"You are to be the hero of this group then?" Jafar mocked Becca. "Let's see how well you perform against me. You know how it ends," he held out one hand. "All of you dead, or me in my lamp," he held out the other hand with his black lamp in it. He surrounded his black lamp with a ball of light that somehow held it in position, floating above any of their reach.

Then, he pointed to his left, and a stream of light shot out creating a canyon in the ground. Nehemiah was suddenly standing on a small wooden platform, hands tied behind his back and blindfolded, over the lava filled crevice (and yes, this happens to be the same canyon as the other one. They are that close to each other).

Jafar continued to explain, "Your challenge is to get me in the lamp before he hits the lava."

"What do you mean by 'he hits the lava'?" Chiyo inquired skeptically.

Jafar didn't say anything in response, but he didn't need to. The platform Nehemiah was standing on started sinking down.

Becca quickly came up with an idea, suggesting, "You distract him, I'll grab the lamp."

"Me?" Chiyo questioned.

That was sprung on her too fast. She couldn't come up with any great ideas, but Becca was already charging toward the lamp. Jafar used his genie powers to turn Becca's sword into a useless, bendy straw, and Chiyo had to do something before he turned all of her into something like a spork. She dashed forward, throwing two sharp rings toward Jafar. With simply the point of his finger, both of them dissolved into piles of dust. Nehemiah dropped another notch. You could tell he was nervous by the way he shifted uncomfortably. Chiyo stopped in her tracks, thinking, Well that didn't work too well.

Jafar laughed, pointing his finger directly at Chiyo and commenting, "Now let us cut you down to size, shall we?"

Another stream of electric-looking flow came out of his finger, and Chiyo immediately Chibified. The new two-feet-tall version of her was mostly head and had hair all the way to the ground. It wasn't necessarily the greatest fighting form…until she looked at him angrily, and her teeth were suddenly shark teeth, each as big as her humongous eyes. Her arms flailed wildly as she charged him and took a huge bite out of his tail. Meanwhile, Becca found a large tree to climb so she could reach the inaccessible lamp.

"That wasn't your best move," Chiyo's small voice screamed rabidly. "I can still kick your BUTT!"

She charged Jafar again. All he did was wrap some of his airy, genie tail around her arms, and she couldn't move at all. She started shouting angrily at him, her large teeth chomping around, but he still didn't let go. In fact, he also noticed Becca hanging off a branch, trying to reach the lamp. He pointed a finger to her, and the branch cracked. Becca had just enough time to scramble back to the trunk before it crashed to the ground. Nehemiah dropped another notch.

Nehemiah knew he couldn't get off the platform to help the two girls. He had tried already and quickly found out he was floating, with nothing connecting the platform to the edge of the canyon. Just because he couldn't assist them physically, however, did not mean he was of no help at all. Leaning his head back, Nehemiah let out a very strange bird call that should sound a little familiar. Jafar looked curiously to Nehemiah, obviously not understanding what had been done. With the snap of his fingers, the cloth that had been blindfolding Nehemiah covered his mouth instead. Finally realizing where he was—as the platform he was on dropped again—Nehemiah looked around himself, petrified.

Hearing the bird call, Nori turned around in shock. "Nehemiah," he called back.

Dusty grabbed his hand and dragged him, along with Warren, through the real gate to Central City saying, "Remember what you said? Finish your own mission before helping the other group."

"I know," Nori agreed. "He wasn't calling me anyways. It just worried me." He glanced up at the arena shaped gateway they had entered through. It was just a small deviation from the city wall which seemed to go on forever.

When they made it all the way through the arena shaped dome, an armored soldier stepped in front of them with a spear. "Who goes there?" He questioned.

Nori and Dusty looked at each other at a loss for words. Obviously they had to say something special, but what? Just their names wouldn't do. All Nori could think of to do was point behind him and say, "We've got OEOHFPPE with us." Thankfully, when Nori gestured toward the back, he ended up pointing straight to Warren who helpfully put an arm around each of his two friends.

"I'm back," he announced, "and I bring friends. Sorry they're a little bit shy." While he said that, he teasingly pinched Nori's cheek.

"Warren Peace?" The guard asked, so shocked that he had to remove his helmet to confirm.

"Troy Miller? What a surprise to see you first thing when I get back."

"You know him?" Nori inquired, cocking his head to the side at the boy with the dirty blonde, stringy hair that barely hung down in his eyes.

"Yo Dude," Troy responded in a strong surfer accent, "Peace here an' I was like best buds 'fore he ever left Central City…So what brings you back to this side of Fiction-land? Are you staying, or just passin' through?"

"Just passing through unfortunately. A friend of ours actually got lost and we're on a rescue mission. Perhaps once we've found him I will have more time to visit."

"He got lost in the forest? And he's from your side of town? He's dead already."

"Ah, don't you think I'd know that? No, he's been here before. You've actually met him before."

"Dude, why didn't you say so? Who is it?"

Warren looked like he was trying to answer, but nothing was coming out. As Nori recognized the problem, he answered for Warren, "Roxas."

Troy laughed. "You're still looking for that kid? No one's seen him in several months."

Smiling mischievously, Warren commented, "That's because he's been with me the whole time."

Troy laughed in disbelief. "No way! Really? Like the whole time?" Warren didn't respond, but he didn't need to. Troy understood. "How'd he get lost out here?"

Not wanting to explain why they sent Roxas to the castle, Warren just shrugged.

"What can I do to help Man?"

Again, Warren wasn't sure what to say, so again, Nori responded in his place, "Don't tell anybody."

Then Warren came up with something and added, "Buy us something to eat."

Looking to the watch on his wrist, Troy asked, "At this time of day? Well, I'll see what I can't do."

I also had just entered through a gate to Central City—though it was a different gate—following behind Hallom, when he suddenly turned to me nervously and said, "Tiara, I've got to leave for a second. Please don't move. I'll be back in a second."

He almost disappeared, but I stopped him. "No, don't leave me!"

For some reason, he looked behind him. "I-I have to. I promise I'll be back in a second."

"Why do you have to go?"

"It's too long to explain," he whispered, looking behind again, "I have to go now. Let me explain when I come back."

I didn't say anything that time, but I looked scared about being there alone, which concerned him. "They'll kill me Tiara…you know that? If they find out that I'm bringing you here."

"How are they going to find that out? It's all in your mind," I began.

He never got the chance to respond because another figure with similar features appeared in the picture, bragging, "Caught you. It really wasn't that hard. You just need to know when to look, something Dr. Agari hasn't quite learned yet. So who's the girl you're talking too?"

"Hallom?" I questioned, confused as to what was happening.

"Wh-what girl?" Hallom asked nervously. "I'm not talking to anyone."

"I'm not as stupid as you are," the man said. Hallom had the look on his face like he might attack the man. The man simply smiled in return, and the vision of Hallom collapsed to his hands and knees, flickering for a second.

"Well then," Hallom noted painfully from the ground after a moment, "if they already know about you…might as well keep coming." He climbed to his feet, grabbed my hand, and ran off, dragging me behind. "You might just get here before I die."

"You're leading her here?" The man demanded in shock, sounding distant because we were running away from the illusion of him. I could only suppose, however, that he was still near Hallom wherever they were. He continued, "To think you'd have the audacity to do something like that in my presence…"

Hallom toppled again, but he was instantly back on his feet, always running. "W-whatever you do," he panted, "don't let go of me, or I might let go back."

By then, Jafar had destroyed most of the tree Becca was clinging to. She wrapped herself around the trunk like it was her only tie to life. Once again, he reached a finger toward her, preparing to take out another section of the tree—most likely the trunk underneath her. Chiyo just watched on helplessly, and Nehemiah couldn't even watch anymore because he was so far down in the canyon. As the tree fell, and Becca flew toward the ground, she grabbed the lamp in the last second. Miraculously, instead of falling to the hard forest floor, she splashed onto—of all things—the magic carpet.

For some reason, Iago had to bring the magic carpet along when he responded to Nehemiah's call this time. Whether there was a good reason for it or not, it certainly came in handy that it could catch Becca in the middle of her fall. As soon as Becca had a second to thank heavens she was alive, Iago grabbed the lamp from her and flew towards the canyon. Becca took the carpet and flew to get Chiyo from Jafar's grasp.

After they swooped down and picked Chiyo up, the carpet flew several rushed circles around Jafar so he couldn't stop Iago from dropping the lamp in the lava. Jafar tried to hit the carpet with one of his finger streams, but the carpet was too fast. A couple seconds later, Jafar was sucked into the lava pit. The magic carpet let nauseated Becca and Chiyo down and then flew over to Iago.

"Well, it was nice working with you," Iago noted, "But I better get outta here before the forest finds my weakness and decides to attack me too. You're on your own from here." He turned to fly off.

"No wait!" Becca called after him, but instead of him coming back, the carpet flew off too.

Chiyo looked up at Becca stating about her new chibi form, "Now I've got to try to remember how to undo this."

"I think right now there's something more important," Becca responded.

"Nehemiah," Chiyo suddenly remembered.

The two girls immediately rushed to the edge of the canyon and stared down at their dazed friend. He was over halfway down to the lava.

"Well, who's gonna climb down there to get him now?" Chiyo wondered timidly.

"I'm afraid of heights," Becca excused.

"But I'm afraid of lava," Chiyo responded.

"You're just saying that to get out of it."

"Even if I was, I'm only two feet tall! What am I supposed to do to help?"

"It would have been nice of Magic Carpet to hang around a while," Becca complained.

"Yeah, well it didn't, so we've gotta think of something before Miah dies," Chiyo insisted at the same time as the platform dropped again.

Becca looked at Chiyo, probably about ready to rip her head off for thinking she didn't know that already, but instead, Becca got an idea. Chiyo noticed the smile spread across Becca's face and asked, "What?"

"You're small enough to fit on the platform with him," Becca answered.

"What! How is that gonna help?"

Picking up Chiyo, Becca threw her onto the platform while explaining, "Untie him and then you can use the rope to climb up."

Chiyo glared angrily at Becca, but when the platform dropped again, she quickly obeyed. As soon as Nehemiah was untied, she threw the rope up to Becca who braced herself for both people to climb up it. Nehemiah grabbed the rope to start climbing and looked back for a second to see Chiyo was absolutely terrified. He called her name a few times, with no response. When the platform dropped one more time, and he could almost not reach the rope anymore, he took Chiyo by the hand and pulled her up with him.

Happily, they both made it out of the canyon safely and moved on toward the next challenge. A couple minutes later, the temperature suddenly dropped drastically. After stepping through a few trees, they found themselves staring at a huge sea of ice that stretched for miles. Chiyo—who had since regained her normal size—shivered. This was going to be a long walk. Of course, before I get too caught up in the details of just how much trouble the threesome were going to be in, it would probably be a good idea to mention what was going on at the Castle That Never Was.

Zexion was in the new prison-rock-room place—that one place where Roxas, Wesley, and Demyx were being held. He had just finished questioning Wesley to make sure every memory had come back and in order. After taking one last look at his notes to make sure he had left out nothing, Zexion turned his attention to Roxas and Demyx across the room.

"You two, come with me," he ordered, forming a portal to leave the room. They both climbed curiously to their feet and followed him. As soon as all three were back in a hallway near the lab, Zexion continued specifically to Demyx, "Number Three awaits you atop the castle…As for you Roxas, we're going to do everything possible to fix you."

Demyx turned in complete confusion and walked toward the top of the castle. He found Xaldin waiting for him, as said, at the top of the tallest tower. The number three man stood there, distantly admiring Kingdom Hearts—a large heart shaped collection of the hearts of any person ever killed by the Heartless. Demyx stood behind him for a while, not wanting to interrupt his superior's musing, or even worse, find out he was in trouble.

After a second, he scratched his head and began, "Uh…hi. You wanted to see me?"

Xaldin gestured him to step forward and admire Kingdom Hearts as well, which Demyx obeyed reluctantly. Before saying anything, the two Nobodies stood in silence for a long while.

Finally, Xaldin ended the awkwardness with, "You've been told enough times the power of Kingdom Hearts to appreciate it by now."

"Yes," Demyx replied, on second thought adding, "Sir."

"Unity is what it stands for. Nothing else could join all of us together toward one goal."

"Of…course Sir," Demyx agreed, clearly perplexed. This conversation was almost as awkward as the silence that had preceded it.

"You discarded that unity, forsook the authorities." Xaldin paused, building a little more tension. "Even if you are right, you must never oppose your superiors. Do you understand that? You must stand behind us in whatever decision we make. That is what holds this organization together."

"Yes Sir," Demyx repeated again.

Another long pause passed before Xaldin stated, "Do not speak a word of our plans that you heard to another member."

"What?" Demyx asked in shock, "You're letting me out?"

"Yes," Xaldin replied shortly.

"Why? I thought you were mad."

"Do not ask questions. Would you prefer I send you back to The Island?"

"No Sir," Demyx responded, returning to the way he had been before the big news.

After a while, Xaldin added, "You are not just to be released. You will not do anything—in or out of the castle—without the permission and presence of a superior. Do you understand?"

"Yes Sir."

"And believe me, we'll be observing you. One misstep and you'll be nothing more than just a small cloud of black smoke." As he said that, he gestured with his hands in the shape of a small explosion—in a poof! You'll fade kinda way. Then, a portal appeared across the balcony, and Xaldin walked through it, leaving Demyx unattended at the top of the castle.