Since Sora's Keyblade does not have a particular significance to this story, he won't have it. I don't have any heartless or anything in here so there is no actual relevance for it. And as you may have noticed, people like Cloud and such do not know Sora so technically I am not branching off were either game left off. I apoligize not putting this before since this is kind of important stuff I should have mentioned...hehe... Anyway, hope you enjoy this chapter. Thank you athiest for reminding me to mention stuff about the keyblade, and for helping me decide which location to go first.

Chapter 3

Recruited

Sora found himself waking up on Riku's shoulder. He gasped, and pulled away, feeling extremely awkward. He looked ahead of him to find the man holding the strange gunblade.

"What?" Sora asked defensively.

"Nothing," he responded. A couple of seconds of him still staring before Sora started to get irritated.

"What are you staring at?" he yelled.

"Who are you?" he asked.

"Sora," he said angrily.

"Then I am staring at Sora," he said smiling. Riku shifted a bit, then opened his eyes.

"Wow. My back hurts," he said, not realizing that the man was staring at him now. "What?"

"Nothing," he responded the same way he did to Sora.

"What are you staring at?" Riku asked.

"Who are you?" he asked. Sora rolled his eyes in disbelief that he was doing the same thing to Riku.

"Who the hell are you?" Sora asked.

"Leon. Now that you are both done cuddling I can brief you on your mission," he said.

"Woah! Wait a minute! Mission?" Sora asked.

"What do you mean? We aren't some kind of soldiers," Riku said.

"Maybe not, but you didn't think we saved your butts from that place to let you sit here and watch us fix this problem. Everyone is doing their fair share, including you," Leon stated.

"I'm afraid he is right," the man with blonde, spiky hair said as he walked in.

"Ah, Cloud, perhaps you would like to inform them of their duties, since you will be with them. I have to prepare," Leon said.

"Sure," he said softly. "I know this is going to be asking a lot, but I am afraid we all have lost so much that we have to ask you to help us. Not one person here has not lost their hometown or someone they cared for." Sora thought about his mom. Then he recalled how angry he was at Kairi, but he still sort of missed her.

"I understand," Riku said.

"Good. So many people are lost, or have been killed that we need everyone to help fight back what we have worked hard to keep. Everyone has stopped their rebellions and finally pulled together." The tall man with long, flowing silver hair walked in. "Regardless of how difficult it may be." He directed his comment to the silver-haired man.

"What do you want us to do? Where are we going?" Sora asked.

"We are going to Disney Castle. We hope to find the king or the queen-" Cloud stated.

"Alive preferably," the other man said. Cloud shot him an evil look.

"We know he had been incredibly busy for this past year as the worlds finally came to find each other which resulted in all this war. We are hoping he was not around when the attacks happened. Now, when we land, we all will stay together until we get to the castle. Sephiroth and I will search for the king. You two need to find the Queen's chambers and search for her. Look for messages dated from yesterday about whereabouts of the king. Also, though this goes without saying, look for any survivors and protect them at all cost. One man in particular we are looking for. He can take care of himself, but he has not called back to us in awhile so we are afraid he may be captured," Cloud said as he glanced over his shoulder to see a screen reading a foreign language. "That damn Al Bhed again! I can't read this shit!"

"Relax," Yuna said coming in. "You all need to get on deck. We are doing a quick drop off and you know Cid isn't going to let you take your sweet time stepping off." Riku stood up and offered his hand to help Sora up. Leon walked in as this was happening and gave him another look. Sora ignored the hand and stood up on his own.

"Let's go," the man called Sephiroth said, pulling them both rather hard to the door that opened automatically. They walked down a hallway packed with the people from yesterday. The strange moogle sprinted down the hallway as the man called Cid chased it.

"Dammit Lulu, keep that thing away from me!" he yelled. "It is snooping around my stuff!" Lulu came out and caught the moogle as it jumped, then turned to walk away. Sora laughed. "What the hell do you think is so damn funny!"

"Enough!" Paine cried. "Will you shut the hell up."

"Who the hell are you to me what to do!" Cid shouted as they stepped up on the deck. Sora could tell how well the relationships here were. These people were obviously very different.

"Okay, get ready," Cloud said, opening the hatch to the outside, sending a powerful air current at them. Sora took out his sword, ready for anything. They walked out and as the ship landed, they jumped off. Yuna was right. No sooner did they jump off, the ship took off full speed.

"Cloud?" Sephiroth asked.

"Hmm?" he responded.

"Does that look like some kind of lock down?" he asked. They all stared at the castle ahead of them. Every window and door was barricaded with metal. It looked impossible to get through.

"Perhaps everyone is safe inside?" Sora suggested.

"No," Cloud said. "If that were the case, my friend would have contacted me by now."

"Are suggesting that the creatures got inside before they activated the lock down?" Sephiroth asked.

"Yes," Cloud said, observing the area.

"Well, how do we get in?" Riku asked, putting his sword away.

"I'm not sure. I don't think we can get around the mechanism. You think we could pry open?" Cloud asked.

"Maybe," Sephiroth said, unsheathing his intimidating long sword. They walked together up to the main door of the castle. Sephiroth slid and pushed his sword under the door and waited for cloud to do the same.

"Mine is not going to fit under that," Cloud said. "And their swords are to flimsy. Lift it up a bit until I can get mine under." Sephiroth pushed down, levering his sword to pry the door upwards. He exerted a lot of strength and eventually the door started to come open. He continued until Cloud was able to place his sword in. They both pushed hard and achieved a small amount of opening.

"It won't go any farther," Could said.

"Damn! You two go under," Sephiroth said.

"What? No, you have no idea what could be in there!" Cloud protested at their safety.

"There is no other way. Go in and find the switch to shut off the defense system. Then we will come in. It should be near the king's throne," Sephiroth said through immense struggle. Sora rolled under the door without a seconds thought. Riku did the same. Then, the door slid shut with a loud bang that probably alerted every living thing in the building.

"Oh great," Sora muttered.

"Oh no," Riku said, pointing to a room. Sora walked up to see what Riku saw. The room was full of dead people who were massacred. Whoever activated the barricades pretty much locked these people in to be slaughtered. Are we so sure it was used as a defense?" Sora asked.

"I'm guessing not," Riku said. They heard something shuffle. "Get down." They collapsed on the ground, not moving. Sora wondered if the creature would fall for it. It stared at them for a minute, then approached. When it reached them, it began making sniffing noises. Sora noticed Riku nod, giving him a signal. They both raised up and double sliced the creature, cutting it into three pieces.

"Whew!" Sora gasped.

"So these creatures are surviving just fine in here," Riku stated.

"Let's hurry up," Sora said. They raced up a large flight of steps into a room that held several statues. They made a right and traveled down a dark hallway. They stopped at giant, blue double doors.

"Is this the throne room?" Riku asked.

"I guess," Sora asked, yanking the door open. Something hissed and he slammed it shut. Him and Riku got on opposite sides of the door as it opened. Five creatures charged out like bulls, not noticing them. They surprised them from behind and cut through them all with ease. Afterwards, they entered the throne room.

"Holy shit that is a long way to walk to your own chair. Screw being a king and making that walk every morning," Sora said.

"Agreed," Riku said. They made the long walk to the chair and studied the area.

"A switch. Is this what we are looking for. It isn't labeled, of course. It could be anything."

"Well, let's trust the king would not have a self-destruct switch to his own castle so open," Riku said. Sora pulled it and the sound of several things sliding open echoed throughout the castle.

"Okay then. Now to find-" Sora started before being tackled by a monster. Sora dropped his sword and tried to keep the creatures face from his. Riku started to help but was thrown across the room like a cannon being fired. Sora wiggled free and ran to Riku. They turned to see that the creature had picked up his sword.

"What's he doing?" Riku asked. The creature lifted his arm back as though prepared to throw it.

"Is he going to throw it?" Sora yelled nervously. The other monster simply watched. Then, a red cape flew down behind it and took form as a man with black hair, a pale face, a red torn cloak, and a robotic looking claw. He was holding a large three barreled pistol in his opposite hand. As the creature began to throw the sword, the man grabbed it at the end and simply held it. The creature turned to see the problem and tried desperately to yank it from him. The other one began to attack him, but the man simply raised his gun and blew it's head clear off. The creature still attempted to pull the sword from the man's grip. The man pulled the creature forward and brought up his knee onto it's stomach. He then held the end of the sword near it's neck, standing behind him in such away that when the creature instinctively yanked at it this time, it cut it's own in neck.

"Wow! That was awesome! Are you the friend Cloud is looking for?" Sora asked.

"I'm Vincent. You are?" he asked in a deep calm voice as though what he just did was part of a daily routine, then again, for all Sora knew, it might have been.

"Sora!"

"Riku. How did you survive so long in here? Is there food or water?" Riku asked.

"I gone without that stuff longer than a week, trust me," Vincent said. "Is Cloud outside?"

"Yep!" Sora responded.

"Are you supposed to be working on something?" he asked.

"Uh-huh! We are looking for the queen," Sora said brightly.

"Well, most of her remains are near the rug in her room, but feel free to find her head if you want all of the pieces," he said normally.

"What?" Sora said, spiraling down from being cheerful.

"She is dead?" Riku asked.

"I did what I could for these people, but at the rate this things were appearing from the ground it was impossible. Then we all got locked in and I had no idea how to get the barricades up. And it isn't like I could ask anyone. Their bodies were spread around this castle like a puzzle, and a difficult one I might add," Vincent said, scaring Sora into thinking he may have attempted such a thing.

"How awful," Riku said.

"If you are looking for the king, he never returned. Nor is there clues to his location," Vincent stated.

"Then I guess we should leave," Sora said. A sudden high pitched screech rang out from outside.

"Hmm," Vincent hummed. Sora and Riku stared out a window and seen some kind of demonic looking bird fly by. It had no feathers, just what looked like burnt skin and a huge mouth with several layers of teeth.

"Should we-" Sora said spinning around to find Vincent was gone.

"Let's get out of here," Riku said. They ran out the way they came in and followed the same path they used to get to the throne room. They exited the castle and found the bird was spraying out acid at Cloud who narrowly avoided it. Sephiroth was scaling it's back, slicing up and down with his sword. A red blur seemed to flash through the sky, then Vincent seemed to simply float in mid-air as he shot continuously at the eyes of the creature. It's eyes grew blood shot and then exploded.

"It's blind!" Cloud shouted. As it flew low, Cloud jumped and sent and powerful slash through it's underside. The bird screeched and unexpectedly turned upside down and flew straight to the ground causing Sephiroth to violently hit the ground. It then spiraled into the air, turned to and fell to the ground at Sephiroth. It's mouth was open as it fell to it's death and Sephiroth got caught in it on impact. With the amount of teeth in it's mouth, Sora doubted his survival, but it was the bird's final move that made sure Sephiroth was dead. It closed it's jaw, making a crunch that made everyone but Vincent cringe.

"Sephiroth," Cloud said. Sora did not think they were good friend, but Cloud definitely had set that aside.

The air ship could be heard from the distance. Sora felt an uncomfortable twist in his stomach. This was not over. There would be more trials, and probably more death. He looked at Riku, feeling childish for the way he acted this morning. What is that had been Riku who died? He looked at Riku, his feelings becoming mixed as he realized how much he cared for Riku. But then, that was because they were such good friends. Nothing more.