There was evidence of fights all over the farm buildings, and not just ones Sora's own battle had left on them. The tools in the smithy were strewn all over, the kitchen looked like a small hurricane had passed through, and many of the rooms for farm hands weren't in much better condition either.
All of the rooms had one thing in common though – they were deserted. This wasn't good, he needed to find Jamie. If the Heartless hadn't claimed him, then he'd need a friend, and he'd need a new life. If he could persuade Danny to see it the right way, he could handle both at the same time.
Knowing himself that the Heartless weren't exactly bright, he made a point of checking places to hide – inside cupboards and underneath the beds, for example. Still no sign of anyone.
He finally reached a small office just above the kitchen. Whoever worked in here would be in an unparalleled position to smell food being prepared before anyone else.
At a glance, it too seemed devoid of life. A single cabinet of paper, no room to hide in there, a simple chair, and a desk.
And there, underneath the desk, curled up, was a boy, just as Danny had described him, just a bit younger than Sora. He held a somewhat rusty and dented old short sword pointed at him, his grip on it clearly showing his competence with it.
"Put that away," Sora told him. "I'm here to help."
"You could be one of them."
"I just got rid of them. They won't come back here again, ever."
"Are you sure?"
"Sure as I can be." He extended a hand, though keeping wary of the sword. "I'm Sora."
"Jamie," he replied, putting down his weapon and pulling himself to his feet. He was a head shorter, and dressed in a simple shirt and pants, nothing fancy. "Did you help the others too?"
Sora took a few moments to figure out how to answer that, then put one hand on his shoulder, and shook his head. "There weren't any others. I'm sorry."
Strangely, it didn't seem to bother him. "I knew it. I heard a fight. I was told to take shelter, and came here. It went on for hours, I could hear them all, there was screaming and shouting."
"Easy, there. It's a hard thing to go through, losing everyone you knew."
Again, this didn't bother him. His expression didn't change at all. "One of those black things came in here."
"A Heartless."
"I suppose. It looked right at me. I couldn't do anything to it. I was afraid, then... then I must have fallen asleep, because next thing I remember was waking up on the floor, and there was nothing there. I could hear them outside still, but I wasn't afraid any more. I knew I couldn't help them, I couldn't do anything to them."
Sora stood listening in silence. There was something passing him by, he was sure, but he couldn't figure out what.
Jamie continued on, "I stayed in here, watched them go. None of them came back to here. Then there was nothing at all, just silence. I thought they might come back then, so I hid under the desk. I don't know how long I was there for, but the next thing I remember, I could hear someone else fighting them, a few minutes ago."
"That was me. I'm used to it, I fight Heartless a lot."
"Yeah... I thought I'd better wait and see what happened... then you showed up."
"Jamie? What do you feel, right now?"
"I... don't feel anything, why?"
Sora knew what he'd been missing. He hadn't gone to sleep. He'd been turned into a Nobody.
This was unexpected, and probably not good. He needed to talk to someone who knew Nobodies. Or someone who was one...
"It's just a hunch," he told the waiting Jamie. "Wait here for me? I've got to go see someone."
"Can't I come with you?"
"I won't be more than a few moments, and it's safer this way. Keep that sword with you, if anything attacks you, just hold it off until I get back."
"But-" he began to object.
"Trust me," Sora cut him off. "I won't be long enough to let anything happen."
Reluctantly, he nodded. Sora focused for a moment, porting himself directly to the café. No one there was surprised to see him just pop out of thin air, and head directly to Danny.
"Well?" he asked, not wasting any words.
"I've found him, but there's a problem. There were Heartless there, and they got to him before us. You remember what I said about Roxas?"
"Of course."
"He's like that; a Nobody."
"How is that a problem?"
"He just lost his entire life, everyone he knew. He should be experiencing emotional trauma from it, but he's not, he doesn't feel anything."
"Because a Nobody doesn't have a heart, I remember you saying, but I still don't see how it's a problem, Sora."
"He doesn't know it yet. I also haven't managed to confirm about the ability he's reported to have, but I'm fairly certain of it."
"Alright, so what do you want to do about it?"
"Take him to Roxas. Roxas was part of Organisation XIII, they were all Nobodies. He'll be able to do something to help him, I'm sure of it. I'll figure out something to check his ability along the way."
"Be careful. Even if he can't feel the shocks of many new things, you don't want to put him through too much."
"I'll remember. So can I take him?"
"Go ahead. I want you to check up on him often though, and as soon as you think he's ready to join us here, bring him in."
"Great, thanks. I better get back before he thinks I've just run off and abandoned him or something."
Danny just nodded, back to making someone's lunch, and he headed back the way he'd come. Jamie hadn't moved far, he was leaning on crossed arms, looking out the window with the same blank expression he'd had when Sora left.
"You didn't miss anything."
"See, what'd I tell ya? Gonna take you to see someone I know, he'll be able to help you."
"Help me? With what?"
"Uh, it's kinda hard to explain, and I don't really know how to say it..."
"And your friend does?"
"Naturally, that's why we're seeing him."
"Where is he then?"
"Twilight Town."
"I've heard that place before... sometimes people passing through mentioned it."
"Which way did they come from?"
"Northwards, I think." He went back to the window and leaned out, looking northwards. "I think you might want to find another way."
"Why's that?"
"Those Heartless things are there. I think they're surrounding us."
"I told them to leave!" Sora burst out, irritated. He beckoned for Jamie to follow then stormed out, leaving to the north – the same way he'd come in.
There was a long line of Heartless in a ring around the area. They were watching him again.
"You can tell these things what to do?"
"I don't know how. I did it before I found you."
"How do I know you didn't set them on us?"
"I fight these things normally, I don't use them or anything," he replied a little more harshly than he intended, still bearing down on the Heartless. They didn't react.
"I told you to leave," he told them, destroying a few with a swipe of the keyblade. They didn't react. "Go! Just go, away from here, don't just stand there, move!"
Unlike last time, they looked to each other, chittering sounds between them. Sora watched, trying to get a hold of his annoyance.
Finally one nodded at him, then they all turned to leave, then a short distance away, vanished entirely. The sense of their presence left with them.
"You didn't fight them," Jamie commented.
"I'm still winded from last time, things haven't gone the way I expected, and I shouldn't be able to command them, but I can. So I'm taking advantage of it while it still works to make things easier for us. Now come on, we're going to Twilight Town, now."
"Whatever you say."
Roxas, unlike Sora, was easily recognised. Apparently the normal limits his other had to put up with didn't apply to him.
It felt good to be back in a familiar place again. He'd stored away his robe for now, back to his more casual look, and even found out a skateboard.
Right now, he was looking for Kairi. She needed to be told what had happened to Sora, and be damned with whatever rules kept preventing Sora from doing it.
He finally tracked her down at a small house on the southern edge of the town, a place he had never really ventured before. It was obviously a scholar's home. You could tell, the only things tidy were books, books that Kairi, Donald and Goofy all immersed in, apparently searching for something along side whoever the scholar was.
Roxas let himself in quietly, not drawing attention to himself just yet.
"I knew it was here somewhere!" the scholar exclaimed. "I thought I'd lost this old book."
"We're meant to be searching for ways to help Sora," Kairi told him. "Not looking for old books."
"Young lady, this old book happens to be the missing index of everything I have here, and more importantly where it all is. If anything, we'll find where we need to look from here."
"Or you could ask me," Roxas told them, coming into view. "I know what's happened to Sora."
Kairi was onto him in a moment. "Tell me! I have to know!"
"Last time I saw him, he was putting up with having to work for a place called the Dark Arcology, not doing too bad for himself, but stuck with it's rules that means while he's outside of it, no one will recognise him. Except me, of course."
"Why you?"
He showed the markings on his wrist. "Sora has some as well, mine showed up because of that. I can ignore the rules he has to work with."
"Fascinating," the scholar muttered. "May I examine them?"
"Go ahead."
He took out a magnifying glass and looked closely, took a few notes, then buried himself in a book again. Kairi rolled her eyes, then turned back to Roxas. "Is Sora alright?"
"A bit annoyed about not being able to tell you himself. You met him, he said, but he couldn't tell you it was him."
"Who did he tell me he was, do you know?"
"Axel."
"That was... and I didn't realise it..."
"You couldn't have known," the scholar interrupted, not looking up. "No one could know except him, and anyone from the Arcology itself."
"And me," Roxas added.
There was a sound, not exactly a sound, more a feeling. He didn't like it. It meant trouble.
Kairi picked up on it too. She was also a Keyblade Master, she could tell as easily as he could.
She tapped Donald on the shoulder, who in turn nudged Goofy, then they all left, looking southwards. There was a bad feeling about this.
He summoned his keyblades, he had a feeling he'd need him.
Then he saw why. There was a hoard of Heartless descending on Twilight Town. Larger than he'd ever seen, it was like a black mass headed directly for them. Kairi stood stunned, watching it, then Goofy took her inside.
"I'll keep us safe," he told her. "You coming Donald?"
"You're going to fight them, aren't you?" Donald asked Roxas.
"What else?"
"Why?"
"Sora isn't here to do it, so I'm taking care of it for him."
"I'll help. You'll need it."
"At least I have one ally against this hoard. It doesn't look like we have long."
"I'll warn as many people as I can, get them to pass the word around. We'll be ready for them."
"I hope so," he replied grimly. It didn't look as good as Donald made it sound.
Sora was impressed. He'd decided to test Jamie in a mock battle, and found his swordsmanship not only to be competent, but highly skilled – yet he claimed never to have picked up a sword before then. It just came naturally to him.
This wasn't the definite proof he needed though, so he left again briefly, stopping by the little used Arcology Armoury, making a note of where it was (Floor 103, storage room 4B) and returning with a few spears, all practice ones so if Jamie did break through his defences, he wouldn't be hurt much.
"I can't use those," he protested. "I've never even seen one before."
"Try it. I don't know much about them either, so it'll be good for us both to learn from."
"But Sora-"
"I know, you haven't used them before. Just try it."
"Alright... if you're sure."
Sora handed him one, sticking the others into the earth nearby, then readying his keyblade to defend himself. Jamie held the spear inexpertly, staring at it blankly for a few moments, then he nodded, took a two handed grip at the far end, and jabbed sharply at Sora.
He only just managed to jump clear in time.
"Close," he muttered to himself.
"I... did it right?"
"More than right, expertly, I think."
"Can we try again?"
"Of course, just let me get up."
Jamie made several more attacks with the spear, all of which were clearly not from the hands of a beginner, or someone who'd never seen one before now. Even he had trouble dodging some of them.
"How did I do that?"
"I think I know how. You've got some kind of latent talent, as soon as you pick up something, you know instantly how to use it."
"That explains a lot of things... I always did seem to be good at everything."
"Now you know why."
"Maybe you should take these spears back."
"Want me to get you a proper one from the armoury?"
"You think I might need it?"
"Better to have a weapon and not need it, than not having one and needing it."
"Alright... nothing fancy though, just one that does the job."
Sora nodded, porting himself there and replacing the training spears. The spear he picked out was made of an odd dark-green metal for both handle at spear tip, strangely light. The quartermaster looked at him oddly.
"Something up?"
"No one ever takes out spears. Especially not this one," he replied.
"Why not?"
"No one's ever been able to use it. Everyone who does, finds it vanishes from their hands, and reappears on the floor beside them. Some people looked into it a while ago. Apparently it can only be used by an impossibility."
"How so?"
"It's impossible to be an expert without having ever used one before."
"I think I know who it's made for," he grinned back as the mark was made showing his signing it out. "I think I'm going to see him any moment now."
"Good luck with that. People have searched for ages for it's wielder."
"I've already found him," he replied, porting himself back.
Jamie examined it curiously.
"It's... different," he said finally. "I don't know how."
"Try and attack me with it."
"Are you sure?"
"I'll dodge, I'll be fine."
Jamie nodded, taking it up ready to stab again, and Sora prepared to move aside and block.
He didn't get the chance, as Jamie stabbed, the air seemed to solidify into an arrow shape, hit him full on, and hurled him away, landing him somewhat painfully in a bush.
"You'll be fine?" Jamie asked him, grinning.
"I wasn't expecting it," he replied testily. "Get me out of here."