Author's Note: I've seen the playthrough of the "Kingdom Hearts Birth By Sleep 0.2-A Fragmenty Passage" demo on youtube, and it's amazing, despite some...small mishaps on the character designs. But none the less, I seriously can't wait for KH2.8 to come out. Really looking forward to the full game of 0.2 and X-Back Cover.
I still don't own Kingdom Hearts or Final Fantasy.
CH 3: Familiar but Still Grudged.
As they were making their way to Port Royal to check up on Will and Elizabeth, as well as investigate on the more secrets of immortily which this world had shockingly held more than any other worlds Sora had visited in the past, he couldn't help but think about how much he and his friends learned for the past two years ever since his first adventure had begun. How he forgot that, as a four year old boy, he agreed to allow Ven's heart to sleep inside his own heart and for twelve years, had held the blond's heart inside him.
Sora couldn't help but feel guilty for having kept Ven's heart imprisioned inside him and never knowing, and despite Ven saying that it was alright and actually thanked him, the sixteen year old still felt bad for not realising for so long.
"Sora?"
"Huh?" Sora blinked, before realising that Kairi was looking at him with a bit of concern on her face. As much as he didn't want to admit it, she was still beautiful.
"Are you okay?" asked the red-haired girl.
Realising that he must've looked a bit down, Sora shrugged, smiling a little, "Yeah, I'm okay. Just thinking."
Kairi sighed, for she half figured what her close friend was thinking about, and did her best to assure him, "We'll figure something out. I don't know how yet, but we'll figure something out."
Despite that they had Chaos and possibly Bhunivelze to worry about, Sora knew that his friend was right. He didn't care how long it took to stop Chaos, he wasn't going to let the God of Destruction or whatever Chaos was, to destroy the Realm of Light, not after all the hard work in finally defeating Xehanort for good. While Sora had no idea how yet, he knew that Kairi was right. They will figure something out, one way or another.
"Yeah. You're right." Sora nodded. "Thanks, Kairi."
It wasn't long before Sora, Kairi, Ven, Lea, Xion, Donald and Goofy to arrive in the familiar world which Ven and Kairi were the only ones who haven't been to this Pirate world before. However, when the seven worldly travellers descended from the gummiship, they found themselves at an unfamiliar island and an unfamiliar and possibly very rowdy town with several pirate ships docked at the single port, with pirates coming in and out, some of them stocking up for supplies for their voyge, some of them just arriving and two or three different people...well, they looked hung over to the point of losing their breakfest, lunch and dinner into the ocean.
"Uh, are you sure this is Port Royal?" Ven asked, uncertainly, nose wrinkling in disgust at the oder smell of heavily used achohol and vomit mixed in even from the side of the beach.
Donald, remembering the Underworld mislanding a year ago, scowled at Sora, grumbling, "Sora..."
"What? I didn't land us here." Sora protested while waving his hands that said, 'It wasn't me!'
That's when Donald remembered it was Goofy who piloted this time and then quickly turned to glare at his silly friend, grumbling, "Goofy...!"
"Oops. Sorry." Goofy shrugged guiltily.
"Ah, don't worry about it, Goof." Lea shrugged. "Actually, compared to the first time Xion and I were here with the others, this is paradise, unlike the Isle of Dead Meat." glad that they didn't land back on the Cannibal Island.
"I don't think I'd like to go back to the Isle De Murta either." Sora reluctantedly agreed, remembering the island of the cursed treasure of Cortez, the very same place where Jack Sparrow had shot Babossa dead.
"Either way, maybe we should look around and see if we can find a ship that'll take us to Port Royal." Sora suggested.
"Uh, you might wanna hold that thought, Sora." Lea said, seeing something that made him point to their right. When Sora and the others followed his gaze, their eyes widened as the sight of a familiar ship with black sails that was also docked.
"Garwsh. Isn't that...?" Goofy began.
"The Black Pearl." Sora agreed.
"Then that means Captain Jack and his crew are here." Xion realised. "Maybe we can see how they went in finding the Flying Dutchmen."
"Forget it! I'm not gonna go near that boat again!" Donald said stubbornly.
"Nice try, but we're going." Sora smirked, as he and Goofy both grabbed hold of Donald's arms and dragged the protesting duck who tried to fight back, while Kairi, Ven, Xion and Lea followed while laughing softly at the rather cute scene.
But little did they know that Jack wasn't the only familiar face they were about to greet here...in Tortuga.
In the noisy courtyard of one of the many taverns that dotted every corner of Tortuga, the captain of the Black Pearlwas on a mission. Jack Sparrow knew the impossibility of the deal he had made with Jones. 100 souls in three days wasn't possible, even for him. Still, he had always tried doing the impossible, before trying anything else, so at than at least that course of action had been explored. Thusly, he had decided that maybe trying to harvest some souls might not be a bad place to start, unless something better happened to come along.
He also tried to think of many possible salutions on how Davy Jones knew about the Keyblade and about Sora, but so far, Luxord's chances of actually meeting him seemed slim now that Jack thought about it. And this Keyblade War...maybe getting a Keyblade wasn't such a good idea after all, and Jack had seen treasure that had made him interested at first, but when he learned about those certain kinds of treasure, the knowlage of those made him reconsider.
In truth and he didn't mention this to anyone, but Jack never really liked in taking another man's life or threatening a woman, unless in the end, he had no choice or he, in rare situations, that he'd be the one to kill the most evil men in this world.
Gibbs was seated a few feet from where Jack was sitting. He was in the process of interviewing potential candidates for the crew, at least that's what it was supposed to seem like.
He asked every person the same question. "And what makes you think you're worthy to crew the Black Pearl?"
And every answer was a study in inadequacy. "Truth be told, I never sailed a day in me life." said the first man, who appeared to be older than Moses. "I figger I should get out an' see the world while I'm still young."
Any answer, however, was good enough for Gibbs. "You'll do, make your mark."
The next person in line stepped forward. "My wife run off with my dog." He said, sullenly, "And I don't give a ass rat's if I live or die."
"Perfect." Replied Gibbs, gaily.
"Me have one arm and a bum leg." Said the next person.
"It's the crow's nest for you." Said Gibbs, helpfully.
Jack, meanwhile, finding no particular interest in the exchange between the potential recruits and Gibbs, had turned his attention to the compass. It still was acting strangely, pointing in every direction except for the one which would show him what he wanted most. "I know what I want, I know what I want, I know what I want." He repeated over and over, as if saying it multiple times would somehow make it true. Unfortunately, it made very little difference. The compass still spun wildly in all directions over and over again.
In irritation, he slammed it shut again, and repeated this, but still ended up in the same result. Maybe Tia Dalma was right. Maybe Jack didn't know what he really wanted.
Gibbs continued on with his recruiting efforts. The last one in the line came forward and said with eagerness, "Ever since I was a little lad, I always wanted to sail the seas, forever."
"Sooner than you think. Sign the roster."
"Thanks very much."
Hoping to get his mind off of the riddle that the compass was presenting to him, Jack asked, "How we coming?"
"Including those four, that gives us, four."
In further irritation, Jack gave the stupid compass a violent shake, as though it might help to get the bloody thing to work, or just to take out his frustation on everything's that happened to him for the last month...or perhaps both. Maybe he should have a compass that just pointed north; at least something like that would never drive him to madness. Besides how the Compass allowed Sora to lock the keyhole to protect this world from darkness or opening up a gate to another world, Jack felt that his special item was getting the better of him these days.
Another recruit had shown up at the table. Turning his attention to him, Gibbs asked, "And what's your story?" he had expected another pathetic recital. But instead, he received an answer that was completely unexpected.
"My story?" The man mockingly repeated. "It's rather a very unbelievable one in which once you were taken in by a man who you thought was going to give you what you wanted actually lied for his own purposes, having holding onto your precious cards."
Jack froze. He reconigsed that voice, but how? He turned his head and his eyes widened for he saw a familiar man...or his head, really. The familiar blond hair, cold blue eyes, blonde small beard, and one earring on his left ear. The difference was that the man no longer wore the black coat, but instead, he wore the more typical pirates clothes, shirt light brown, vez dark brown, with darker brown trousers and nearly black boots, and he looked...pretty ragged.
In more ways than one. Suddenly believing that Luxord, whom Jack thinks was still was and still not having any idea on what happened after Sora left the second time a year ago, the Pirate Captain became nervous, and slowly plucked a frond from a nearby plant and embarrasingly hid behind it, before slicking his way out to avoid Luxord's wrath.
"I was part of an Organization in forcing a boy to gain our goal but was destroyed by a former comrade who betrayed us and sent me to a place worse than hell. Then I found myself here, back to who I was, but because of a certain man whom the boy helped, I'm stuck here." Luxord continued, before he grabbed the bottle of rum that was on top of Gibbs' table and took a long drink.
Gibbs was confused, not having heard anything like that from his captain before. In the end, he asked, "Come again?"
"Weren't you paying attention?" Luxord hissed venomously, causing Gibbs to lean back slightly nervously.
"So, do I make your crew or not?" he growled softly, choosing to ignore the question, "You haven't said where your going? Somewhere nice!" With sudden violence, he heaved the table over. It fell to the floor with a great crash and instantly brought a stop to the rush of activity that had been whirling around them. Everyone turned to star at the source of the commotion. They all seemed quite stunned by this unexpected interruption.
Luxord, who had also regained his heart but was not in any good position right now, and was, in short, drunk, hollered in sarcasm, "So, am I worthy to serve under Captain Jack Sparrow?"
Suddenly, he drew his cards and aimed it straight at a walking palm frond that was making its way across the room. "Or should I just kill you now?" for he, like Lea and Isa, still had the powers from his Nobody.
Jack eased his head out from behind the frond, only to see that Luxord was aiming his cards straight at him. He tried shifting positions from the left to the right, only to see that Luxord's dangerous cards had followed him. Seeing no other alternative, he said, "You're hired."
But that didn't pacify Luxord, as he held an insane smile, itching to imprision anyone inside his cards for all eternity, which he would've done if Axel hadn't defeated him. "So sorry. I need to let out my frustration once and a while."
He was just about to use his pwoers when he was suddenly accosted by two of the new recruits that had signed up that evening.
"Easy, sailor."
"That's our captain you're threatening."
Their efforts met with only partial success, for though they managed to prevent Luxord from shooting Jack, they weren't able to prevent him from shooting the cards altogether. The card's power zinged upwards, ricocheted off the chandelier and shattered the bottle of rum that a pirate across the room had been enjoying. Promptly, the pirate turned to the person next to him and belted him across the mouth. That was as good an excuse as any for the whole room to explode in an all-out brawl. Immediately swords were ringing, pistols were firing and pirates were trying to beat each other to smithereens, all in good fun, of course.
Amidst the sudden noise and chaos, nobody seemed to take any notice of Jack, and Gibbs . Jack stuffed the now unnecessary palm frond into a nearby barrel (not that it had ever been of much use in the first place), and called to Gibbs. "Time to go?"
"Aye," replied Gibbs to the obvious question and stood up, following his captain.
Scooting through, around and in-between fights, Jack and Gibbs, in their own typical bizarre form of luck managed to slip out of the tavern's courtyard unnoticed and unscathed. Along the way, Jack tried out each drunken man's hat to replace his long gone hat, though none of them seemed to fit him just right, not like his precious hat.
He passed by another man and took his hat, then tapped him friendly, saying, "Thanks, mate." only for the man to tumble backwards and collaspe onto the lower floor. Jack then took off the hat and placed onto another man who was held by two other men who shoved him over the railing.
And no sooner had they exited than a new person made it's appearance on the scene. Elizabeth Swann, the daughter of the Govener of Port Royal, who would usually wear a dress, was now dressed in boy's clothes after her escape, pushed her way through the crowd, only to be confronted by Luxord t the center of the brawl, fighting his way brutally out of every person who came in his direction. He didn't even seem to be wasting any effort and was unaware of the imminent danger that he was in.
Quickly, Elizabeth drew her own sword and went at it alongside him, drawing away pirates who could very well have sneaked up on Luxord's back, whole he was to preoccupied to notice. The two of them were a challenging competition, but they were only two against a whole roomful of opponents, who were quickly figuring out who was responsible for starting all of this in the first place.
At last, the fight boiled down to the two of the. Elizabeth found that they were surrounded by dozens of pirates. All of them surrounded by dozens of pirates, all of them with weapons drawn, all those weapons pointed straight at them.
But, even now, Luxord seemed completely unaware that he was in serious trouble. "Come on, then, who wants it?" He shouted loudly, waving his sword wildly, "Form an orderly line; I'll have you all one by one."
Elizabeth rolled her eyes in annoyance. Nobody or not, Luxord hasn't changed much, except the fact that now the latter was clearly not with Organization XIII anymore and became more of an annoying man than anything else. He couldn't see that every one of the pirates was more than willing to take up his challenge.
Deciding to end this quicker with that she knew what any typical man would, Elizabeth grabbed the bottle of rum he was holding and shattered it over his head. Luxord dropped like a rock, out cold instantly.
The pirates, before menacing, became suddenly confused. "I just wanted the pleasure of doing that myself." She said, with a great deal of bravado in a deepish voice to make sound like a young man.
It was the right approach. A cheer rose from the pirates, and mugs were raised in the air, congratulating the young lad for his pluck and daring.
A few minutes later, the pirates were dealing out their own form of punishment to the half-conscious Luxord. They pitched him bodily into the mud laughing and joking amongst themselves, as to the evenings' happenings. One solitary figure among them was silent in the mockery of the humiliated Luxord. Elizabeth Swann quietly approached him, lying in the mud. Whether he did things worse than pirates did or not a year ago, Elizabeth felt that something was amiss, and she kneeling down to help him to his feet. She said, in a mildly chiding voice.
"What have you done to yourself, Luxord?"
"I know you..." Luxord grumbled, before answering to Elizabeth's question, "And also...I am no longer Luxord. It's Durol, and before you ask, I am no longer part of Organization XIII."
"How did this happen?"
"Believe me...you will not believe it."
Little did the two of them know, heir entire conversation had been overheard by a deadly enemy. Caius Ballad, who had arrived earlier as well, watched them as they disappeared around a corner. The look on his face was utterly chilling. This made his plot to find the Keyblade bearers a lot easier than he imagined. As long he could keep an eye on Elizabeth and the former tenth member of the first Organization, he could find Sora and his friends.
Slipping away from his hiding place, he began to follow them silently through the streets of Tortuga.
By the time Sora and his friends arrived on the docks, while surprised that, possibly due to Xehanort being defeated and Chaos only just making his appearence, that there were no signs on anymore Heartless or Nobodies at the moment, they instantly caught sight of Jack Sparrow, without his hat, and Gibbs, making their way back to the ship. Deciding to see how their pirate friend was doing and hoping to see Will, Sora and the others hurried, with Donald trailing behind, still grumbling for having to see the pirates again, still sore from last year's events with the evil Captain Barbossa.
"Is that him?" Kairi asked as she followed her friends.
"Yeah, pretty much." Lea laughed, "Walks like a toddler, huh?"
Sora ignored the redhead's jokes and despite still not really trusting the pirate, the Keyblade wielder called out, "Jack!"
Hearing someone calling his name and not adressing him as captain, Jack turned around, not recongising the group just yet, and called out, "You'd be adressing me as 'Captain' if you want to join me crew, lad."
"Except your friends, right?"
Jack stopped, before turning around fully and his eyes widened in not only seeing Lea, Xion and the blond haired boy that looked like Roxas again so soon, but also seeing three other familiar faces, Sora who shrugged a little, Goofy who greeted with a friendly wave, and Donald who looked miserable with his arms crossed and his face pouting. The only one he didn't recongise was Kairi.
"Sora?" Jack asked, before he turned quickly to Gibbs and said, in a slightly anxious whisper, "Tell the crew to be nice." before quickly adding, "And hide the rum."
While Gibbs scurried to do obey, keeping the bottle of rum out of sight, Jack turned back to Sora and his friends, and said, "Nice be seeing you again, lad, and I gather you already reuighted with...Lea, Xion and Roxas."
"Did he just call me Roxas?" Ven asked, puzzled to Donald who nodded.
"Well, you do look like a spitting image of him. I guess that's why Roxas looked a bit less like Sora." Lea pointed out, before turning to Jack and added, "So, how'd your caper go?"
"Wot?" Jack replied, dumbfounded.
"You know, with the whole Flying Dutchmen thing? Did you find the key?" Lea said again, more clearly this time.
"You were looking for the Flying Dutchmen?" Goofy asked, as he, Donald, Sora, Kairi and Ven looked shocked at hearing this.
"You know?"
"It's a long story." Sora sighed, "We have bigger problems, which is one of the main reasons why we came here."
"I thought those trouble thirteen organizers were gone by now." Jack said, puzzled.
"They are, but now we have a problem that's a lot worse than Organization XIII, even worse than the Heartless and the Nobodies." Sora continued.
Ven then decided to correct Jack for mistaking him for Roxas and said, "And as for me, sir, I'm not Roxas, even though I look just like him, and his and Sora's and my connections are complicated."
The pirate quirked an eyebrow at the boy who just said was not Roxas but looked just like him, except that his clothes were different, and asked, "If you're not Roxas, then who're you?"
"I'm Ven, short for Ventus." Ven replied.
Kairi then added, a bit reluctantedly, "And my name's Kairi. I'm one of Sora's best friends."
Jack gazed the now apparently two knew commers, them smiled and replied, "Pleasure to meet you and Ventus, darlin'." before frowning in concern, and turned to Sora, muttering, "You're not a eungue, are you?" for he never realised that Sora had a best friend that was a girl, or perhaps more than just a friend.
"A what?" Sora slumped.
"Oh gimme a break. This is getting us nowhere." Donald grumbled.
But before anyone else could say anything further, another familiar voice called up, "Captain Sparrow?"
Jack turned to catch sight of a young man, who looked just out of boyhood approaching them. "Come to join me crew, lad? Welcome aboard." He called out blithely. He was always in need of new crewmembers, now more than usual. The lad looked strong enough, and he was sure that they could find a place for him.
But just as he turned his attention to continue his conversation with Sora, apparently joining Jack's crew wasn't exactly what this "lad" had in mind. "I'm here to find the man I love."
Everyone froze, before looking at each other, dumbfounded, but none more so than Sora, Donald, Jack and Lea, all of them having blank stonishment before Jack said, rather uncomfortably, "I'm deeply flattered son, but my first and only love is the sea." before he gestured at Lea to find some way to get the boy of their presence.
Goofy, however, seemed to recongise the voice, and muttered, "Hey, wait..." before turning around and realized that the boy was none other than Elizabeth Swann. "Oh! Hi-yah, miss Swann! Ah-hyuck!"
Hearing the name caused everyone to turn and their eyes widened, as Sora and Donald both exclaimed in surprise, "Elizabeth!?"
"You're a girl!?" Ven and Lea both exclaimed in shock, while Kairi and Xion both looked at each other, with giggles, apparently having also realised that the boy was really Elizabeth Swann.
"Sora! Donald! Goofy!" Elizabeth cried happily, before asking, "You didn't recongise me?"
"Uh uh." Donald shook his head, at the same time as Sora replied, "Not me."
"Wow, even I was surprised." Lea laughed nervously. "Anyway, nice to meet you, ma'am. Names Lea. Got it Memorized?"
"My name's Xion." Xion introduced herself.
"And I'm Kairi." Kairi added.
"And I'm Ventus, but you can call me Ven." Ven said last.
Elizabeth smiled at Sora's new friends, accepting the greeting, before she turned her attention to Jack, correcting him for his earlier statement, "Meaning William Turner, Captain Sparrow."
Once he had seen that this was indeed Elizabeth, Jack then changed the subject and said, "You know, these clothes do not flatter you at all. It should be a dress or nothing. I happen to have no dress in my cabin."
"And what does that mean?" Kairi suddenly challenged, feeling rather insulted as she turned to face him and crossed her arms, with a challenging look that even made Lea nervous. Sora backed off a bit, knowing Kairi's mood swings once and a while, and Ven, remembering the times with Aqua, backed off a bit too. Xion tilted her head to the side a little in confusion, for she was still new to being a human. Donald, quickly frightened, gulped before he hid behind Lea who quirked an eyebrow at him.
Jack, who was too used in knowing woman's challenging look, grinned nervously at Kairi, and muttered quickly, "Nothin'."
"Jack," said Elizabeth. She had come to ask a question and she intended to get the answer. "I know Will came to find you. Where is he?"
Returning to reality, Lea then asked, "Yeah, where is he?"
"I thought he was with you to help save Elizabeth." Xion added.
"Jack, what did you do this time?" Sora sighed in exasperation. For as long as he knew the pirate, Jack did have a reputation in getting into trouble, either he wanted to or not.
Jack, knowing that he was in a bit of trouble again, offered the best thing he could come up with. "I am truly sorry to have to tell you all this, but through an unfortunate and entirely unforeseeable series of circumstances that have nothing whatsoever to do with me, poor Will has been press-ganged into Davy Jones crew."
While Sora and his group were shocked to hear this, Lea frowned skeptically. Jack was hiding something. The redhead could tell. Being skilled in lying himself, Lea learned from Isa in their childhood how to pick up tricks and lies in others, and that became a second nature now in their adulthood.
Even Elizabeth was skeptical on what she just heard, and asked, "Davy Jones?" confused by the name and slightly concerned.
Jack nodded, looking appropriately remorseful, but before he could reply, another voice, which after the sound of someone vomiting sounded, joined the conversation, a decidedly familiar, not to mention slightly sour voice. "Oh, please. The captain of the Flying Dutchman?"
Jack, Sora, Donald, Goofy, Kairi, Xion and Lea were all shocked and surprised to see that Luxord, or rather, Dulor now, was there, heavily hung over and covered in mud. They didn't even realise that he was with Elizabeth until he spoke. He didn't seem to be exactly thrilled to be where he was.
That was probably best, because Sora, Donald, Goofy, Lea, Xion and Jack weren't really all that ecstatic to be seeing him again either.
"Luxord?" Xion muttered.
"It's Dulor." Dulor groaned, before his eyes turned to the black-haired girl and now it was his turn to look surprised. "Xion? I thought you disappeared, you little puppet."
"You call her 'puppet' again," Lea began, in a strong tone of warning, "And I won't hesitate in burning you into crisp again. Got it memorized?"
"Oh, so you're here as well, Axel." Dulor cheered sarcastically. "As well as Sora and his friends."
"We're not thrilled to see you either." Sora grumbled, before whispering, "But I guess this means you got your heart back too, right?"
"Even so, it does not mean I will forgive all of you." Dulor said.
"You look kinda awful." Goofy said, seeing the mess on Dulor. "What happened to you?"
"He's hungover, that's what's goin' on." Lea answered, in a matter of factly. "I've seen guys get drunk over achohol." shrugging.
"Goofy's right, you do look bloody awful." Jack agreed, before asking, "What are you doing here?"
"You hired me." Dulor reminded him, sullenly, "I can't help it if your standards are lax."
"You smell funny." Retorted Jack. Sora, Donald and Lea couldn't help but burst into laughter at this comment, while Kairi, Goofy, Ven and Xion glared at the four of them, whether Dulor had done terrible things in the past or not.
"Jack," said Elizabeth, as if reminding him of her presence and to keep the two of them from continuing to trade insults that could turn ugly later on. "All I want is to find Will."
"I know." said Jack, half-under his breath, as he thought of what he could say to Elizabeth that would comfort her, but at the same time, take any attention away from himself. But then, he suddenly looked back at her, a renewed interest in his eyes. "Are you certain?" he asked, with a new intensity which he had not shown hitherto in the conversation. "Is that what you really want most?"
Elizabeth looked at Jack in mild confusion. "Of course."
Sora and the others glanced at each other, wondering what Jack had in mind in all this.
Jack then took Elizabeth by the arm and led her a little way off. "Because, I would think that you would want to find a way to save Will most."
"And you know how to do that?" Kairi asked, a bit skeptically, as she and her friends joined in the conversation, some of them mildly interested now themselves.
"Well," said Jack, "There is a chest."
"Oh, for Moogle's sake." Dulor said despairingly from the side.
Sora, Jack, Lea, Donald, Goofy and Xion casted him a look, before Jack turned his attention back to the seven worldly travellers and Elizabeth, continuing, "A chest of unknown size and origin."
"The chest with Davy Jones' heart?" Lea quickly realised, though he wasn't certain if he was right about his guess, but it didn't hurt to ask.
Pintel and Ragetti passed through the conversation, carrying a crate of rum between them while having heard only a fraction of the previous phrases and found it necessary to point out, "Wha' contains the still beatin' heart of Davy Jones."
Ragetti mimed taking his own heart from his chest, beating it right under the others' noses. Sora, Donald, Goofy and Elizabeth, a little surprised at first to be seeing those two again, were momentarily lost for words which allowed Jack to return to the topic at hand. "And whoever possesses that chest, possesses the leverage to command Jones to do whatever it is that he or she wants, including saving brave William from his grim fate."
"You never said that when we first met." Lea said, finding himself more and more skeptical. Then again, Xehanort could split his own heart and place each pieces into weakened people and turn them into clones.
"But I guess it does make a bit of kind of sense, since we dumped the chest of cursed gold into the ocean a year ago." Sora pointed out, having a deep thought about this, quickly adding, "Not that I'd trust you on this, Jack, and...I'm still finding it heart to believe it, since once someone loses their heart, they turn into a heartless and their nobody is created."
"But on the other hand," Xion said, "When both are destroyed, they fuse back into their original beings and return to normal."
Jack and Elizabeth were a bit surprised on this, and Lea shrugged, "Yeah, that's what happened to me, and what happened to Mr. Poker-face here." jerking his thumb at Dulor who gave him a cold glare at the insulting nick-name.
"We found that out just recently, in fact." Sora shrugged, "But we'll worry about that later. Are you sure we can trust you on your word?" with Donald nodding in agreement. Ven, Xion, Goofy and Kairi all looked uncertain on this on whether Jack was telling the truth or not.
Elizabeth considered this for a moment, before asking, "How do we find it?"
That was the sign that Jack had been waiting for. Elizabeth was ready to listen still further. "With this." he said, holding up the compass, "My compass is unique."
"Unique? Don't you mean broken?" Donald asked sarcastically.
"True enough." Jack agreed, but then continued, "But this compass is not an ordinary one, for it does not point north." while in the background, Dulor vomited again.
Despite her better judgement, Kairi then asked, finding herself more curious, "Then, where does it point?"
"It points to the thing that you want most in this world." Said Jack, in his most flattering voice.
"Uh...you mean it really points to what you really want?" Sora asked, "Sorry, I find that hard to believe." he shook his head.
"It's probably better than not figuring out how I ended up small back when I first met Cinderella." Ventus muttered under his breath.
Xion, being possibly the youngest, couldn't help but ask, "Are you telling the truth?"
"Every word, missy." Jack replied, before he placed the compass in Elizabeth's hands, and continued, "And what you want most in this world is to find the chest of Davy Jones, is it not?"
"To save Will?" Elizabeth asked.
Jack nodded, "By finding the chest of Davy Jones."
Having skillfully twisted Elizabeth's true desire into that thought, Jack eased open the compass and immediately backed away. If this worked, he had no intention of going anywhere near the compass for awhile.
Elizabeth, with Sora and the others lingering around her to get a better look, looked down at the compass. The needle spun wildly for a few seconds, as if getting used to a new holder whose desires weren't constantly flying in every direction at once, before finally holding steady in the direction of the southwest. All eight of them were quite stunned at this.
"Whoa..." Sora and Ven both breathed in awe.
Lea whistled, impressed. "Gotta admit, I was skeptical on that thing."
"So I guess that means we're going with to find the chest?" Kairi asked.
Sora, figuring that this might be their only chance in figuring out more on the immortilty of this world, and remembering that there was another afterlife world within this one, answered, "Seems like it. Guess we'll be going onboard the Black Pearl for a little bit. What do you say, guys?" to which Kairi, Ven, Xion, Lea and Goofy all nodded in agreement, while Donald groaned, but in the end, knew that he was out voted on the decision. Besides, the Black Pearl was the only transport that was willing to take them anywhere anyway.
Jack, after a few seconds, eased his face over Elizabeth's arm and peeked at the compass. "Mr. Gibbs?"
"Cap'n?"
"We have our heading." Declared Jack, rather pleased.
"Finally." Said Gibbs, visibly relieved. Turning back to the ship, he began shouting orders. "On deck, all hands, weigh anchor and crow that canvas."
A bustling of voices and crew suddenly began around them, as they Black Pearl prepared to leave Tortuga. Jack was elated: they had a heading.
"Miss Swann. Kairi and Xion." He said, grandly gesturing up the gangplank.
Elizabeth, smiling, took the invitation as gracefully as a lady. Kairi and Xion did the the same, with Sora, Lea, Donald, Goofy and Ven quickly following, ready for another adventure.
They all seemed to have forgotten, who was about to follow when Pintel shoved a goat into his arms and said, with a cackling sneer. "Welcome to the crew, former Organizer." This insult and the resultant mocking laughter of the crew around Dulor made it clear that the pirates were delighting in seeing their captain's former enemy brought so low.
As they climbed on deck, Jack turned to Lea and asked, "So, where are Roxas and those other two friends of yours, mate?"
"Isa and Namine?" Lea blinked, before answering, a bit hesitatedly, "Busy somewhere. It's a long story. Like Sora said, we have bigger problems."
"Can't imagine any problem bigger than Davy Jones or the Heartless or those Organizing troubling men."
"Actually, when you hear about the new threat that's more dangerous than even the giant squid Gibbs told us earlier, you'd probably be thinking that that's nothing compared to we're up against who hasn't made a full scale attack yet..." Lea paused, still haunted by the sight of Chaos in the Realm of Sleep. "At least for now."
Unfortunately, little did Sora and the others know, that Chaos and Davy Jones were not the only problems they were facing.
Back in Radiant Garden...
After Riku, Mickey, Aqua, Terra, Isa, Namine, Cloud and Zack told Leon and the others on the situation on Chaos and Bhunivelze, sadly even Merlin knew nothing about this except for some rumors about the two's connections. However, Even did say that Chaos was part of a research on a Chaos and Omega theory he discovered back when he was Vexen and had gone to Midgar himself, which left the group to conclude that they had to find out more on Bhunivelze from the only ones who would know about the corrupted god more than mortals.
The Gods of Olympus Coliseum.
So, after departing Merlin's house while Namine stayed behind to find out more, and with Angeal and Genesis having gone ahead to their next location, Riku and the others made their way towards the castle via Leon's permission. Mickey and Isa both led the way since both of them knew the castle more than the rest of them, save for Lea and Sora, for they knew that they had to find Aqua's armor and Keyblade. Terra's armor was back at the Keyblade Graveyard, but he decided to worry about getting his later, since they had more important things to worry about.
Cloud, however, kept on casting his eyes back and forth, and the more he did so, the more vigilant he became and the more he began to realise that they were being followed, not even convincing himself that he was paranoid.
Suddenly sharp movement caused him, and, surprisingly, everyone else, even Zack, to whip around behind them, just as a silhouette of a figure darted behind a rock to hide from their sight. But the group already suspected that there was someone there, and, not taking any chances, Cloud and Zack drew out their swords, while Isa summoned his Claymore since he was still practicing on his Keyblade, and Mickey, Riku, and Terra all summoned their Keyblades, while Aqua summoned Master Eraqus's Keyblade.
"Who's there?" Riku demanded.
"We know you're there. There's no point in hiding." Cloud added.
The group continued to stand in defence, as the figure finally gave up and came out from their hiding place. To Isa's annoyance and disbelief, it was a familiar mullet-haired young man, who too had regained his heart and discarded his organization coat for a more teenage punk clothes, wearing a tattered vez, short sleeved white shirt, jeans that were slightly torn in the knees, black sneakers, and wrist bands, with a chained necklace with the letter "M" at the bottom.
"Haven't I seen you before?" Mickey asked, skeptically.
Demyx, or Myde now, shrugged nervously, before seeing Isa and, remembering Saix, shook violently in fear, before dropping to his knees, placing his hands together as if to beg for forgiveness or to the gods, begged to the annoyed blue-haired man, while the others were puzzled, "Pleeese...! Saix, don't kill me! I'm begging yooouuuu!"
"Wait a minute..." Riku frowned, "You're the guy Sora mentioned; the whimp who ran away in the Underworld."
"Do you know him?" Zack asked, puzzled.
"He was the ninth member of the first Organization." Isa sighed, desummoning his Claymore. "But he was also the biggest slacker of the organization as well. Not to mention that his reports were that a five year old could do better at, and he would play that stupid styter of his which made horrible and loud noise. I was the one to give him a lecture every single time."
Myde grumbled, "Yeah, well, you also smacked me in the head with that clipboard, which still hurt, and tugged my ear as though you're my mother."
Isa smirked, "Makes me wonder if you slacked off at highschool as well."
"So, what are you doing here?" Aqua asked to Myde.
"Aw man. You mean you guys heard me the whole time?" Myde groaned.
Cloud scoffed, "Even a rookie Turk could sneak around better than you. But why were you following us?"
"Well, I've been stuck here since getting my heart back." Myde shrugged, "Not that I don't like being here, since my world's still not around. Then I saw you guys coming to this huge castle, so I got curious." while surprised the Isa was completely different compared what he used to be like as a Nobody.
"And...you followed us because you were curious?" Zack asked, skeptically. Personally, as far as he could tell, this guy was more of a mess-maker than Reno who always got the job done despite his appearence.
Myde nodded sheepishly, "Pretty much."
Everyone glanced at each other, before they all desummoned their weapons, as Terra couldn't help but say to Isa, "You're right. This guys is a slacker."
"The only question is, what do we do now?" Cloud asked.
"Well, he doesn't seem to be doing anything wrong." Mickey thought. "I know that I'm gonna regret in saying this, be maybe he should come with us, just in case."
Everyone looked at him as though he was crazy. None the less, they didn't know if they should agree with Mickey or not.
Until someone made the decision.
A/N: We'll be back in the next chapter and see what happens next. Please continue your awesome reviews, and I'll see you next time.