(One day, in part of Canada, I was lounging on my couch when suddenly, for no reason, I smacked myself in the head, went to my laptop, scrapped two pages of this chapter, and wrote like, six in it's place. Behold, the fruit of spontaneous... something. I don't even know what the hell made me do it, but I did it, and here it is. This one's a wee short though. Meh, world comes next so I'm forgiven. I know I am.
Everything that has a copyright is copyrighted to their respective owners.)
Oathkeeper
Chapter Fourteen: The Beat Goes On
"No. No it's not. Ya can't make me believe it."
"I'm telling you, it's a legendary weapon."
"Nuh-uh. That can't be any kind of legend, yo."
"Beat, seriously. Donald told you the legends. Then vouched for it. Goofy did too. Even Snoopy did. Later on, if you're still with us next time we go to Traverse Town, they'll be able to tell you too. Why are you the only one who doesn't believe it?"
"B'cause it just doesn't work, ya know?"
"...I give up..." Sora said, falling back on his bunk. Beat, on the bunk above him gave a 'meh' and tried to think of something else to talk about. The most obvious thing came to mind, and he kicked himself for not trying it a few days ago.
"Hey, Sora. What was ya world like?" Beat asked, tentatively. Something was nagging at the back of his head as to why this question wasn't good to ask, but he had forgotten.
"Well... hm..." Sora got a pensive look on his face. Probably thinking about all the things that got destroyed and- oh, that was why it was a bad idea...
"Ya don't have to say nothin' if ya don't wanna. Jus... ya know. I'll tell ya about mine."
"...My world was called Earth. An-"
"No freakin way!" Sora jumped at the unexpected interruption, and scowled. Oh no they were not going to argue about this.
"Hey, I'm telling the truth so-"
"My world was called Earth too! Like... what kinda coincidence is that, yeah?" Whoa, hang on.
"What?!"
"Yeah, I know! Well... there's a lotta worlds, so I guess maybe there's some chance Earth's a popular name, yeah?"
"Well... Where on Earth are you from?" If they were from the same world, something he said might sound familiar. Sora listened intently.
"Japan. I lived in a district where a lot of... people who aren't from Japan lived. Near a place called Shibuya, in Tokyo..."
"That sounds like my Earth. Japan and Tokyo, they're there."
"Ya mean... same world?"
"...Yeah. What are the odds?"
"Pretty bad. Even I know how many worlds there are... well, not really, but ya know..."
"Yeah, I know..." Sora did know. Aside from Riku and Kairi, who weren't with him at the moment, there was absolutely nothing left of his old home. But, corny as it sounded, Beat himself was living proof that he once had a home. "I know..."
The feeling was surreal. He could tell from the silence that the older boy was thinking the same thing... Sora had found out that Beat was fifteen years old. He had to go through the same thing Sora did, at almost the same age, at the same time... He wondered if Beat had friends like his. Bonds as strong as his... Sora cleared his throat, trying to start the conversation up again.
"Well, after Earth broke... man, the magic and stuff... kinda came out of nowhere, didn't it?"
"Hah! Maybe for you it did..." Wait... what was that?
"Beat, what are you talking about? There was nothing like that on our world... was there?"
"Well... I don't think it was all over tha' place, like it is out here... In Shibuya, it was there..."
--
"Beat, no!"
"Rhyme, what- Rhyme, what the hell!"
"GRAAGH!"
"The hell was... Rhyme?! No... Rhyme? No... NO!"
--
"It was... everywhere. Nobody saw it, but it was there, ya know? Nobody else saw..."
"... Beat?"
"I dunno if it was anywhere else... but, in Shibuya... you didn't die right away..."
"You mean, like ghosts and stuff?"
"No, nothin' like that. Ya... just didn't die right away. You'd end up somewhere else, in the same place. Nobody could see ya, but ya could see other dead people... And..." Beat stopped talking for a very loaded minute. The atmosphere was suffocating because there was no question Sora was about to discover something very dark about his world. "It was kinda like... that place with all the fightin' yo."
"The colleseum?"
"Yeah, that place. 'Cept... a lot less rules, and... you'd die, again I mean, you'd die again if you didn't follow them, and they were still trying to kill ya anyway. Like..."
--
"YO! What'd ya do with Rhyme?!"
"God, if you can't figure that out, you're about as smart as that board you're carrying around."
"Yo, I asked you a question! Now ANSWER me before I kick your ass from here to Canada!"
--
"It's wierd... ya know, I was dead too. But... I'm not dead anymore. I dunno why. So..."
"Wait, what was the point of it all? I mean... die again? I believe you, but... seem kinda pointless..."
"There was a point. Winner gets to live."
"...What?"
"You die, wake up in Shibuya, and for a week, ya do whatever ya can to survive. Winner gets to live again. And there's... a lotta ways to die, yo."
--
"Your job?! What kinda job means killin' people?! Is that why you..."
"Finally he gets it. But keep in mind, I wasn't aiming for her. I was aiming at YOU, Skulls."
--
"... What kind of sick game is that?"
"It's the game. And... it's the only chance we had... What other choice did we have, yeah? Just... had to be careful... not to..."
--
"That's why she protected you. Gave her life for you."
"Rhyme is gone... because of me?"
--
"...slip up..." The skater trailed off for some reason, lost in thought.
"...Beat...?" Sora inquired slowly, silently alarmed at the vacant look that overtook the skater's face. He seemed to snap out of it quickly though, shaking whatever it was away, and grinning sheepishly at the Keyblader.
"Heh... Sorry Sora. This probably..."
"Nah... I kinda know about that too. I mean... friends and all that..."
"... Yeah... I guess..." The silence that followed was somewhat awkward, with that vibe of 'well, what next?' stagnant in the air.
"...Wanna talk about it?" Sora asked after a minute or two of mental preperation. Even he knew that question was a game of Russian roulette all on it's own.
"I... I dunno... You got anything to talk about?"
"A couple of things..." Sora offered. He thought he knew what Beat was going through... the best cure in this case was probably to get it all off his chest. That, and despite how horribly insensitive it was, he really did want to hear about what could've possibly been going on on his world. The only place he had left that embodied his sense of normalcy. Yet another aspect of his reality was falling apart before his eyes, but this time, he wanted to see it through.
"Well... We've got nuthin' better to do, yeah?"
"Yeah."
"...Kay then... ya'd better not fall asleep, yo!"
"As if!" Sora was telling the truth a little too well, he later found. Stories were told and exchanged, bonds were formed. And no sleep was had. Donald threw a fit as the two groggy boys slugishly worked at half the normal speed. Neither had any regrets.
A few nights later, Beat lay awake at night looking at the ceiling, thinking deeply about what he had told Sora.
Sora now knew that after Beat had died, he had met a twelve year old girl, nicknamed Rhyme in the game and formed a pact to make her his partner. He also knew that Rhyme had been erased, killed to use another term, because she was his partner.
"So... she jumped in front of it?"
"Nah, it came from underneath. Bastard almost chomped me in half. So... so Rhyme jumped in, and pushed me outta the way. I still don't know how she managed that, she's like half my size, yo. But she did... and then... she knew it was going to be like that when she pushed me. So... why would she put her life in front of mine like that? She... barely knew me..."
"Well... you did keep her safe, didn't you? I mean... you were partners, so you had to watch eachother's backs. That's what partners do."
"But... she barely knew me! She had her whole life, and she threw it away for a stranger... What kinda thing is that to do?"
"... Sounds like a selfless kinda thing to do."
"..."
"So... so you wouldn't have saved her if you were in her place?"
"Of course I would've! She was my freaking... my partner..."
"Even though you didn't know her?"
"... Y-yeah..."
Sora, freaking bastard, he smiled then. Sora had the balls to give him a wide toothy grin and say;
"She probably knew that. So, that's why she saved you. You're just as selfless as her."
Beat was not normally one for self control, but he had, through some miracle among miracles, managed to restrain every urge spuring him to slug Sora right in that big smile of his. And he also managed to hide the fact that he wanted to break something clear in half for a few hours afterwards. Only because nobody noticed his tightly clenched fists and grit teeth.
And then, nobody noticed that he had cried the moment he was alone. Afterwards, he swore to never cry again.
His anger had subsided, because despite what Sora had said, Beat couldn't hold it against him. It was impossible to be truly enraged unless he knew what exactly he was talking about.
Because he hadn't told Sora the entire truth that night. So Sora could smile all he fucking wanted because he didn't understand.
And Beat wouldn't get mad again. Promise.
--
They had been flying for a full week since they left the Colosseum. And Beat, the one who wouldn't -couldn't- stop moving, was more then a little restless. There was nothing to smash, nothing to do for fun, and that included smashing things by the way, so he was bored.
Sora was quite bored too. While he loved the books that Leon had lent him, he still wasn't much of a recreational reader by nature. So he got tired of not moving around pretty fast. Though, not nearly as fast as Beat did, but still, by the third day, he wanted out.
It was worse since, Beat almost refused outright to read.
"No way, thas' lame, yo." And then he would attempt to use the bridge as a skate park, and Sora was pretty sure by now that Donald would have ulcers by the time he left the ship. His dad had ulcers back before his world broke, (insert pause here to wallow in sorrow, check, moving on) and he knew that they wouldn't do much to improve the duck's already volatile temper.
However, given the frequency of occurrences the mage had blown his stack, it was debatable on whether such a short fuse could get any shorter. Maybe he could take tips from Goofy on how to relax? The simple knight seemed immune to any and all forms of even the most mild annoyance. When Sora reflected on this, it terrified him a little bit. He idly wondered on how long it would take Goofy to snap...
Nevermind that, he'd think more on it in his nightmares. He needed to face the problem at hand instead, that being, find a method of entertainment for Beat (and himself, mostly) that would keep the skater (and the Keyblader) out of Donald's feathers before he snapped and put everybody, literally, on ice.
Sora didn't like the cold. And he didn't have a suitable substitute for his teddy bear to snuggle said cold away so- no, no, he was a big boy, a hero with a legendary weapon to boot, so he didn't need a stuffed animal to stave off the cold.
Real men snuggled girls.
...Wait, that was probably true, but it really didn't sound manly at all.
'...Note to self, find girlfriend anyway.' Meh. If anybody said he wasn't manly, he'd Keyblade them upside the head. That being said, he supposed he owed Yuffie one hell of a smack the-
"We've arrived." Donald said, nursing his temples, obviously beyond any sort of thankful conceived by mortals.
Donald (the captain, sorta) saying that they had arrived (meaning that they had gone somewhere they were trying to get to, which last he checked, was a world) meant that there would be room to walk. Meaning that as son as they landed, Beat was going to fly out the hatch like a bat out of hell, and maybe start grinding up the nearest building.
"Wait, what?! For real?! You better not be screwin' with me, or I'll-"
"Yes Beat, we are landing. We've picked out a landing spot and we're going to be able to get off the ship in about five minutes. You would know this sooner if you weren't making a fort out of the mattresses in the crew quarters."
"Hey! Donchu look at me like that! What else was I supposed to do?!"
"Read?"
"No way, thas' lame, yo."
"... get ready to disembark. Sora, remember to carry an ether with you this time. Be prepared for everything."
"Yes Donald."
"Beat, I should've asked this before we left the Colosseum, but do you have a belt for potions?" Beat shook his head, grinning.
"Yo, why would I need somethin' like that when I've got all these pockets?" True, his cargo pants were loaded with pockets. But that still left the obvious flaw.
"Beat, with pockets, even if they button down, the potions still aren't secure. Chances are better that they would break while swinging around and the like. And the weight would be placed awkwardly for you."
"Ugh... you know healing stuff, right? Magic? Can't you use that?"
"It would be better if I saved my magic for attacking. Using it on healing would drain me that much faster."
"But... wouldn't it be better to use up your magic first? Cause, potions and stuff like that'll cost a lotta money, yo." Beat asked, thinking hard. It didn't seem to be something he did often, but since he was trying to make a rational argument, Donald 'took it easy' on him when he dashed it across the rocks.
"As far as priorities go, survival is higher then finances. I'd rather not risk your lives or mine to save a few gil."
"Aw..."
"Carry two potions in your pockets for now, ask Sora for them, and we'll pick you up a belt later when we visit Traverse Town." Beat looked confused, as he locked eyes with the duck.
"Yo, you know I got no money, right?"
"I said that we would pick you up a belt. I know you've got no money." Donald said walking past the boy to get prepared for leaving the ship.
"So... why?" Beat asked quietly. Donald stopped and turned around, his expression questioning the boy on whether or not he was crazy.
"Why else? You're watching our backs, so you need to be able to stay alive. After all, we have to watch yours too, hm? On and off the battlefield." Donald then left a speechless Beat alone in the room, unaware of the emotional whirlwind such a simple gesture had caused.
Beat wasn't used to random acts of kindness. His parents were constantly telling him how disapointed in him they were, the kids at school were constantly avoiding the weird foreigner, and he was left wandering life with no goal of drive.
There was only one person who he could say that loved him without question in the entire world. But then Beat went and got himself killed, started a series of events that were hell, and then to top it all off, his world broke, and he lost what little he had left, including that one person.
Even before this, when absolutely anyone went out of their way for him, including that one person, Beat would be left dumbfounded, unable to say anything. He hadn't asked or pleaded for the gift that was going to come later, small though it might've been, so Beat stood on the ship's bridge for a few minutes to allow his brain to reboot because he had been offered something. Then, unsure of what else to do, he left the control room to go find Sora, and ask about borrowing two potions.
And later he resolved to thank the duck. Because the last thing he wanted to look like was ungrateful.
--
(Alright, now that the chapter's over, you might've noticed that I kinda focused on Beat. That's because I wanted to throw his character out there a little because he's a new element, and I don't know how many people have played The World Ends With You. So as far as he goes, some of you are flying completely blind. In fact, a friend of mine confused him with Seipher (if I spelt his name right... the FFVIII guy) at his description.
I'm not going to play favorites, and put him over Sora. But by now, I think I've established that there's more to the ADHD skateboarder then meets the eye. That was my intention. Mission accomplished. Now there will be pineapple.
Oh, also, no Omake. No, it wasn't because Sora didn't use the spell, I just wasn't feeling very funny at the time.
One other thing before I go, yes, I do think that real men snuggle. I LIKE snuggling. Very much so. Now, if only I had somebody who WANTED to snuggle with me, I'd be good to go...
Meh. See you in the next chapter, unless somebody else drops a flame and I get indignant again. Though I don't like the idea of fighting over the internet (seriously, pointless), disarming the argument of somebody I didn't know at all was oddly satisfying, in a 'oh look at what I did' kind of way...
By the way, I'm still uncertain about pairings. So far, I've got two plans, one of which involves a Great Ninja from an FF game, while the other involves a literal 'Sora Sammich' between Riku and Kairi, because they're going to be very thankful at all the trouble he's going to for their sake, and lets face it people, he's gay for them BOTH. I can't really see one without the other two in a relationship...
But if he's with Yuffie... Hm... either senario would work. Lets hear some thoughts people.
Keep in mind that whoever Sora gets set up with, there's going to be hawt dickings. Perhaps not on this website, but there WILL be dickings, mark my words. (Also I'm not against writing Yaoi for the purpose of the threesome, in case any of you were wondering. If it's Riku and Kairi, Sora's not going to be a virgin in ANY sense of the word by the time this series is through.)