat me at poker?"

Sora chuckled. "I dunno, but I can try! You in, guys?"

Donald and Goofy nodded their assent, and Yuffie began to deal out the cards as they all found seats around a small table.

"I'm telling you, man, this symbol means something!"

Xigbar folded his arms and shrugged. "Yeah, it means you're an idiot."

Demyx glared daggers at him. "Very clever, Eyepatch. You want my fist in your face?"

The other man chuckled. "Ha, as if you had the guts! You're not a bad guy, Demyx, but when it comes to fighting, you're about as scary as string cheese. Anyway, relax, I was just messing with ya. But I'll tell you, there ain't anything there and you might as well give up. I know you like being around all this water and all, but cheer up, there's water at the Destiny Islands, too."

Demyx sighed, brushing back the longer blond hair that hung at his neck. "You know it's not like that, Xigbar." He rather regretted ever telling the older man that he felt so drawn to the rushing waters of Rising Falls. Xigbar hadn't really understood what he meant, and he'd never quit teasing him about it. "I'm pretty sure this symbol means something important. Why would the Seekers just leave their mark for no reason?"

"Ya got me. But if they weren't just saying 'The Seekers were here,' then what is it?"

"Well, um…maybe it's a switch of some sort. Or a code."

Xigbar raised an eyebrow. "A shooting star and a crown ain't a code, kid. And if it's a switch, how're you supposed to trigger it? Look, if there's something here, we can come back. But for now we gotta move on, and Darkside's getting restless. I don't think you wanna be on his bad side any more than I do."

"Not really, no," Demyx mumbled, staring at the ground. To tell the truth, Darkside scared him spitless, but he wasn't about to admit that to the sharp-tongued gunman. "All right, fine. I'll go to the islands. But what are we looking for? Have we at least got a lead this time?"

Xigbar nodded. "Yep. Apparently the kid with the key isn't the only interesting thing to come out of that place - seems there's a tradition of the Seekers there too, and some remnants of their magic. You ever heard of paopu fruit…?"

"Nah. Does it taste good in a pie?"

Xigbar cuffed him lightly on the shoulder. "Enough, kid. Let's get going, all right?"

Demyx rubbed sulkily at his arm. "Fine, just don't hit me again."

Xigbar laughed. "You wimp. Right, last one there has to wash Xaldin's socks." He vanished in a swirl of blue-streaked darkness.

"Hey!" Demyx protested, and followed suit.

Well, there ya go. Next chapter may involve Sora if I keep up with the two chapters per character rhythm I have going, but I'm not positive yet. We'll see.