Roxas, Sora called urgently. Roxas wake up…Roxas are you okay?

Another voice came from outside. "Roxas? There you are. I was beginning to wonder. We haven't seen you since breakfast yesterday." When Roxas didn't reply, the voice repeated, "Roxas?"

Roxas! Sora urged, Axel's here to see you. WAKE UP!

Roxas slowly opened his eyes to see the face of some scary looking, scrawny, redhead. "Who are you?" He asked curiously.

"Don't joke around Roxas. It's not funny," Axel replied.

"Where am I?" Roxas demanded, sitting up.

"Roxas?"

"Why do you keep calling me that?"

"Given the circumstances, I don't think it's a good idea—"

"What circumstances? You're not answering my questions. If you can't be helpful, go away."

"Okay," Axel began, very confused by the way Roxas was acting. "I'm Axel, your best friend. You're in Vexen's lab in a…dentist chair. I called you Roxas because you are Roxas. And what the hell did Vexen do to you?"

A thousand new questions flashed through Roxas's mind, but Sora interrupted, Don't worry about those. I'll answer them later.

"Who are you, and why do you keep talking to me?" Roxas questioned out loud.

Axel repeated, "I-I'm Axel…and you're my friend."

At the same time, Sora replied, I'm…your conscience, so don't talk to me out loud.

Roxas looked intently at Axel for a moment before wondering, "My friend?...Why can't I remember anything?"

Axel clenched his fists and roared angrily through the room, "Vexen!"

Zexion sat silently pondering on the rock floor. How did that pirate get out with a paperclip? How were they going to get Roxas back together this time? They had done another memory dump on him and got nothing back. Nothing but the last three things they had said before IT happened. The occurrence was referred to as IT because they still hadn't figured out how to tell Xemnas. Zexion read another couple pages in the Book of Roxas and then looked up. He'd figured it out.

Vexen appeared, standing next to him, just as the cell door fell to pieces. "Hmm, you figured it out," he noted.

"Yes, I have," Zexion agreed.

"So how do you fix it?"

"I'll show you," Zexion replied, creating a portal and stepping through it to where they were currently holding Wesley. "A small dark hole in a mountain side with no entrance or exit. The only way in or out is through a portal and it would take at least three hundred years to dig to the nearest exit with a spoon."

"A spoon?" They both stopped for a second and just watched Wesley lie there in the dark. After a short while, Vexen commented, "So you said you had something important to tell me about IT?"

"Yes, I found out why he came back. I think you should see this." He left the room through a portal so it would be light enough to read and then turned to the page in the Book of Roxas where it read:

Roxas came out of the room where Nehemiah had laid him rubbing his eyes and mentioned quietly, "It's not near as hard as it used to be since his castle burnt down and he moved into The Castle That Never Was."

"How is that possible?" Nehemiah countered, "There's all those Organization XIII people there. They could still totally kick our butts."

Roxas just shrugged. "I dunno."

Vash agreed with him, though. "Sometimes a lot of people is too many people. It becomes too easy to pretend like you belong."

"Well, if it's so easy now, how do you get there?" Nehemiah demanded of Roxas.

"I dunno," was all he said.

"Come on, you used to live there. How can you not remember how to get there?"

"I dunno. I just don't."

Suddenly Sora's voice came from the living room, "No Roxas, you could get there easily, not the rest of us."

Roxas jumped to the side a little, questioning, "How'd you get over there?"

Sora hopped onto the television and sat with his feet dangling, "We separated. Do you have a problem with that?"

"It just…surprised me, I guess."

"Well, the fact is, anyone who's been there before could get in very easily."

"Yeah, 'cuz they remember how to get there," Roxas mentioned. "I don't remember though."

Sora kind of laughed. "No, it's not that. The forest remembers you. Because you've been accepted by the forest once, it will recognize you and not try to kill you. The rest of us would all be attacked by the wild things that guard it."

"Right, so I can wander around in this forest for days, completely lost, and starve to death…except I can't die, so I'd just starve."

"Organization XIII wouldn't let that happen Roxas. If they saw you were lost in the forest, they'd come get you out…They miss you, you know."

"They do?" Roxas asked, instantly losing himself in thought. He was trying to remember something…anything from the Organization. "Did I really have friends over there?"

Sora shrugged. "Seems like it."

Then Roxas burst out, "But all I can remember about them is you fighting them, you calling them bad. How can I go back there like nothing ever happened, not remembering who I liked, who I hated, what I acted like…and not just call them all bad?"

"Just start over, like you'd never ever met them before and let the relationships develop naturally."

"Who's he never met?" Nori asked as he entered the room, Chiyo still clinging to him.

"Organization XIII," Vash answered, a little confused by the conversation.

Nori frowned, knowing that Roxas had too met Organization XIII before. "No," he countered, "Roxas you used to live with them."

"And wouldn't it be a great idea if we sent him back?" Sora questioned from the television. Roxas just shook his head no, trying to get Nori to respond that way. After a second of waiting for Nori's blank stare of confusion to go away, Sora continued, "Tia might be there, you know, and we can't get there and look for her all in one trip without dying. It makes much more sense that we send him—who's been there before—to find her, and then once he has, we can plan how to break her out quickly, so less people get hurt."

Nori shrugged. "Sounds good to me."

"No!" Roxas countered. Then, he started trying to come up with other excuses. "But it's dark over there! What if I spend a couple weeks in the darkness and decide I don't want to come back? That might happen. Then, you destroyed me!"

"I'm gonna go take a shower now," Nori said, really ignoring the issue. Chiyo let go of Nori's hand as he walked toward the bathroom. Jokingly he inquired, "What? You don't want to come with me anymore?"

Sora just kept trying to convince Roxas. "I'll give you my phone. If you start to feel like you can't handle something, just call, and we'll come get you immediately."

And after a little while, Warren showed up with Dusty. When they did, they saw Roxas sitting on the floor in the living room trying his best not to cry as he said, "But…I don't want…to go…to the Castle…That Never Was."

Warren immediately took his place on the couch—that had been returned to its proper location—and concernedly asked, "What is going on?"

Vash and Nehemiah explained the whole thing and ended with, "We still haven't convinced him."

"That's because I'm not going," Roxas insisted.

Warren leaned back on the couch, letting everything register, before he said, "You can't convince him to do it if he doesn't want to."

"What?" Sora asked in shock. "You're the only one who hasn't agreed with us."

"That's because I'm the only other one that's been on that side of the Outlands!" Warren replied harshly. "It's not as easy of a life as you may think…You realize, chances are, the moment he gets over there, he'll immediately rejoin the organization—not just in pretend, but because you just can't help being evil. He won't find Tia Dalma, and if…in the rare occasion that he does find her, he won't tell you."

"Well, why didn't you say that?" Nehemiah asked Roxas.

"I don't remember that," Roxas answered, slightly embarrassed. "I just know I don't like."

A second later, Warren added, "But it is a good idea." Roxas looked at Warren in shock. His last source of support was gone.

When everyone looked to Warren for an explanation, he continued, "If you were just asking him to go into the forest—or one of the cities of the forest—I would support your idea one hundred percent…granted that someone went with him. Because together, there's a certain element of peer pressure…a dare that passes around among friends to see who can cross the furthest back into the light without getting sucked into its grasp. We could bet each other that the other one wouldn't be able to find Tia Dalma…taunt one another until one of us did something we would get in trouble for—like breaking her out of jail. But if you're asking him to find her in The Castle That Never Was, no one can go with him."

Everyone was quiet for a moment, trying to find a way around this new obstacle. Becca wandered into the house just in time to hear Sora volunteer, "I'll go with him."

"Where are we going?" She asked.

"Not you," Sora corrected, "just me and Roxas because I can combine with him again and no one will know I'm there."

"What do you mean you guys can combine?" Becca questioned, still confused.

They just ignored her, and Warren crossed the room to kneel next to Roxas inquiring, "Can you do it now Roxas? If Sora goes with you?"

"Is it that important?" He wondered quietly.

"It's that important…it's the only way."

"And he'll bring me back?"

"He'll bring you back," Warren reassured.

Roxas silently stood and approached Sora who hopped off the television. "You're going then?" Sora asked, jokingly poking Roxas in the nose.

Roxas grumpily returned the gesture, smashing Sora's nose as he reluctantly agreed, "I guess."

A silence filled the room with expectation as Sora and Roxas just looked at each other. After a second, Roxas started fading and became transparent like Nori had been when he was dead. That worried Becca and Dusty who had seen him like that, but they didn't get a chance to express their concerns. He went all sparkly and disappeared for a moment before taking over Sora like he had a thousand times. Then, where there was once two, stood just Roxas.

Vexen's expression slowly grew more and more shocked until, by the end, he had reached horrified. "Roxas," he muttered in a daze, "how could he?"

"We have to tell the Superior," Zexion stated.

"What do you have to say to me Number VI?" Xemnas's voice demanded just before he suddenly appeared from a portal with Xaldin at his side.

Zexion stood there silently, as if reading the rest of Roxas's life had made him rethink tattling just yet. Suggesting it was different from actually doing it.

Vexen was angry enough to not think twice about it, announcing, "It's Roxas Sir. He truly is a traitor. He's only here to destroy us."

"Is this true Number VI?" Xemnas asked, only because Zexion seemed to have a look of protest.

"Yes," he replied softly after a second. Xemnas turned and started walking toward the laboratory. "N-now's not a good time," Zexion insisted, knowing the last they saw of Roxas he was lying there unconscious, knowing absolutely nothing.

"It's never too soon to dispense of a traitor," Xemnas answered, continuing to walk. Xaldin went with him at first, but then he turned back silently questioning why Zexion and Vexen weren't coming.

Zexion reluctantly followed, as did Vexen who elbowed his fellow intellectual, whispering, "What is wrong with you?"

Mumbling through his teeth, Zexion replied, "Now, he's gonna find out we broke him."

"Well, it was your idea to tell him in the first place."

"Not now."

"What are you two whispering about back there?" Xaldin questioned.

They didn't answer. They just didn't say another word until they reached the lab.

Roxas fell to his knees, clutching his ears, and shouted, "Stop talking! You're so loud!"

Sora whispered softly back, I told you not to talk to me out loud. I can hear what you think.

"Stupid conscience!"

"What the hell Roxas?" Axel demanded, confused.

"Not you, the voice in my head is so loud."

"The voice in his head?" Xemnas questioned quietly from the doorway.

"It's Sora," Zexion replied.

"What?" Axel, Xemnas, and Xaldin asked in shock.

"Sora is inside of Roxas, helping him through every step of the way to search for Tia Dalma in our castle."

Roxas looked down at his chest as if he was searching for someone inside of him and then back to Zexion. "Who?"

Xemnas ordered Xaldin, "Restrain him; then, question him. I would like to see Sora in our prison by nightfall."

Axel still had that confused look implanted on his face, so Zexion handed him the Book of Roxas commenting, "Read this. It will all make sense then."

Axel started just a tad bit too soon in the book, where Roxas was inside of Sora jumping on the bed shouting, "Nori!" When he got to the right part, however, he was even more upset than Vexen had been. Xaldin had gotten Roxas restrained; though, it was harder than he had expected because Roxas was scared. He didn't recognize Xaldin and didn't understand what was going on.

The first thing Xaldin asked was, "Who do you think you are, coming here looking for Tia Dalma?"

Raising one eyebrow, Roxas responded, "Who's Tia Dalma?...And I think I'm Roxas; I'm not sure, though."

"Don't mock us Roxas. We made you everything you are, and is this how you repay us?"

"You also made him everything he is not," Roxas argued, but it wasn't his voice. Suddenly Roxas faded into Sora, who continued arguing for Roxas because Roxas was too confused to do himself justice, "Thanks to those two over there," he pointed to Zexion and Vexen, "he has absolutely nothing. He has no idea he's looking for Tia Dalma anymore. He has no memories of me, no memories of you, no memories of Axel…no memories of breakfast yesterday."

Xaldin angrily grabbed Sora by the throat, but Sora just laughed, "You can't get me out of Roxas. You don't know how." Then, Sora faded back into Roxas, and Xaldin realized he was choking Roxas.

Xaldin let go of Roxas but furiously demanded, "Get out of there Sora!"

Roxas looked at him in surprise and said softly, "Y-you can't have my conscience. It's mine. He hasn't answered my questions yet."

"Your conscience?"

"Roxas has been quite confused for some time now," Vexen mentioned, "that's what we've been telling you all along."

"I think it's getting worse."

"No," both Vexen and Zexion insisted at the same time.

Axel looked up from the paper and countered, "Yes, it is much worse. Before he would have at least been able to admit to the horrible thing he's done. Instead, now I had to stand here listening to him ask me who Sora was, while Sora just sits inside him scoffing at us. And to think, I was actually beginning to believe you cared when you said you wanted us all to get our hearts together. I'll tell you one thing: I'm not flattered anymore!"

Axel had been moving gradually closer to Roxas, and when he shouted that last sentence, his circular weapon—a chackram—appeared in his hand. Roxas ducked in fear as it sliced across his chest. Then, he looked down, surprised that he wasn't dead, and watched as a small blob representing a heart floated away. A second later, a lifeless Sora slowly fell to the ground. Roxas just stood there, shocked by the occurrences.

After waiting a second to let everything sink in, Xaldin stated, "You weren't supposed to kill him."

Letting his chackram just disappear, Axel walked away replying, "Yeah, yeah…at least now he won't bother us anymore."

"Are we just to leave Roxas in here?" Vexen questioned as Xemnas also turned to leave.

Xemnas stopped, pondered, and responded, "Send him to the Island," before continuing out the door.

"The Island!" Vexen and Zexion both exclaimed in shock.

"What island?" Roxas wondered curiously.

"The Island," Vexen explained.

"The Island?"

"The Island," Xaldin assured.

"No," Demyx insisted, suddenly bursting into the room, "not the Island!"

"Don't burst into conversations you know nothing about," Xaldin ordered.

"I know what's goin' on. I've been listening to the whole conversation from the hallway."

Xaldin put his hands on his hips and then gestured out. "Then, why should we not exile the traitor?"

"Because he doesn't know that he did it," Demyx replied intelligently.

"But you have no problem taking Heartless to kill hundreds of innocent people who don't know they ever did anything to wrong you," Xaldin argued.

Demyx was very confused for a second before mentioning, "They didn't."

"My point exactly…Roxas did do something against us. Why should he not be punished?"

"Because he used to be one of us."

"Doesn't that make it worse, knowing he did it willingly even though he used to be one of us?"

"No, because he didn't really know he used to be one of us. And if you spent an entire year with someone who constantly told you you were bad when you didn't know better, you'd probably help him take you out too."

"That didn't make sense," Zexion whispered to Vexen.

Vexen whispered back, "I think he's trying to tell us he's a traitor too."

"I am not…just—" Demyx started, but he trailed off at the end.

"I understand. You're pretending to have a heart by mercifully giving Roxas a second chance," Xaldin mocked sarcastically.

"Actually, it's a third chance," Vexen corrected.

"Too bad our superior already made his decision," Xaldin laughed. "Roxas can come back afterwards…if he survives."

"He won't survive by himself out there! He can't remember anything but his name!"

"Then, if you don't want him to go alone, why don't you go with him?"

"What?" Demyx questioned in shock, but he didn't get to protest because a second later, both him and Roxas were on the Island. Demyx casually looked around, his glance stopping at Roxas. Roxas was still tied to a small, sturdy machine with some leather strips Xaldin had found laying around the lab. Urgently, Demyx tried to untie them, commenting, "We've gotta get you outta this."

He hadn't even finished the first one when, a moment later, Roxas asked, "What's that?"

Demyx looked behind him to what Roxas was referring to and exclaimed, "Gaah! Why are the Heartless here?" He turned back to Roxas and ordered, "You wait here for a minute…not like you could go anywhere anyways."

Reaching an arm into the sky, Demyx created his Sitar just as the little black creatures began multiplying, appearing in every which direction. He played a couple notes, at first just to defend himself and his friend against the Heartless, setting up around them a circle of Dusks and making a couple attacks. When he was sure he had things under control, he sent out a couple sharp musical notes to cut the ties around Roxas's hands.

Roxas fell to the ground, examining his free hands and everything Demyx had created. Turning to his protector, Roxas wondered, "Cool, did you do all that?"

Demyx sent out another round of Dusks so he could kneel next to Roxas and help him up. "Yup, and you can too…sorta."

"Really? How?" Roxas asked excitedly.

"You don't remember your keyblade?" Demyx questioned just to be sure.

Roxas just shook his head.

Demyx picked up two sticks from the ground and put one in each of Roxas's hands saying, "Use these as your swords."

"Will these actually kill those?" Roxas inquired, indicating the Heartless.

"Oh, yeah, it'll work just fine…now come on, let's try to head that way." Demyx pointed directly ahead of them.

They headed off, through the Heartless. At first, Demyx had to do all the defending. After a couple seconds, Roxas finally tried to slash at a little black creature with his left stick. Halfway through the attack, however, both sticks turned into his two keyblades. Surprised by it, he dropped them both to the ground and they disappeared.

Demyx laughed at him. "That's what was supposed to happen. I told you you could do it."

Roxas smiled. It was halfway between an embarrassed smile and being frustrated out of his mind about the memory thing. Demyx kicked a new stick off the ground, and Roxas caught it with both hands.

"Now try it again…and don't be afraid of it this time."

As told, Roxas tried cutting away at another Heartless. As the Heartless dissolved into a cloud of black dust, Roxas admired the key he held between his hands. He was quickly brought back to reality when the next Heartless tried to attack him, and he had to defend himself. It didn't take him too long to get the hang of using his key again. After all, he still had his muscle memory. After a little while, he felt comfortable pulling out his second key—which looked much neater. Then, he was unstoppable, as he destroyed hoards of Heartless.

Roxas was exhausted by the time enough were gone that they could run away. Demyx grabbed his hand and dragged him towards a group of trees that would provide some protection. When he knew the Heartless weren't following them anymore, he stopped. Both of them collapsed to the ground, trying to catch their breath.

After a second, Roxas reformed his black key in his hand and examined its every detail commenting, "That was awesome!"

"Glad you thought so," Demyx responded. "I hate fighting…You did really well, though. I wasn't expecting you to pick back up on it that quickly."

"You mean I used to do this all the time," Roxas realized.

Demyx shrugged, "Kinda." He stood up, refreshed enough to continue on, and suggested, "We should keep going. The sooner we find our way out of here the better…plus, less things will attack us if we keep moving, I think."

Roxas stood and followed. For a while they walked on in silence because neither of them could think of anything to talk about, and because Roxas was still marveling at his key.

Eventually, Roxas decided to say, "Thank you…for coming with me. I think I'd be dead by now without you."

At that exact moment, a couple dozen cannibalistic looking natives appeared out of the trees. Demyx looked around at them and replied, "Don't thank me yet. I think we may still die." As the Sitar reappeared in his hand, Demyx muttered, "Where are those Heartless when you need them?"

"What do you mean by that?" Roxas whispered.

"The Heartless…they attack people and take their hearts. They'd help us rid ourselves of this nuisance."

Roxas nodded for a second before inquiring, "So what are we gonna do without them?" Demyx thought for a while. He was taking too long, and the natives weren't going to just stand around waiting for them to form a plan. One of them pulled out a poison dart gun and prepared to shoot at the two Nobodies. Roxas shouted, "Look out!" and jumped in front of Demyx, somehow blocking the dart with his key.

He was excited that it had worked, but a second later all the natives had poison dart guns or archery bows. Demyx rushed to his feet, surrounding himself and Roxas in a giant bubble and pointing to the right.

"Go that way," he ordered.

"Okay," Roxas agreed, automatically going the other direction.

Demyx followed so he could stay in the bubble, demanding, "What are you doing? This is not what I said."

"Well, I figured you meant we should go this way and you just didn't want the cannibals to know your plan."

"No!"

A second later, they plowed right into one of the cannibals. All three toppled to the ground, and the bubble popped. They were out of the circle, though, which was a good thing. Roxas and Demyx were instantly to their feet, sprinting at full speed away from the pursuing natives. They were somehow managing to stay just out of reach. Demyx slid to a stop at the edge of a river while Roxas was watching behind them. Roxas, not knowing Demyx had stopped, ran into him, and they both fell into the river.

Demyx came back to the surface of the fast moving water and realized that Roxas hadn't. He swam down to search for him. Eventually, he found Roxas and grabbed the boy, pulling him to the surface. Roxas gasped desperately, flailing his arms around.

"Don't tell me you don't remember how to swim," Demyx complained.

"Swim?" Roxas asked, "Is that what this is called?"

Demyx just sighed and let the river push them downstream, away from the natives. It was nice to think about nothing but holding Roxas's head above water for a while. It was short lived, though, as a moment afterwards two boats of natives appeared—one downstream heading up and one upstream heading down. They were trapped.

Quietly Demyx ordered, "Take a deep breath and hold it. Plug your nose," and he dove under water. He swam under the boat that was downstream. It was trying to turn around because the natives realized what he was trying to do, but they couldn't navigate as fast as he could swim. He ducked into a small, swampy creek that split off from the river and finally took into consideration Roxas's desperate pounding on his chest from lack of air. Roxas gasped again as they resurfaced.

"That's not nice!" Roxas protested.

"Yeah," Demyx agreed, "but we lost them." He gestured to the two boats which had accidentally t-boned.

They swam slowly through the murky water for quite some time before they came across a small shack along the bank and Roxas wondered, "Do you think we should stop there?"

"I don't see why not," Demyx answered. "It's getting late and that will give us shelter for the night. It doesn't look like those cannibals would live in a house like that."

Demyx looked around it for a while, but there didn't seem to be an entrance. For some reason he looked under the water and happened to notice a small hole in the wall of the shack just big enough for one person to fit through. He tried going through it, and, sure enough, it lead to the inside of the shack. Excitedly, he went back to the surface where he had left Roxas and brought Roxas to the hole, shoving him through. Roxas crawled out of the hole to the floor of the shack as Demyx swam through.

Suddenly, a small, teenage boy with big ears on top of his head and a sword as tall as he was, stood in front of them, making a noise which seemed to be a growl.