Here we are in Chapter 9. Sora's back in Traverse Town, and he'll hopefully be getting some answers. I own nothing here! Except for the plot!
-start chapter-
"See? I'm doing just fine!" After seeing how depressed Sora was when they left the Coliseum, Donald finally consented and let him drive the gummi ship. He was surprised by how well Sora was doing, although Sora seemed to enjoy shooting the lasers a little too much.
"Where'd you learn to fly Sora?" asked Goofy.
"This is my first time, but I did a few simulations on Gaia, well, for airships anyway. The controls for these ships are pretty similar. Who designs them?" The two anthros shrugged. "I wonder if he's from Gaia…"
"Oh hey!" Goofy pointed toward a very familiar world coming up. "There's Traverse Town! Almost there!"
Donald's eyes widened when he saw something else. "Look out for that meteor!"
Too late. They crashed.
Meanwhile, Yuffie was loitering around the entrance to Traverse Town. She was bored. There was nothing for her to do, and nothing interesting had happened since Guard Armor was destroyed. "Something happen!" No sooner had she shouted this than the group of travelers that had left only a few days earlier walked in through the gate. This wouldn't have been noteworthy if it had not been for the fact they were covered in soot and smoking. Yuffie took one look and burst out laughing. "What happened to you guys? !"
"This genius flew into a meteor!" shouted Donald, pointing at Sora.
"I said I was sorry!"
"So, what are you guys doing back here?"
"We found some weird stuff that we wanna ask Leon about," explained Sora.
"Ah, he's probably training in the sewers in the alley."
As one, the three voiced their disbelief. "Sewers?" Yuffie nodded.
"Yeah, for some reason the Heartless don't go there. What's with the weird chain?"
"That's one of the things we're asking about."
"Hey, Yuffie, do you know anyone who wants a puppy?" asked Goofy.
"Puppy?"
"Oh, yeah…" Sora almost forgot about them. "We found a bunch of puppies while we were traveling around. We couldn't leave them in the worlds where we found them, so we brought them with us."
"Are they Dalmatians?" Sora gave her a disbelieving look.
"…How did you know that?"
"There are a couple of Dalmatians in a house in the second district who lost their puppies when their world was destroyed. Those puppies are probably some of theirs."
"But there's 24 of them…" said Donald. Yuffie grinned.
"Wow, you found a lot of them!" Sora twitched slightly.
"How many puppies do they have?"
"99"
"How'd they end up with that many? !" shouted Donald. Yuffie shrugged.
"I don't know. They're dogs! We can't really ask them. Why don't you take them back to their parents? I bet Leon would appreciate it."
"Leon?" Sora was confused. Why would Leon care?
"Yeah, Leon's actually a real softie when it comes to puppies. He just doesn't want people to know."
Sora grinned. "Like Angeal?"
"Angeal Hewley was a softie for puppies? !"
"Yeah, he used to sneak some into Shinra Tower so he could take care of them for a while. When he knew he couldn't keep them anymore, he always found good homes for them. Sometimes, I'd play with them."
Yuffie raised an eyebrow. "Angeal Hewley let you play with his puppies?"
"He'd let anyone play with them…except for scientists and most executives."
"What are you guys talking about?" asked Donald. He and Goofy had no idea what they were talking about.
"Angeal Hewley was a First Class SOLDIER," explained Yuffie. "He was one of the strongest SOLDIERS to ever be in the program." Sora snickered.
"It got him a fan club. It was funny seeing him trying to avoid the fan girls."
"Hey, what were you doing in Shinra Tower anyway?" asked Yuffie. "It doesn't seem like they'd let a kid go in and out of it."
"I lived there."
"Seriously?"
"Yeah, my foster father lived there, so I lived there too." Yuffie propped her head on her fist in thought.
"The people that lived there were mostly Turks and SOLDIERS. Who was your dad? Maybe I've heard of him."
"…" Yuffie raised an eyebrow when Sora went silent. He'd been pretty talkative until then. Sora sighed and looked to the side for a second. "I'd rather not say…"
"You two have a falling out?"
"You could say that…"
"You don't like talking about it, do ya?" said Goofy. Sora had almost forgotten those two were there. He nodded in response to the knight's inquiry.
"Yeah, it brings up painful memories." At this point, Yuffie decided that it was becoming a little too awkward.
"Well, I'll just leave you guys to do whatever. See ya around!" And then Yuffie ran off to do something else, most likely involving the killing of Heartless.
"Well, we better go get some new weapons before we look for Leon," said Donald. Goofy took a look at Sora, who was still looking off to the side with a far off look in his eyes.
"Sora? Are you okay?" Sora blinked and looked at Goofy.
"Hm?"
"Ya seem sad." Sora gave the anthro a smile.
"It's nothing. Don't worry." That done, the three went to the item shop.
"Hi Uncle Donald!"
"Hi boys. Goofy here needs a new shield. Show 'em Goofy." Goofy pulled out his shield.
"Whoa!"
"What happened to that? !"
"A giant three-headed dog tried to eat him," said Sora.
"Cool!"
"Do you guys have any shields?" asked Goofy.
"Sure! One second." Huey dug around behind the counter and pulled out a shield. It was diamond shaped with a royal blue outline. There were four interlocked circles on the shield that were light blue. The top and bottom circles were yellow on the inside, and the right and left circle were a darker blue on the inside. The left and right circles also had metal studs in them. The top and bottom circles had yellow outside of the circles, making a couple of triangles on the top and bottom of the shield. There were also a couple of light blue handles that were sticking out of the top and bottom circles. "It's called the mythril shield."
"It looks okay. How much is it?"
"750 munny," said Dewey. Fortunately, defeating so many Heartless got them a lot of munny and they were able to easily able to buy it.
"Okay, now how 'bout something for me?" asked Donald. Louie held up a green staff with a thick blue stripe on the shaft and a blue star on the top.
"It's called the Shooting Star. Only 300 munny."
"Deal." Donald handed over the munny and he took the new staff. Since that was all they needed, they left the shop and went to the second district. They quickly ran into a Large Body, only it had some new Heartless with it. There was a Red Nocturne and a Blue Rhapsody, but there were two more Heartless they'd never seen before. They were the same size and shape as the spell-casting Heartless, but one was yellow and the other was green. Sora took a quick look at them.
"Yellow Opera, absorbs Thunder spells. Green Requiem, absorbs all spells, casts Cure." "The green one absorbs spells!" Sora jumped up and split the Greed Requiem in two. Donald hit the Large Body with a Fire while Goofy bashed the Red Nocturne into the ground. Sora then shot a Fire at the Blue Rhapsody while Goofy threw his shield at the Yellow Opera hard enough to go through it. Donald cast another Fire on the Large Body. The large Heartless started glowing, slapped its body a couple of times, they did a belly slide towards the duck magician. Donald jumped out of the way, and Sora threw the Keyblade at the Large Body's back. It went straight through, and the Heartless quickly dissipated.
After they took care of the other Heartless they ran into, they found a door with a picture of a Dalmatian on it. This seemed to be the most likely place to find a Dalmatian, so they went in. Inside were two depressed looking Dalmatian dogs.
"I guess this is it," muttered Donald.
"What 'cha lookin' at Sora?" asked Goofy. Sora was staring at a wall with a surprised look on his face. At Goofy's question, he smirked.
"Oh…Nothing. Let's get those puppies that we found locked in tiny cramped treasure chests."
The two anthros gave him an odd look at his behavior, but decided to shrug it off. Sora seemed to behave rather strangely at times for reasons beyond their comprehension. Fortunately, one of those glowing circles was in the house so it was easy to get the 24 puppies into the house. The puppies saw their parents, yipped happily, and ran towards the dogs. The dogs brightened and ran forward to meet the puppies. 25 dogs happily nuzzled each other. 1 of the puppies was more interested in sniffing something near the wall. Goofy sniffled and wiped a tear away from his eye.
"Isn't it beautiful?" Sora nodded. One of the dogs suddenly separated from the huge mass of dogs and stuck his head under the sofa. He pulled out a pink box, trotted over to Sora, and dropped it at his feet. Sora blinked and pointed at himself.
"For me?" The dog nodded. Sora opened the box. "Uh, I think they're gummi blocks." He pulled out the two blocks. Donald nodded.
"Yep, they're gummi blocks." Sora nodded and turned towards the dog.
"Thanks." The dog seemed to nod and went back to celebrate the reunion of a portion of his family. "Well, we should go." The two anthros nodded and headed for the door. Sora took a second to wave good-bye before following the two anthros outside. They had to deal with the Heartless again while they made their way to the alley. Then they had to get rid of the Heartless in the alley while they looked for the entrance to the sewer. Goofy eventually found some loose boards over the opening of what looked like a tunnel. So, the three removed the loose boards and went into what was presumably a very clean sewer.
Inside, they found Leon carefully swinging his gunblade around with Aerith watching him. There were also three puppies napping off to the side. What was really out of place was the nice sun mural on the wall around 30 feet away from them. Aerith seemed to notice the three before Leon. "Oh, you're back. How did it go?" Then again, Leon was still swinging his sword. Maybe he was just ignoring them. Sora knew a surefire way to get the man's attention though.
"Some weird stuff happened with the Keyblade." That got Leon to stop.
"What happened?"
"There were these weird beams of light and a locking sound," explained Goofy. Leon thought for a second.
"Did the beam go into an object shaped like a keyhole?" The three nodded. "You found the Keyholes of the worlds." The three blinked.
"What's a Keyhole?" asked Goofy.
"Every world among the stars has a Keyhole. This Keyhole leads towards the heart of the world," explained Leon. He looked towards the mural for a moment. "This world too must have a Keyhole."
"Why do you know this?" asked Sora.
"It's in Ansem's report," explained Aerith. Sora raised an eyebrow.
"I thought you didn't have any copies."
"One of the moogles here read a couple of them before his world was destroyed," said Aerith. Sora stared in disbelief.
"…You got this information from a Moogle?" Aerith shrugged in a 'What does it matter?' manner. Leon decided to continue his speech.
"The Heartless enter the Keyhole and do something to the world's core."
"What happens to the world?" asked Sora, although he had a pretty good idea.
"Eventually, it disappears." The two anthros' eyes widened.
"What? !" Sora was a bit more calm.
"I think I know where the one for Destiny Islands was…" He sighed. "Oh well, too late for that…"
"Anyway, once you lock the Keyholes, the Heartless can't reach the world's heart," said Leon. "That's why your Keyblade is so important. It's the only thing that can lock the Keyholes."
"That means you're the only one who can do this," continued Aerith. She held her hands in a begging position and made her eyes big and shimmery. "Please, you're the only one who can do it." Sora sweatdropped slightly, but was unable to resist Aerith's puppy dog eyes.
"Okay, okay! I'll do it!" Leon shook his head.
"Another victim…" Sora sweatdropped again. Did this happen often? "Well, seeing other worlds will probably serve you well. Plus, you still haven't found your friends, right?" Sora shook his head.
"No, I haven't found anything."
"We haven't seen any sign of King Mickey either," said Donald.
"You'll just have to keep looking," said Leon. "Now, if there's anything else…" Sora summoned the Jungle King. Leon gave it an odd look. "What is that?"
"It's the Keyblade. I changed the charm on the end, and it changed shape," explained Sora. He pointed at the chain on his arm. "A chain wrapped around my arm and the original charm showed up on it. I don't know where the chain came from." Leon frowned.
"The Keyblade can change its form?"
"Looks that way," said Aerith. "We never knew what its powers are. Is it really so surprising that it has such an ability?" She had a point. She turned to Sora. "I wouldn't worry about it. It'll probably happen at least a few more times if you continue to travel." Sora shrugged.
"It's as good an explanation as any."
"We also found these odd gummi blocks," said Goofy, holding out the two gummi blocks they'd found. "Do you know what they're for?"
Leon stared. "…" And stared. "…" And stared. "…" Aerith rolled her eyes and turned towards the travelers.
"Ask Cid. He should know."
"We'll do that," said Donald. The three turned to leave.
"Wait." They turned toward Leon. "Take this with you." He tossed Sora a black, rectangular stone. The feel of it reminded Sora of materia. He looked it over to see if there was anything special about it, but didn't see anything.
"What is it?"
"A stone with mysterious power. I've been carrying it for luck. I want you to hold onto it."
"How do I use it?"
"…" Sora sweatdropped. Leon gave him a magic stone that he didn't know how to use. Maybe it was like some materia and had to be leveled up before it could be used. Sora slipped it into one of his pockets.
"We should probably leave and see Cid now," said Donald.
"Wait. There's something I'd like to talk with Sora about," said Aerith.
"Okay."
"It's personal. Can we talk over there?" She gestured towards where the three puppies were. Sora shrugged and walked over to them. The puppies woke up and went straight for him. Sora grinned and petted them. Aerith smiled at the sight. "Leon's been trying to get the puppies to their home, but they're afraid to leave because of the Heartless outside."
"They must've smelled the other puppies on me from when we brought them to their house."
"Oh, you found some of them?" Sora nodded.
"Yeah, it sounds like there's still a lot left though. Is that all you wanted to talk about?"
At that, Aerith's expression became solemn. "Sora, what is that singing around you?" Sora frowned.
"Singing?" Aerith nodded.
"It's strange. I can make out the words, but I've never heard any of them before. The voices seem so depressed…but also full of hope. It's an odd combination."
"Wait a minute. I've heard that description before." Sora stood at his full height so that he could look Aerith almost straight in the eye. "Kimihiro said the same thing." Aerith looked surprised.
"Someone else can hear it? Is he…an Ancient?" Sora nodded.
"That's what everyone thinks. You must be one too though if you can hear the singing as well." Aerith nodded.
"Yes, I'm an Ancient, on my mother's side. My father was an ordinary human." Aerith closed her eyes, holding her hands to her chest. "I thought I was the only one left. So there's more."
"You think there's more than just you and Kimihiro?" Aerith smiled and nodded.
"Yes, you." Sora's eyes widened.
"You think I'm a…" Sora sighed and he put his hands behind his head in a thinking position. "Okay, you're not the first person to think that, but I don't think the chances of me being an Ancient are very good."
"But there is a chance?"
"…" Sora dropped his hands. "I can use materia more easily than most people, and it seems stronger when I use it. In addition, I don't seem to suffer any detrimental effects from mako exposure or other procedures that, in theory, would work better on Ancients than normal humans. And I can see ghosts. The only other person I know who has any of that in common with me is Kimihiro…And when I was in another world, the knowledge of how to do a spell just popped into my mind. I don't know why."
"I've never handled materia, so I don't know about that part, but I can see spirits and learned how to use magic on my own too," said Aerith.
"Where do you think that knowledge comes from? I'd seen Donald use it a few times, but he'd never explained it to me."
"I don't think it has to do with being an Ancient." Sora blinked in surprise.
"You don't?" Aerith shook her head.
"No. Every time I learned a new spell, it was when I was in a situation when I was afraid I was going to lose someone important to me." Aerith smiled. "What was the spell, and what happened?" Sora frowned as he remembered the events.
"Goofy got shot in the chest and I used Cure." Aerith smiled and nodded.
"See? You learned Cure because you felt you needed to know it at that exact moment." Sora sighed.
"It still doesn't make much sense. You're making it sound like a limit break or something." Aerith frowned at this.
"Sora, what was your childhood like?" Sora blinked.
"What?"
"I'm curious."
"…" Sora averted his eyes. "I don't like talking about it." Aerith got a concerned look on her face.
"It was bad?"
"At some points. The rest of it wasn't necessarily bad, just…I don't know…intense. I've lived with people trained to kill for as long as I can remember…Death has always been so close…The thought of myself or those close to me dying doesn't bother me at all." Aerith frowned, looking worried and sad.
"I see, you have a completely different set of values than most people." At this Aerith suddenly smiled. "I think those values are changing though if you learned Cure in that situation." Sora blinked. "By the end of your journey, I think you'll understand why you learned that spell." Sora frowned.
"You think I'm changing?" Aerith grinned and nodded.
"Yeah, but in a good way. I can't wait to see you when you've changed. I bet your eyes will be much happier by then." Sora blinked a couple of times.
"What do you mean?"
"You smile a lot, but most of the time your eyes seem so…sad…and full of pain. I'd like to see you again when they match…" Sora sighed.
"I can't believe you noticed…Okay, I'll come see you after this is all over. You can tell me if I'm still faking." Aerith grinned.
"It's a deal." They shook on it. Aerith took a look at the little puppies. "Are you taking them with you?" Sora shrugged.
"Might as well." Sora bent down, scooped the puppies up, and walked over the waiting group.
"You two done?" asked Donald. Sora nodded.
"Yeah, Aerith was just curious about something she noticed. We can leave now. Let's drop these guys off with their parents and go see Cid."
"Be careful. Those three don't want to leave," said Leon. Sora shrugged.
"They gotta leave sometime." That said, Sora went towards the exit. The puppies started squirming, but Sora kept his grip on them as they left the sewers. When no Heartless showed up, they relaxed slightly.
"Good thing we got rid of the Heartless earlier, huh guys?" said Goofy.
"Just be thankful it takes a bit of time for 'em to repopulate an area," said Donald. The puppies finally got out of Sora's grip and ran over to a boarded up section of alley. They started pawing at it and whimpering. The travelers walked over to the puppies.
"You guys find something?" asked Goofy. Sora tapped the wood a couple of times. It wasn't too sturdy.
"Stand back." Sora walked back about 15 ft, turned, and ran toward the wall, hitting it with his shoulder and elbow. The wood splintered, and Sora broke through it. Sora looked to see what had caught the puppies' attention and saw three more puppies looking up at him. "More puppies…"
The three were quite happy to find a back door into the Dalmatians' house in the alley. The puppies were reunited with the present members of their family. The Dalmatians gave the travelers another gummi piece. Then they had to fight their way through the Heartless that had respawned in the second district to reach Cid's shop in the first district.
"Hey Cid! We got something to ask you about!" said Sora.
"Hm?" Cid looked up from a magazine he was looking at. "Well? I don't got all day. What is it?" Goofy held up the two gummi blocks. Cid raised an eyebrow when he saw it. "It's a gummi block split in two. You couldn't tell?"
Donald huffed. "We know that! What we don't know is what it's for."
"You gotta be fucking kidding me. You're flyin' a * censor * gummi ship, and you don't know a fucking thing about navigation gummis? ! Bunch a *censored * pinheads. Innerspace ain't a fucking playground."
"Hey! What else are we supposed to use to travel to other worlds?" said Sora, rather indignant. "We're supposed to save the world. We kind of need to use them."
Cid waved a hand to dismiss Sora's reasoning. "Yeah, yeah, whatever. A navigation gummi allows you to go to new worlds. I'll install it onto your ship, but you gotta do me a favor first." Sora cocked his head to the side and crossed his arms. What sort of errand would Cid want them to do?
"Yeah?"
"Deliver this book for me." Cid handed Sora a very old book that looked like it was missing a few pages. "It's really old, so be careful. When the old man brought it in, it was falling apart and wasn't worth crap. Couldn't even fully restore it. That's the best I could do. Just take it to him. He lives in the house behind that red door in the third district. Ya can't miss it."
"Sounds easy enough," said Sora. "Are you the guy who makes the gummi ships?"
"Yeah. They're not airships, but they're close enough."
"Oh, so that's why the controls are so similar." Sora turned to leave, but then a loud ringing sound rang out and shook the shop. Sora slapped his hands over his ears. "What the fuck? !"
"Oh, that's the bell in the gizmo shop in the second district," explained Cid. "I guess you can check it out, but you better deliver that book for me first. When you're done with that, go to the house in the third district. We wanna talk to you guys some about the Heartless."
"We'll be there," said Donald.
"By the way…" Cid pointed up. "There's a synthesis shop upstairs. You can get to it if you pull down that ladder. The moogles are complaining that the forge has gone out though."
Sora gave Cid a look. "Moogles?"
"Yeah, turns out they're real here." Sora shrugged and looked at the ladder on the ceiling. He shrugged, jumped up, grabbed it, and pulled it down. "Lighting the fireplace should restart the furnace."
"If it's that simple, why don't you do it?" asked Donald.
"Does it look like I care about shit like that?" Sora rolled his eyes at the mechanic and shot a quick Fire into the fireplace. After making sure that it wasn't going out, they climbed the ladder to the second floor.
"Welcome, kupo! May we help you, kupo?" Sora stared at the moogle for a second out of shock.
"We got some materials for synthesis. You got a list of what you can make with the materials?" said Donald.
"Of course, kupo!" The moogle picked up a thin paperback and handed it to the three. "Just tell us when you're ready to synthesize, kupo." Sora took a look at the catalog. There was normal stuff like cottages and elixirs, some accessories, and some power up items. Sora's eyes widened when they fell on one item in particular.
"They can make something like that? ! Well, it might just have the same name. I'll have to see about this one. Too bad I have no idea where to get any of this stuff." Eventually, they got a cottage, a guard earring, an energy bangle, and a power chain.
"Thank you for choosing to synthesize at Mogsam's Synthesis Shop, kupo! You're the first customers I've had in a long time, kupo! Hey, could you do me a favor, kupo?"
"Sure!" said Goofy.
"Get those dogs out of my shop, kupo!" The moogle (Mogsam?) pointed in a corner where three puppies were sleeping.
"How long have those been here?" asked Sora.
"They came in a couple of weeks ago, kupo. I couldn't get them to leave, kupo."
So, they had to go to the Dalmatians' house again, killing any Heartless that came between them and the house. After dropping off the puppies, they went on their way to the third district, continuing the slaughter of any Heartless that crossed their vision. As promised, the door was easy to find. It was red and had a flame on it. Sora tried to open it, but the knob refused to turn.
"It's locked. I guess I could kick it down…"
"It opens with magic," said Donald. "Fire!" The fireball hit the door, and it clicked open.
"I'm gonna have to remember that," muttered Sora as they walked in.
On the other side of the door was a lake with an island in the middle of it. There was a house on it. Between them and the island were several rocks floating back and forth.
"How'd anyone build a house here?" asked Sora. The two anthros shrugged. It was a good question. Sora took a look at the rocks and then jumped over the first one and onto the second one, then onto the fourth one, then the island. Donald sighed.
"Why does he do that?"
"Do you think he'd show us how to do that?" asked Goofy. Donald shrugged and started jumping across the moving stones. Thankfully, Sora had decided to wait for them outside the building. As soon as they reached him, Sora walked into the building with them following him. It was pretty rundown inside. Sora took out the book.
"Why would Cid want us to take a damaged book to a place like this?"
"There's something about this musty place." Sora's eyes widened. Kairi was walking around the building with her hands behind her, looking around the place with a smile on her face. "It reminds me of the Secret Place back home, where we used to scribble on the walls." She turned to look at him, still smiling. "Remember?"
Then someone was shaking him. "Sora? You okay?" Sora turned to look at Goofy, who looked concerned. Sora then turned back to where Kairi had just been, only she was gone.
"I'm hallucinating again?"
"Well, well, you arrived much sooner than expected." The three spun around to see a man with a long white beard, glasses, a bag, a blue robe, a blue pointy hat, and a wooden staff in his left hand. Sora narrowed his eyes when he processed the meaning of the sentence.
"You knew we were coming?"
"Of course!"
"Why?"
"I suppose I should explain. My name is Merlin. As you can see, I am a sorcerer. I spend much of my time traveling." He took a moment to stretch. "It's good to be home. Your king has requested my help."
Goofy perked up. "King Mickey?"
Merlin nodded. "Yes, indeed. So you are Donald, Goofy, and…Who might you be young man?"
"Sora."
Merlin gave him a quick look over. "So, you're the one who found the key…Interesting…"
"So what did the king ask you to do?" asked Donald.
"Just a moment." Merlin stepped onto a pedestal into the middle of the room, put his bag on the ground, opened it, and started waving his arms. "Presto!" Little items immediately started floating out of the bag, growing bigger as soon as they got out. When they reached full size, the items put themselves in what were presumably their proper places. After a few minutes of this, the place looked much homier. "There, much better. Now, your king asked me to train you in the art of magic. We can start any time you like. Just let me know when you're ready to start the training. Oh, and another thing." He pointed at what appeared to be a miniature white carriage. Then it turned into a friendly looking woman with white hair, a blue outfit and a purple bow, and a wand.
"Hello, I'm the fairy godmother. You're king asked me to help too. I will assist you throughout your journey."
"I do not know how much I can be of help, but stop by anytime," said Merlin.
"Actually, we just came to deliver this book." Sora handed the sorcerer the old book.
"Oh, so Cid asked you to bring this book to me?" He chuckled. "Thank you." He set it down on a pedestal before turning back towards the travelers. "You wish to know what kind of book it is?" The two anthros nodded while Sora just put his hands behind his head. "I don't even know myself. In fact, it's not even mine. Somehow, it found its way into my bag one day. It was such a curious book, I asked Cid to repair it for me." He looked at the book again. "This book holds a great secret. The missing pages will unlock it." He looked back at the travelers. "Do look at it whenever you want. Do give my regards to Cid for repairing it for me. Another thing. That stone of yours…You should see the fairy godmother about that.
"Stone?" Then he remembered the stone Leon had given him and pulled it out. "You mean this?" Merlin nodded.
"Yes, this is the Fairy Godmother's expertise though so I suggest you show it to her." Sora shrugged, walked the two feet to her, and held out the stone. She chuckled at this and took a look at the stone. She frowned slightly.
"Poor thing! He has turned into a summon gem!" This interested Sora.
"Is it like a summon materia?"
"It's similar. This little creature lived on a world that was consumed by darkness. When a world disappears, so do its inhabitants. But this one had such a strong heart that he became a gem instead of vanishing with his world." Sora took a look at the gem.
"It's possible to summon him? Will he stay or will he disappear again?"
"You can summon him, but he is only a spirit and will only stay for a short amount of time. Then he will return to the gem. Now, watch!" She waved her wand and touched the gem with it. "Bibbity bobbity boo!" The gem glowed for several seconds. Sora was surprised to suddenly sense a foreign entity in his mind.
"Who's there? What are you doing in my mind?"
"What's going on? Where am I?"
"Are you the summon?"
"Summon? What are you talking about?"
"Okay, I am Sora. And you are…?"
"Simba."
"Okay, what was the last thing you remember?"
"I was swimming with Timon and Pumba, but then…Wait! What happened to them? !"
"I don't know. It sounds like they might've disappeared with your world."
"No!"
"Look, I'm in a similar situation. My world disappeared too. If I get rid of the creatures responsible, the worlds that disappeared will come back. Would you be willing to help me?"
"…Yes, but I'm not sure how I can."
"We'll work on it, okay?"
"…Okay." And then the presence left his mind. Donald and Goofy were staring at him. The Fairy Godmother was smiling knowingly. Sora had a feeling she knew what had just happened.
"Whenever you call, he will help you. If you find any more of these, please bring them to me. Don't worry, when their worlds are restored, they will return home. Sora, please help them."
"Sure, why not?" With that, he slipped the gem into one of his many pants pockets and turned towards Merlin. "So, how do I use this?"
"You should be able to use it like a summon materia." Sora blinked.
"You know how to use a summon materia?" Merlin chuckled.
"I've come across many things on my travels. That includes those spheres that contain the power of the lifestream of your home world. I also recognize that you have been exposed to mako. That's the extent of my knowledge in that subject though." Sora sighed. For a second, he'd been hoping to see if he had mako poisoning or not.
"Hey guys, come look at this," said Goofy. He was looking at the book.
"What now?" muttered Donald.
"It's glowing."
"The book's glowing?" Sora stepped closer for a better look. It was indeed glowing. "Why is it glowing?" Sora touched a page with his pointer finger, glowed white, and suddenly disappeared. The anthros' eyes widened.
"Sora!"
"Oh my. I'm sorry. I had no idea it could do that," said Merlin.
"Now what are we supposed to do? !" shouted Donald. "We needed him to find the king!"
"The story in that book is for children. Sora will be safe. He just needs to find his way back out," said Merlin.
"How long do ya think that'll take?" asked Goofy.
"I'm not sure," said Merlin. "We'll just have to wait for him."
With Sora, he was blinking and trying to process what just happened. "I just got sucked into a book." He looked down. "And I appear to be standing on a page…" Sora turned around in a circle to see if there was anything that stood out. He sweatdropped slightly when he saw what appeared to be a pop-up of a tree with a door in it. That was the only thing that stood out so he made his way over to it. He stared at it for a moment before reaching out with a hand and touching it. He was then blinded by a flash of light.
When the light faded, Sora found himself standing a few feet away from the tree, only now it seemed to be real, and he was standing on dirt with some plants around him. There was also a yellow bear with a red shirt sitting on a log in front of the tree tapping its head with its paw. It didn't look like a real bear though. It looked more like a stuffed toy, except it was moving. No one else was there, so Sora walked up to it.
"Think, think, think, think." Sora raised an eyebrow. How odd. At least he was pretty sure the bear was male now.
"What are you doing?" The bear looked up, seemingly unsurprised.
"Thinking." Sora rolled his eyes. That was kind of obvious considering he kept saying 'think' over and over again, but Sora decided to try and talk to him anyway.
"About what?"
"I was thinking about how to say goodbye to Pooh." Sora cocked his head.
"Pooh?" Odd name. The bear looked up.
"Yes?" Sora stared for a second before it clicked.
"You're Pooh?"
The bear nodded. "Yes, I'm Winnie the Pooh. Pooh for short. Who are you?"
"Sora."
"Hello Sora. Have you come to say goodbye to Pooh too?" Sora raised an eyebrow at this and sat down next to Pooh.
"I just got here. Why would I need to say good-bye?"
"Because everyone's gone away." Sora blinked.
"What do you mean?"
"Well, we all lived here in the Hundred Acre Wood," explained Pooh. "And we'd take walks together, or play Pooh sticks…And every day, I'd eat some honey." Pooh sighed. "Just one small smackeral would taste very good right now." Then Pooh got a bit sadder. "But now everyone's gone, all my friends, and my favorite Hunny Tree too. Everyone must've gone away while I was napping, I think…" Pooh was silent for a moment before standing up. "So who knows? Maybe I shall end up going away somewhere as well. But I wonder, how do I say goodbye to myself?" He started tapping his forehead again while walking to the tree with a door. "Think, think, think." He opened the door and walked inside. Sora sat there for a moment.
"I guess most people would wonder the same thing…" Sora stood up again and walked into the house. Inside, Pooh was licking a paw and holding a brown, two-toned pot. He seemed rather sad and was staring morosely into the pot. Sora bent down to Pooh's level. "Something wrong?"
"Oh bother, there's no more honey left." Pooh sighed. "If only the Hunny Tree would visit…Then I could eat my fill…"
"You got a lot of pots here." It was true. Pooh's house was full of pots, presumably full of honey. "There's probably one with honey in it around here." Sora looked at the pots on top of a cupboard that seemed too tall for Pooh to reach. Weirdly enough, it looked like most of them had been full of honey, but had been emptied. Sora did find one about ¾ of the way full which he handed to Pooh. The little bear immediately brightened up.
"Oh, thank you very much Sora." Pooh immediately started stuffing the honey into his mouth.
"Yeah, you're welcome." Sora went to leave and opened the door. He blinked. There was an owl standing in front of the door.
"Hello." Oh, the owl could talk too. "Let me guess: You'd like to know what happens next."
"Well, yeah, this is kind of weird. Wait a minute. Do you know something?"
"No. Some of the pages are missing, so I can't know."
"The pages?" Then something clicked in Sora's mind. "Pooh's friends are missing because the pages are missing?" The owl nodded.
"The pages are scattered over many worlds. Would you find them for us?" Before Sora even had a chance to answer, a strong wind suddenly picked him up and flung him back. Sora pushed himself up, and found himself looking at Goofy and Donald.
"You're back!" said the knight.
"What happened?" asked Donald. Sora looked over at the innocent looking book.
"I think there's a world inside that book."
"That's not very unusual," said Merlin. "Often, the story written in a book becomes a world all its own. It is possible to travel to these worlds, but only with the books with the story, and only a very small percentage of the books can serve as a portal, usually one. No one is really certain how these worlds can exist in books or the true nature of them. I've heard that there are ways to bring beings from these worlds out of the books, but that it has a high price."
"There's something wrong with it." Merlin blinked.
"The Heartless? They can reach those worlds?"
"No, I didn't see any. It was something else." Sora explained what he'd been told while in the Hundred Acre Woods. When he was done, Merlin was rubbing his chin in thought.
"So individuals and parts of the world have disappeared because some of the pages were torn out…"
"That's what it looks like," said Sora, crossing his arms. "And that owl asked me to find the missing pages."
"Are you gonna go look for them?" asked Goofy. Sora shrugged.
"If I see them, I'll bring them back, but that's it."
"C'mon, let's go. Cid said we were gonna talk about the Heartless in the third district," said Donald.
"I don't think that's a good idea," said Merlin. "At night time, Heartless activity increases exponentially. I think even you would have difficulty. I suggest you stay here for the night. You and Sora can practice magic a bit. I'd offer to let Goofy practice too, but he can't use magic."
"I'm okay with it," said Sora. "I need to figure out how to use that summon any way."
"It is a good opportunity to improve my magic…," said Donald.
"Hey, you guys agreed on something!" said Goofy. Sora and Donald blinked a couple of times. Then they decided they didn't care and it wasn't worth it.
"Well then, to my lab." Merlin tapped the floor with his staff, and the section of floor they were on rose up through a hole in the roof to a room that was noticeably bare. Merlin made a grand sweep with his spare arm. "You can practice here to your heart's content. Only magic will work on the objects I summon though." With that, Merlin snapped his fingers and several floating tea pots and cabinets appeared.
"We're beating up furniture?" asked Sora.
"Don't worry. It's easy to fix," said Merlin.
"Fire!" Donald blew up a cabinet. Then the pieces flew back together, making another cupboard.
"That'd come in handy at my house," said Sora, remembering all the times walls and furniture had been destroyed due to spats. Then he held the Keyblade forward, pointing at another cupboard. "Fire!" This one was blown up as well. Sora and Donald continued to cast various spells on the poor furniture until Merlin stopped and told them some ways they could improve their spell casting.
"Are you going to try your summon now?" asked Merlin. Sora pulled out the summon gem and looked at it before nodding. He tried to use it like he would a summon materia. This seemed to work, as he could feel an unfamiliar power flow through him. Sora spun the Keyblade a few times, slashed it diagonally twice to make an 'X,' and then held it straight up. A light flew out of the tip, and the shadowed silhouette of a lion appeared behind Sora. Then it cleared up, and a lion with a red mane was standing next to him with a confused look on his face. Sora looked at him in surprise.
"You're Simba?"
"You're Sora? What are you?"
"I'm a human. Donald's a duck. I'm pretty sure Goofy's some sort of dog."
"A human? I've never heard of a human before."
"I wouldn't worry about it. Humans aren't that different from animals."
"What are those?"
"Tea pots. And Cupboards. We're destroying them, like this. Fire!" Sora shot a tea pot, which shattered. "Think you can do that?"
"I can't shoot fire." And then he disappeared. Sora blinked and shrugged.
"Guess there's a time limit. What's with you guys?" Donald and Goofy were giving him confused looks and Merlin was thoughtful.
"You were talking to it," said Donald.
"Yeah, he had some questions."
"Oh, you can understand him?" asked Goofy.
"Yeah, that's unusual?"
"It is uncommon. I know Aerith can communicate with her summons, but no one else seems to be able to," said Merlin. "I guess it's something you two have in common. Or maybe it's just the Keyblade. Hard to say."
"How does Simba use his attacks?" asked Sora. "He doesn't seem to know how."
"Try channeling some mana to him. That should work. He should be able to claw and bite like a normal lion if that doesn't work, and that should be pretty strong on its own. There's a reason the lion is called the King of the Beasts." Sora nodded and summoned Simba again.
"Okay, I'm gonna try something." Sora channeled his magical energy to Simba. After a couple of seconds of this, Simba suddenly let out a loud roar, shattering nearby tea pots and cupboards. Sora grinned. "Nice." Simba looked a little surprised.
"That's never happened before…"
"Well, I think that's enough for now," said Merlin. "I'll get you some beds for the night." He then magiced up three beds. Sora dismissed Simba, and the three climbed into the beds. There wasn't really much else they could do at the moment.
It was dark. Very dark. It took Sora a moment to realize that this was because his eyes were closed. He struggled to open his eyes, but his eyelids were so heavy, it took a very long time. Sora finally managed to open them, only to find that his vision was badly blurry, and the room he was in was only dimly illuminated by a faint blue light. Sora tried to sit up, but a wave of pain caused him to let out a yell of pain and fall back down on the hard bed he was on.
"Careful!" Sora tried to tilt his head towards the voice. All he could make out was dark hair and mismatched eyes. "You were pretty badly hurt. It's gonna be a few days before you can get out of bed." Sora stared at the mismatched eyes as the pain in his chest continued to pulse. He started to tear up as he thought about what was causing it.
"It hurts…" A hand brushed the hair off his sweaty forehead. Then the hand rested on his forehead, cooling it off slightly.
"It's not just physical. It's also the worst type of emotional pain. It's okay. You don't have to hold it in. Just let it out." Sora choked out a sob. Then he started sobbing and sobbing, not able to stop, and not wanting to.
Sora bolted up, clutching at his heart and panting. "Another dream?" Sora groaned and palmed his face. "Why am I having these dreams now? It's been years."
"Are you okay?" Sora looked up and saw Goofy looking concerned at him. Donald and Merlin weren't there. "You looked like you were having a nightmare."
"It's nothing. Just a memory." Sora got out of bed and stretched slightly. Once again, he hadn't bothered to take off any of his clothes before going to sleep. "Where are Donald and Merlin?"
The knight pointed down. "They're downstairs, eating breakfast," said Goofy.
"Okay, well, let's go get some food," said Sora, walking to the moving patch of floor.
"Sora?" Sora looked back at Goofy. He looked worried. "Are ya sure you're okay?" Sora put a smile on his face.
"Yeah, it's not a horrible memory. I was just in a lot of pain at the time. Are you coming or not?" Goofy nodded and walked over to the patch of floor, which then moved down back to the study where Donald and Merlin were sitting at a table. Donald was eating some kind of oatmeal. Merlin wasn't really eating. He just seemed to be thinking, but perked up when he saw Sora and Goofy.
"Good morning. I was getting worried. You wouldn't wake up, and it sounds like you usually are up before these two." Sora shrugged.
"I guess I must be a little rusty." He sat at the table and spooned some oatmeal into his bowl.
"What were you dreaming about anyway?" asked Donald.
"Nothing important. Just a memory," said Sora. Donald raised an eyebrow. Sora ignored this as he didn't feel like sharing any more information. After they finished breakfast they left the house.
"Hey, there's a chest over there," said Goofy, pointing at a smile island a few feet away from the island Merlin's house was situated on. Curious to see what was in it, Sora jumped over and opened it. He twitched when three spotted heads poked out of the chest.
"It's another one of those puppy chests!" shouted Sora. Donald and Goofy groaned. They had gotten used to these, but it was still annoying. It looked like they'd have to wait to go to the house with the meeting in it. Sora jumped back to Merlin's island with the puppies, and they all jumped across the moving stones to the door out of the cave. As soon as they stepped out of the door, a couple of Soldier Heartless popped up. However, before Sora even unsheathed the Keyblade, something slashed through them. Sora stared in shock as Riku, with a sword that looked like a demon wing, turned to look at him.
"There you are." Riku jerked his head backwards towards where the Heartless had been. "What's going on?" Donald was giving him a suspicious look. Goofy had cocked his head in interest. Sora stepped up to Riku and started poking him. "Hey!" Then Sora grabbed the sides of his mouth and started stretching them. Riku knocked him away. "Cut that out!" Sora grinned.
"You're real!" Riku looked confused.
"I keep hallucinating about Kairi. I was afraid I was beginning to hallucinate about you to." Then a look of realization dawned on Sora's face. "Wait. Where's Kairi?" Riku looked confused.
"Isn't she with you?" Sora shook his head.
"No, I've been looking for her too…" Riku thought for a moment.
"Well, I'm sure she got off the island. She's probably looking for us right now." He nodded as a Shadow decided to appear behind him. Sora narrowed his eyes at it. "We'll all be together soon. Don't worry. Just leave everything to me. I know this-" Sora got tired of waiting for Riku to notice the Heartless, so he cut the Shadow in two with the Keyblade. Riku blinked and turned around where Sora was standing. Sora smirked slightly at Riku.
"I think you need to pay more attention to your surroundings first." Riku rolled his eyes.
"You're still the same."
"You mean he's always been like this?" asked Donald. Riku jerked his head towards the two anthros and narrowed his eyes.
"Sora, who are they?"
"Oh, they're looking for their king," explained Sora. "They have a gummi ship so I'm traveling with them to look for you and Kairi. Been to three other worlds looking for you two." Sora grinned again. "Guess I won't have to look for you now. We just have to find Kairi."
"Really?" There was something about Riku's tone that worried Sora. "I never would've guessed."
"And guess what!" said Goofy. "Sora's the Keyblade master! Who would've thought it?" Sora shrugged.
"I still like my daggers more."
"So this is a Keyblade?" Sora blinked. Somehow, Riku was holding the Keyblade, and Sora hadn't noticed that he was no longer holding it. Sora would've found this odd if not for the fact that the Keyblade is ridiculously light. Really, he doesn't get how it can cause so much damage. Sora just decided to shrug it off.
"That's what everyone says. You want it?" Riku blinked.
"You don't want it?" Sora grimaced and put his hands behind his head.
"The only upside I can find about it is that it's easier to kill Heartless with it. Everyone in this world is convinced I'm some chosen one just 'cause I showed up with it. I'd rather find you, Kairi, and the Tsviets." Riku snorted. He didn't seem that surprised. Then he grinned.
"Catch!" He tossed the Keyblade, and it disappeared before reappearing in Sora's hand. The other three blinked.
"Huh, that was kinda cool," said Sora, looking the Keyblade over. "I think you might be better at using this than me."
"What? !" shouted Donald. He was ignored.
"So, you're coming with us." Riku raised an eyebrow. Sora seemed to be saying this as a statement not a question. "We've already looked in a few worlds for Kairi, so she's not in those. We're getting a navigation gummi installed in our gummi ship so we can go to more worlds she might be in."
"He can't come!" said Donald. Sora gave him a glare.
"Either he comes or I leave!"
"What? !"
"You heard me! He's my friend, and I don't want to lose him again!"
"I don't care!"
"Uh, guys? He's gone," said Goofy. He pointed where Riku had been. Sora looked at the spot where Riku had been. For a second he seemed upset, sad. Then he gave Donald a look capable of freezing magma, killing a legion of Heartless, scaring Kuja, making Garland think he would either be useful or a threat, and then some. This of course, meant Donald froze up. Sora grabbed the puppies, which were also frozen by his look, and stormed off. Goofy managed to shake it off first.
"Gawrsh, maybe you shoulda let him come with us." Donald shook his head.
"We have to be careful of the world order. We can't take too many people or we'll mess it up."
"Yeah, but Sora seemed pretty angry about it," said Goofy. "Do you think he'll come back?"
"He has to. He can't travel without our ship." Donald started walking off. He stopped when he saw Goofy wasn't following. "C'mon, we gotta get to that house."
"Donald, I think we're using Sora, but I wanna be his friend…" Donald sighed.
"I know you don't like it, but our priority is to find His Majesty, and we need the Keyblade master to do that."
"I know, but it doesn't seem right…" With that said, they spent a few minutes looking for the house they were supposed to meet in. Inside the house were Cid, Leon, Yuffie, and Aerith.
"It's about time you bozos got here!" shouted Yuffie pointing at them accusingly. Then she narrowed her eyes and cocked her head. "Wait a minute. You're one short."
"Well, Sora and Donald kind of had a fight…" said Goofy. He wasn't exactly sure how to describe it.
"Any idea when he'll get here?" asked Leon. Just then Sora came in with a slightly upset look on his face.
"There you are!" said Donald. This was a bad idea as Sora gave him the same look that he had earlier.
"Holy crap! That actually looks worse than the Squall Death Glare!" shouted Yuffie, pointing at Sora.
"It's Leon."
"Can we get this fucking meeting started already? !" Sora stopped glaring at Donald and gave Cid his full attention. Aerith giggled.
"I think we're ready." Cid rolled his eyes before getting serious.
"You guys ever hear of Maleficient? I hear she's in town."
"Who's Maleficient?" asked Sora.
"She's a bitch! A fucking * bleeped * shit of a bitch!" That's Cid for ya. Sora found it slightly amusing. Guy swore more than anyone he'd ever known.
"She's the reason this town is full of Heartless," said Leon. "Don't take her lightly."
Aerith nodded. "She's been using the Heartless for years."
"We lost our worlds thanks to her," said Leon.
"Yeah, one day, a swarm of Heartless just appeared," said Cid.
"My world was lost 9 years ago," said Leon.
"For the rest of us it's been 7 years," said Yuffie.
"I got out of that * censor * mess and came here with those two," said Cid, pointing at Aerith and Yuffie. "Leon won't tell us how he got here."
"That's awful!" said Donald. He actually seemed to be sincere.
"The leader of my world was a wise man called Ansem," said Leon. "He dedicated his life to studying the Heartless."
"If we had his reports, we could get rid of those ******fucking Heartless," said Cid. Sora put his hands behind his head.
"Too bad the pages got scattered."
"Yeah, but I bet Maleficient's got most of the pages, * bleep *" muttered Cid.
"Man, can you say a sentence without a bad word?" asked Yuffie.
While Cid said something rather colorful to Yuffie, the group was being watched from a rooftop by Riku and the woman with the horns. The woman gestured towards the group. "You see? It's just as I told you. While you toiled away, searching for your friend, he quite simply…replaced you with some new some companions. Evidently, now he values them far more than he does you." She placed her hand on Riku's shoulder while the boy continued to look at Sora, who seemed to be amused by Cid's outburst. "You're better off without that wretched boy. Now, think no more of him, and come with me. I'll help you find what you're looking for." With that, she turned and started walking away. With one last glance towards Sora, Riku turned to follow the sorceress.
Back in the house, Cid was done blowing up at Yuffie and turned to Sora. "You deliver that book?" Sora nodded. "Good, one less thing for me to do. I installed the navigation gummi. If you find anymore, bring 'em to me. I also threw in a warp gummi so you can warp to worlds you've already been to. That way you can take care of this problem faster. As for me, I'm going back to my real job." Sora raised an eyebrow.
"Your real job?"
"Yep, I was just watching the accessory shop for someone. I'll still be in the first district if you need me though." And then the loud bell rang again. Sora yelped and slapped his hands over his ears. Yuffie pointed at him and laughed. Aerith gave him a sympathetic look.
"Your hearing's sensitive enough that the ringing hurts it, huh?" Sora nodded. "I thought so. Don't worry though. It doesn't ring too often." Aerith looked thoughtful and put her fist under her lips. "Although, I've been thinking." Sora uncovered his ears and blinked.
"About what?"
"There's a legend about the bell over the gizmo shop," explained Yuffie. "Something good's supposed to happen if you ring it three times."
"But it's all boarded up," said Aerith. "Nobody can get in."
"That's not a problem! Sora can break through boards really easy!" said Goofy. Yuffie sighed and shrugged.
"That figures."
"* bleep * If you can get in, then go check it out," said Cid. "Ring the fucking bell three times and see if anything happens."
"Sure," said Sora.
"Really?" said Donald. That was a bit out of character for Sora.
"Yeah, I still have some misplaced aggression to work out," said Sora with a glower towards the duck.
"Misplaced aggression?" asked Yuffie.
"I think he's still angry at Donald," whispered Goofy.
"Well, that sucks," said Yuffie. The three travelers left the house shortly after this and went to the second district. After taking care of the Heartless that they ran into, they found a door with a sign next to it that said Gizmo shop. The inside didn't look like a shop. It had some clocks and platforms. As soon as they entered, some heartless showed up. There were 2 Green Requiems and 4 Heartless that looked similar to Soldiers except they had aviator caps and goggles with tiny propellers on the top and a pair of leathery wings. Sora took a quick look.
"Air Soldier. Figures. Nothing too special. Just can fly." Sora grinned and did something he hadn't done since fighting Cloud: He let loose. He jumped up, let out a slash, and landed behind the six Heartless. The Heartless fell to the ground and dispersed. Goofy and Donald shared a look. Sora had been acting violent since they left Leon's house, and they were pretty sure they knew why. The rest of the Heartless that showed up were also quickly and violently dealt with by the young Tsviet. Fortunately, there weren't too many between them and the back door. On the other side of the door was a ladder that led to the roof. On the top of the roof was all the different kind of spell-casting Heartless. Goofy managed to slice a Red Nocturne in half. Donald hit a Blue Rhapsody with Fire. By then, Sora had killed all the other ones.
"Sora, are you okay?" asked Goofy. Sora gave a grin, which was obviously supposed to be fake.
"Oh, I'm fine. Everything's great!" The sarcasm in his voice was overwhelming. Then he walked over to some boards that were blocking an alcove and started kicking them down.
"I think you should've just let his friend come," said Goofy.
"No kidding," muttered Donald. "This is kind of creepy." There was a loud cracking sound as Sora finished breaking down the boards and tossed the pieces away. There was a ladder in the alcove which Sora climbed up. At the top was a rope. He pulled out a couple of ear plugs, put them in, and pulled the rope, ringing the bell. Down below, there was a fountain with a mural on it. When Sora rang the bell, the mural rotated (seems it was a cube) to a different picture. Donald and Goofy watched this happen.
"Is that it?" asked Donald. "That doesn't seem so great."
"That was only once though," pointed out Goofy. Sora rang the bell again and the mural turned to another picture. Sora rang it one last time, and the mural turned to another picture. This time though a blue sheet of light appeared in front of it with a keyhole in it. The anthros' eyes widened.
"The Keyhole!" Sora looked down from where he was and took out the earplugs.
"The Keyhole? Guess I better lock it." With that, he jumped down from the alcove, walked past the anthros, and jumped off the building and to the ground.
"Hey!" shouted Donald. "Wait for us!" He jumped down after Sora. Goofy shrugged and jumped down as well. Sora calmly walked towards the Keyhole but stopped a few feet away from it. Then he jumped up just as a giant suit of armor identical to the last one dropped down from the sky.
"I thought we took care of that!" shouted Donald.
"Maybe there's more than one," said Goofy. Sora didn't care and he leapt at the armor and started hitting it as quick as he could. The armor tried to punch him, but Sora jumped back to avoid it. Donald took advantage of it and cast a Blizzard spell. The armor sent a hand at him, but this left it open to Sora who hit it with the Keyblade hard enough to knock it a couple of feet back. The armor shook a couple of times. Then it put its hands on the ground and the head floated off as it did a handstand. As it finished doing the hand stand, its feet changed to resemble pincers and its head put itself on its former bottom and the visor opened. Sora froze up at this.
"That's not right!" And that's not all that ran through his mind. He immediately wondered how other people would react.
Weiss: "Is this one of Hojo's weird experiments?"
Nero: "That. Is. Disgusting."
Seren: "Huh? Oh well, don't care. Still gonna kill it."
Rosso: "The fuck? !"
Ash: Laughs hysterically while pointing.
Azul: "Is this supposed to help it?"
Kimihiro: "This isn't the weirdest thing I've ever seen…" Sighs. "That sure says a lot about my life…"
Chris: Raises an eyebrow. "…"
Zoro: "Great, I must be drunk."
Kyo: "Ha! Asshole!"
Zakuro: "Now what? !"
Ed: "Holy-Why would-That's not-Oh forget it! Not like it can do anything worse than this."
Sora shuddered at the imagined reactions. This was the only reason the altered armor was able to hit him into a wall. Sora let out an odd choking sound. "Heal!" "No one must ever know of this." With the disturbing thoughts over, Sora launched himself at the armor and bashed a pincer to the ground. He then continued to bash it, making the two anthros sweatdrop. The armor just backed away from Sora and decided to go for the two sane ones. They were able to defend themselves though. Goofy blocked one of the clawed feet with his shield while Donald cast a Thunder spell. Sora continued to bash the pincer like a mad man. He didn't seem to notice the rest of the armor was busy.
"What's wrong with him? !" shouted Donald. "Can't he see we need some help? !" At that moment, Sora finally shattered the pincer he'd been bashing. Then he rushed over and hit one of the feet to the ground and started bashing it. He still didn't seem to notice that Donald and Goofy were having problems. The armor tried to hit Sora with its pincer, but Sora hit it away and continued bashing the foot. It shattered before the armor could do anything else. This seemed to be enough for the armor. It dropped to the ground and started spinning around, much like the last armor they had fought. They all had to run every which way to avoid it. Donald hit it with another Blizzard spell, freezing it to the ground. Sora and Goofy started bashing the incapacitated armor until it broke free, but Sora hit the other pincer extra hard, causing the pincer to break in two. The armor tried to grab Goofy with its foot, but Sora hit it to the ground and started bashing it mercilessly. The rest of the armor did something odd. The head floated off, the body changed position so that the narrow end was pointing at Goofy and Sora, and the head floated down to the spot in the middle of the body. A dark ball of energy started building up on the end that was pointing towards the two. Sora either didn't notice or didn't care. Goofy jumped in front of Sora with his shield held up. Sora noticed this and looked up just as the foot finally broke. Then the armor fired the energy at them. Donald's eyes widened.
"Aero!" Donald blinked. He didn't remember knowing that spell before. It wasn't a bad thing though. The only problem was that the spell would only work on one person, and Donald had no idea which person it had been used on. He was rather surprised when the dust cloud the blast had caused cleared and both Goofy and Sora had a wind shield. Sora raised an eyebrow.
"That's new. What sort of spell is this?"
"Just get it!" shouted Donald before casting a Thunder spell. The armor floated backwards before Sora ran up to it and started slashing the armor very quickly. The armor tried to speed up its floating away, but Sora threw the Keyblade at it. It was thrown with enough force to go straight through the armor. It let out a strangled squeak/squeal type noise before falling to the ground and crumbled to pieces as a heart floated off and away.
"Finally!" shouted Sora. "That was one of the most wrong things I have ever seen!"
"I don't get it," said Goofy. "It was just another Heartless. What was so bad about it?"
"Did you not see where its head went? !" Goofy's face lit up in realization.
"Oh…I get it!"
"Sora, did you use Aero?" asked Donald.
"Aero? Wait. Was it that wind thing?" Donald nodded. "It's different from the Aero in my world…"
"Did you use it or not?" Sora frowned.
"Yeah, I wasn't even in Wisdom form this time though…"
"Uh, wasn't there something else about that spell?" asked Goofy. It looked like he was trying to remember something.
"You can only cast Aero on one person," said Donald. "Sora and I both just now learned it." That caused Sora to perk up a little.
"Well, if it happened to you too, I guess I shouldn't worry too much about it."
"Aren't you gonna lock that?" asked Donald, pointing at the Keyhole.
"Right." Sora held the Keyblade up and pointed it at the Keyhole. The familiar beam of light shot into the Keyhole and the clicking sound was heard. As the beam and Keyhole disappeared, a gummi block fell from somewhere onto the ground. Goofy picked up the block and gave it a look.
"Guys, this looks like the navigation gummi that we found."
"Well, I guess, that we'll go see if we can find Cid," said Sora.
They looked all around the first district, but they couldn't find him anywhere.
"Let's just look for him later," muttered Donald.
"Yeah, let's just go," said Sora. He wanted to get going and look for Kairi on the new worlds they'd be able to go to.
"We got everything we need, right?" asked Goofy.
"Yeah, we got lots of potions, hi-potions, and ethers from fighting all those Heartless," said Donald.
"Well, let's go then!" Sora started running towards the gates.
"I think he's back to normal," said Goofy.
"Well, that's a relief. He was creepy like that," muttered Donald. With that, they ran after the Tsviet.
-line break-
Did anyone else think the Guard Armor's transformation to Opposite Armor was creepy? My reaction upon seeing this was 'Did it just-Holy-That ain't right!' I tried to get what I thought Sora would think. Then I wondered how the other Tsviets would react to this. It might've had something to do with watching 'The Smoking Gun' right before working on that part. Oh well, I thought it was fun.
I did not plan that conversation with Yuffie. That just came out. Just goes to show that Yuffie is somehow able to make you do strange things even when you're the one writing about her.
Let's see, I think that's 36 puppies. It's hard to keep track of those things.
Is Sora an Ancient? He's not sure, but Aerith seems to think he is. Kimihiro is the equivalent of an Ancient in his world so he is considered an Ancient and has powers like one. Whether Sora is an Ancient or not will be revealed in a later chapter.
Did you like the dream sequence? There's a reason I showed this one, but not the one in Deep Jungle. That's a secret right now though.
Personally, I was surprised that Sora wasn't that upset when Riku went and disappeared again. So when I wrote it, I decided to have Sora react how I thought he should react, and he took out his anger on the Heartless.
I think this chapter could use a little work. You guys please tell me any suggestions you might have to make it better, and I'll make those additions. As for now, I'll give you guys two omakes. One is the regular Tsviet one. The other one is something that happens during the chapter.
Omake: What about the Rest? Part VI
"Hey, Mirajane! Look what we found!" shouted Natsu. The barkeeper looked up from cleaning her glasses and blinked when she saw what Natsu was talking about. It was a girl, maybe 12 or 13, in an odd gray outfit with glowing blue lines. She had curly blonde and brown hair in a ponytail and blue-green eyes that were glowing. She also had a rather blank look on her face, like she was dead to the world.
"Weird, huh?" said Happy.
"You're one to talk," muttered Lucy. Mirajane smiled at the odd girl.
"Well, nice to meet you. What's your name?"
"Christine the Aquamarine." Monotone. Odd.
"Her name rhymes! Is that cool or what? !" said Natsu.
"So, do you want to join the guild?" asked Mirajane. The girl seemed to have a lot of magical energy so it would only make sense.
"No." Mirajane blinked.
"No?"
"She got dragged here by Lucy because she was using some sort of weird summoning magic," explained Happy.
"Lucy dragged her here? Odd, usually it's Natsu who drags people here." This was true. That was how Lucy ended up joining.
"She can summon creatures without keys! And they weren't anything I've ever seen before! I'm gonna find out what they were!" shouted Lucy.
"…" Chris didn't seem to care. This annoyed Lucy.
"Hey! Do you even hear me? !"
"She cast some really tasty fire magic too!" said Natsu, drooling slightly.
"It's a bit odd that she can use different types of magic," said Happy. "Do you think there's something different about her magic?"
"It is unusual for a person to have more than one type of magic," mused Mirajane. "Do you have any idea why this might be Christine?"
"…"
"Not very talkative, are you?"
"She only talked 6 times on the way here," muttered Lucy.
"Hey, can I have some more of your fire?" asked Natsu. Chris fired a large fireball at the Salamander. Natsu happily grabbed it and started eating it.
"Well, she seemed okay with that," mused Mirajane.
"That's only because he keeps bugging her nonstop to do that when he gets hungry," said Lucy. "I'm pretty sure she's just doing that so she doesn't have to listen to him ask over and over again."
"It's true. She was twitching really bad for a while back there," said Happy.
"…"
"You know, if she's not a member, she can't stay here," said Mirajane.
"She can probably stay with me. Hey! Where'd she go? !" Chris had disappeared while they were talking.
"Maybe she can turn invisible," suggested Happy.
"Don't be ridiculous. If she could, she would've done that days ago! I gotta go find her!" With that Lucy ran off. Mirajane chuckled.
"This should be interesting, don't you think?"
"Aye." Natsu was too busy eating his fireball to answer.
Omake II: Still Likes Puppies
Angeal Hewley was dead. He'd been dead for a while. He wasn't sure how long he'd been dead, but he'd guess around 10 years. It was hard to keep track of time when you no longer had a body. If this wasn't weird enough, Angeal had somehow ended up in some weird town where it was usually dark. He wasn't exactly sure how he ended up there from the Lifestream, but it wasn't all bad. It wasn't like there was anyone there who could see him, except for maybe one girl with brown hair in a braid and a pink bow. Whenever he happened to see her, she was looking right at him, probably because he still had those wings growing out of his shoulder. He avoided the young woman as much as possible.
Another thing Angeal found odd were the little black things running around the place. They attacked anything they could, including Angeal. Angeal wasn't sure if they could hurt him, but he could hurt them. Whenever one got close, he hit them with his sword, and easily killed them. Angeal didn't know why he had a sword. He'd given it to Zack. Maybe it had been so important to him that it had left an impression on him. Or maybe he was able to summon a copy of it. Angeal honestly didn't know. He didn't know that much about what happens after death.
On the bright side, he'd found a nice place to stay. It was a pleasant little place. The only things that lived there were a couple of Dalmatian dogs. Angeal had gotten used to the strangeness of Traverse Town by then. He was just fine with his situation. The dogs could see him, which he figured wasn't too weird. Angeal remembered hearing that animals were more sensitive to the spirit world than humans. He could touch the dogs too. He hadn't really been able to keep any dogs for very long in Shinra tower. With his job, he had to travel around a lot. It just wouldn't have been fair for the dogs. Being dead, Angeal no longer had this problem. The only problem was that the two dogs seemed sad about something, and nothing he did would cheer them up.
After several years of living, sort of, like this, Angeal got a big surprise.
"Sora? !" It certainly looked like the small boy, only much older. Even more surprising was that he was looking right at Angeal.
"What 'cha lookin' at Sora?" Well, that proved it. This was indeed Sora. He'd grown a lot since Angeal had last seen him.
"Oh…Nothing." Sora was smirking. Well, Angeal was sure Sora could see him, and he seemed a bit more devious now if that look was any indication. "Let's get those puppies that we found locked in tiny cramped chests."
"What? !" The dogs gave Angeal a surprised look, but that's it. He had a furious look on his face. Whoever put the puppies in the chests was likely to be mauled by the angry SOLDIER, which was just what Sora wanted. Then the odd duck that Sora was with went over to the green glowing circle and did something that caused a lot of puppies to appear. This got Angeal's attention. Most of the puppies ran over to the larger Dalmatians. One wandered over to Angeal and sniffed him curiously. Angeal scratched the puppy behind the ears. Maybe things were starting to look up.
"Well, we should go." Angeal looked up just in time to see the two odd animals walk out the door. Sora stayed behind another second and waved good-bye before going out the door.
"That was odd," mused Angeal. Then another puppy came over to investigate the unusual man, and Angeal decided this was fine by him.
Sora actually showed up a few more times with more puppies, but Angeal was busy and managed to miss him all those other times.