A/N: Thanks a lot for reviewing guys, I'm glad you're liking the story.

Through the Test of Fate

Chapter 7

Promises

The hallways of the building seemed to stretch out endlessly to Kairi and Xion who ran through one quickly, the latter being weighed down by the unconscious Sora resting against her shoulder. Thankfully his wounds didn't seem too bad, it looked like they made it before the thing could do much. Still, under other circumstances Kairi would have wanted to heal him before escaping but with that weird creature on the loose, they had to keep moving just in case it decided to chase after them.

Kairi frowned as she cast a brief glance at Sora, wondering just why Vexen had been so interested in him to the point of creating a clone.

It suddenly looked like he was someone very important considering he had a past with Xion and the attention of Vexen. Not to sound conceited but if the older man valued him more than capturing her then he really Sora must have had a very impressive past.

She pushed those thoughts away before she could dwell on them too deeply. Right now was not the time to think of such things, there would be time to sort all of it out later when they weren't in danger of being killed by some experiment gone awry.

Almost as if goading luck, a new set rapid footsteps echoed in the empty hallway of the basement. Kairi and Xion glanced over their shoulders to see two glowing yellow eyes closing in on them as the thing ran at them.

"Xion," Kairi looked at the girl running at her side firmly. "I'll stay behind and hold that thing off. You take Sora and make sure he's safe, got it?"

Xion seemed to struggle with her words before nodding slowly, "I have no idea why you're endangering yourself like this but... be careful."

Kairi grinned weakly and came to a stop, Oathkeeper appearing on her right hand as she turned to face the thing while Xion turned a corner and disappeared from view.

'I'm doing this...' Kairi answered Xion's earlier words as she held her blade at her side in a ready position, 'Because Sora got involved in all of this because of me. If he hadn't met me then he'd be safe at home right now instead of endangering his life like this.'

The Heartless-like creature leapt at Kairi with a screech.

'That's why I promise to protect him!'

Kairi gritted her teeth as she charged in at the creature and cut off one of its outstretched hands, making it recoil back in surprise before she cut off the other hand and a leg in one swift motion. With moves like that of a dance, she twirled, swung, and stabbed at the enemy without missing a beat. Various wounds were spread across the creature's body before she pointed the tip of her blade at its chest and released a large ball of light that sent it flying back several feet.

The Fourth Strongest Keyblade Wielder panted harshly, her dilated eyes taking in the damage of her attack.

Only the Heartless' tattered body remained pinned to a crater in one of the walls of the hallway. It looked like she had won.

"Good. Now I can go back to Xion and check on Sora-!" She gasped mid-sentence when seeing the thing's body let out some odd purple liquid that covered its wounds before the remaining liquid reformed its missing limbs. "What is this thing?!"

The Heartless opened its eyes as it pushed itself off the crater to land on the floor with a thud. It quickly got on a standing position and growled, its eyes growing feral.

Kairi scowled as she got in her ready stance.

Things weren't looking too good.

Xion sat Sora on one of the chairs of the building's lobby as her thoughts drifted to Kairi. While there was not a lot of trust between them, if any for that matter, the only reason they were working together now was because they had a common goal.

She looked over Sora's condition briefly and cast a Cure spell on him. It wasn't the most powerful out of the healing spells but it was the fastest and most efficient. Instead of healing the wound with its own power, the spell increased the speed of the subject's natural healing rate. This varied from person to person but someone like Sora should heal nicely in just a few minutes.

With that done she summoned her Keyblade and headed off to the basement again. While she did not trust or care for Kairi to be brutally honest, it wasn't like her to be on anyone's debt.

The sight that met Xion upon making it to the basement was shocking to say the least.

Kairi was panting harshly as several puddles of a dark liquid shot into the air and gathered at a single location, slowly making the form of the Heartless-like creature that had been in Vexen's lab.

"Xion? Where's Sora?! I thought I told you to-"

"He's fine," she interrupted with a frown. "Don't get the wrong idea. I'm not here because I suddenly feel some sort of connection to you," she moved to Kairi's side and held her blade in a fighting stance, "I don't want to owe you anything so I'm here, besides, Sora sees you as a friend."

"All right then," Kairi said as a grin formed on her face though it disappeared once the Heartless formed before them. "This thing just keeps on healing any wound I inflict on it. Not even magic seems to be working."

Xion nodded without tearing her eyes away from the growling creature, "Can you keep on fighting?"

"Yeah. This is nothing."

'As if you could say that while looking so weak,' Xion mused. Kairi could not keep on fighting for long, it was obvious to her the moment she set foot on the basement. Her brow was covered in sweat, her breathing was ragged, and her legs shook slightly; only a fool would think she was fine.

"I'll take the lead," Xion decided in a voice that left little to argue before she charged in at the creature before it could attack.

The Heartless was cut in half as the Keyblade Wielder delivered a deadly vertical slice however, the creature did little more than twitch before the dark liquid shot out of each half and, to Xion's misfortune, completed each half with a brand new one. There were now two of those resilient things.

Cursing under her breath, Xion pointed her blade at the two before releasing a powerful gust of air that knocked them back several feet.

"We can't keep on attacking without a plan," Kairi voiced in a concerned tone. "If we're not careful we can risk that thing multiplying again. Since its healing itself with that odd liquid then maybe we should freeze it?"

"Sounds like a plan," Xion nodded as she gripped the handle of her Keyblade with both hands and a small blue orb formed at the tip of the blade.

The two creatures screeched angrily as they ran at their prey but were cut off as the small blue orb made contact with one of them before exploding in a freezing wind that froze one of the creatures completely. Cracks began to appear on the frozen Heartless as the whole thing was shattered into tiny pieces.

Xion didn't have time to see if the plan had worked as the other creature swiped at her with its clawed hands but she easily blocked with her blade before taking a few steps back. She then ran at the thing and stabbed at its chest, earning an annoyed grow, but she wasn't done and unleashed a wind spell that hurled the creature against a wall.

Kairi watched what happened with in relief. The remains of the other creature did not rebuild it, meaning that her earlier assumption had been correct. With that in mind she took Oathkeepr and swung it in the direction of the remaining creature, creating a harsh cold wind that froze the target on the spot before its body shattered much like the other creature.

"That should do it," Kairi declared with a weary grin.

"Let's get going already, if we stay too long then we'll surely run into more trouble," said Xion as she and Kairi headed for the stairs to the lobby.

Sora took in his surroundings in a daze. His chest ached terribly but he managed to sit up and make sense of where he was.

For some reason he was sitting in the lobby of Vexen's lab. But why was he? Last thing he remembered was the weird Heartless-like thing appearing from one of the containers on the lab before it attacked him. The thing must have hit him on the head since it was beginning to throb in pain.

Deciding that staying there was a bad idea, he got up and looked around in thought, wondering if he should go back to the basement or leave the building. Luckily, the question seemed to answer itself as Kairi emerged from the stairs leading to the basement with Xion following after her.

"What's going on?"

"Sora?! You're awake!" Kairi smiled.

"We're getting out of here," Xion joined in with a frown, "Now that Heartless thing is taken care of we have nothing else to do here."

"I see," he nodded before noticing that Xion was giving him a glare, "Um... Can I help you?"

She continued to glare before kicking him on the shin.

"Ow! That hurt!"

"You shouldn't have done something so dangerous," Xion scolded.

Sora grinned sheepishly, "But everything worked out in the end didn't it? Hopefully you don't have to worry about that Vexen guy controlling you anymore."

"Speaking of which," Kairi broke in while giving Sora a look, "You have some explaining to do after we get back home."

"Home?" Xion repeated with a raised eyebrow.

"I'm staying at his place for now," she explained with a shrug, not noticing the slight twitch in Xion's right eye.

Something caught the attention of Sora out of the corner of his eye. A gasp escaped his lips almost immediately before he groaned loudly, earning two puzzled expressions.

"It's already eight," he lamented, "That means that I have just enough time to make dinner, do my homework, and shower. Get it? I don't have any free time today!"

Kairi sighed, "Then let's get out of here already."

After parting ways with Xion; Sora and Kairi had finally made it to the apartment after what seemed like a long time. Not a lot of words were spoken during their walk, probably because they were all tired after everything they went through. In the end, Xion promised that she would be seeing him around.

Sora was currently sitting on his bed while Kairi sat on a chair facing him, her arms crossed as she waited for his explanation. Now that they were alone she could finally get some answers.

"Let's see... where should I start?" Sora trailed off in thought before clearing his throat. "Okay. I'm gonna start with how things happened from the very beginning," he decided, "It all started the day I woke up in a hospital bed. I had no memory of who I was or why I was at there. The doctor that looked after me said that I had lost my memory and almost my left arm too. I tried to ask if he knew anything about what happened but he didn't know anything."

"Did he say when you'll be getting your memory back?" Kairi asked.

"No. There's zero chance of me ever getting it back," he answered and he grinned nervously, not entirely comfortable talking about it, "It bothered me a lot at first but I'm getting by okay. Anyway, I pretty much settled into a normal life and decided not to dwell on the past. Those memories will never come back so there's no use moping about it."

Sora looked down, "But it looks like my past caught up with me in the end. I met Xion a couple of days ago but learned of our past together just a few hours ago. From what I heard, she was born because of me helping Vexen with an experiment. I still don't know the full details about what our relationship was but I can tell we were pretty close."

"Then you can just ask her about it tomorrow," Kairi reasoned with a sympathetic smile.

"I could but there's something that's really bothering me," he admitted, making the girl look at him in confusion. "My past self was supposedly very strong. I bet he also knew about Vexen controlling Xion, so why didn't he do anything to help her? It was so easy for us to do it so why couldn't someone as strong as him help her?"

"You think there's something else going on."

Sora nodded, "I didn't really think of this until just a few moments ago though. It's probably why I feel so helpless." He sprawled out on the bed and held his right hand up, as if reaching for something, "I mean, the answer are right there. If I only had a few of my memories then I wouldn't have to worry so much."

"You don't have to worry." Kairi spoke up in determination. "Whatever happened to you doesn't matter now. Even if your memories won't come back you don't have to worry because I'll be there to help you no matter what. Next time you feel like you need help then tell me, don't go running off in your own again. Whatever happens from now on, to Xion or to someone else, know that I'll be at your side ready to help."

He could already feel the weight leaving his shoulders.

It was odd... They only met a few days ago but he already felt as if she was his closest friend, the one person he could trust with everything. That's why he didn't have any trouble believing her when she said that she would be at his side to help whenever he needed it. Kairi was that kind of person. Someone who would try to protect someone like him from getting in a fight with Terra only a few moments after meeting him.

"Kairi," he genuinely smiled at her, "Thank you."

She smiled back, "You don't have to thank me idiot."

The sun rose over Twilight Town as various students walked to their schools. This town being bloated with different schools and students, made it hard to walk a single street without seeing someone wearing a school uniform.

Among these students was Sora, a book bag slung over his shoulder flailing wildly as he sped through the streets, bumping into a few angry people on the way. Leave it to him to oversleep, he did go through a hard fight just the day before but the teachers would have none of that. He had a feeling Ms. Tifa would break his nose if he was even a second late.

Thanking his training with Kairi, he continued to speed through the streets without stopping. This new stamina of his was really helpful in situations such as these. Now he probably didn't have to worry about being late ever again.

"Who might you be?" Isa asked himself with an amused smirk.

Standing atop a tall building in his usual search for the missing Keyblade Wielder he happened upon a peculiar sight. A student wearing some random school's uniform was running through the streets while using quite a bit of his power without realizing it. Seriously, he was like a beacon, how he didn't notice someone like him sooner was beyond him.

Usually a random person with the power to summon a Keyblade would not get his attention, there were easily hundreds that could in his school, but this guy was easily strong enough to be a ranked member of the organization he was a part of. This guy was either a spy from another organization infiltrating Twilight Town or some prodigy that refused to go to a good school.

But as interesting as this guy was, he had bigger fish to catch. The reward for Kairi had grown after news of Vexen's death and the disappearance of Xion had reached their ears. Kairi was the most likely suspect since it was unlikely that anyone else could take out Vexen, the sixteenth strongest, and Xion, the fourteenth strongest.

"Just where are you Kairi?" A smirk played on his lips as he stretched out his senses to try and find her. This was really getting boring though, he wasn't one to pursue a target for so long, he needed a good fight every once in a while.

An idea formed in his mind. If things continued to be this boring then...

Maybe the interesting student running around town could put up a good fight.

It was getting dark by the time Sora finally got out of school. This time he decided not to think about the fact that his whole day was pretty much spent in school and focus on the positives instead. Like how this time he didn't need to stop by a store to buy something or how he was getting better with a Keyblade each passing day.

He smiled at that as he walked by the park he usually trained at. A chuckle escaped his lips when he remembered that Kairi had not gotten up in the morning, meaning that he got a day off from training.

"Sora!"

'Huh? That sounded like Kairi... She didn't wait for me here to do what I'm thinking... right?'

He swallowed a lump in his throat as he turned to see Kairi walking towards him with a grin.

"We missed morning practice but don't worry, we'll make it up right now."

"But I just got out of school and-"

"No excuses! I already told you that you can't afford to miss a day of training," she scolded with her hands on her hips.

At least she was back to her usual self, she'd looked really tired the previous night so it was something less to worry about.

"Now let's go."

"Got it," he said with his head hung low as he followed her into the park.

The two stopped once they made it to a nice secluded spot behind a set of bushes and trees. It was getting dark so Kairi didn't think anyone would be running around near the Stop spell. As they were about to start, they were interrupted by the sound of footsteps coming their way.

"I thought you said there would be no one coming here," Sora whispered to Kairi.

Finally someone stepped into the clearing.

"Xion?" Sora let out in surprise at seeing the girl so soon after what happened. The way she parted ways with them seemed like it would be a while before they saw each other again.

"What are you doing here?" Kairi asked.

Xion grinned, "I'm going to help Sora train too." She moved to his side and gave Kairi a smug look, "As the one that knows him the best, it's only obvious that he should train with me."

"Hey now, let's not fight Xion-"

"You knew the old Sora the best," Kairi interrupted Sora's attempt to lighten the mood with a glare thrown at the smug girl, "The one who's teaching him now is me and he's been making good progress. So, why don't you leave us alone so I can focus on his training?"

Xion glared back, "What did you just say?"

Not knowing why she was feeling so annoyed over seeing Xion standing really close to Sora with a smug look, she continued to argue, "Only the truth. He's better off being trained by me. Besides, Number Fourteen, someone who is only the fourteenth strongest should step aside and let me, Number Four, help him train."

Sora watched the two argue from the sidelines. He wasn't about to let himself get dragged in between their argument now that the two were locked in a heated debate over who got to train him. Why the two didn't just train him together was beyond him but, as he watched the sun go down in the horizon, he wondered how long he would need to stay.

"This might take a while..." he muttered to himself before being subjected to two harsh glares. He instantly tensed up and stood at attention with a yelp, "Y-Yes?"

"Who do you want to train you?" The two asked simultaneously.

'I got in between anyway!'

"Well?"

'What did I do to deserve this?!'

Once the girls finally reached a decision Sora's training had begun once again. The Stop spell was put in place and it was decided that Xion would be the first to spar with Sora to measure his strength. He tried to argue that he already fought with her for a little while before but they were having none of it.

They also decided that they should have a long talk after the training cession was over so that they could straight some things outs.

Sora and Xion stood opposite of each other, both his a Keyblade on hand. Kairi nodded at them to begin as the two of them ran at each other. This being just a spar, they made their first move easy to read, both were swinging horizontally.

The two blades clashed, drawing sparks from the strength behind the swings, before the two swung once again. Sora parried Xion's blow and dished out his own only to have the girl sidestep and kick at his side, but he lowered his right elbow to meet the blow before swinging at her exposed body. The girl's eyes widened as she quickly blocked by bringing her blade to her side.

Kairi frowned as she watched the two sparring.

Sora was much stronger and faster than before but it looked like he hadn't realized. Was this an effect of having to face part of his past? It wasn't likely since he couldn't remember anything but something had to have happened to have him improve so much in so little time. From what she saw, Xion actually had to concentrate on the spar to avoid being hurt.

Oh well. Whatever happened was greatly beneficial to them. If Sora kept on improving like this then he could probably last more than ten seconds against the strongest members of the organization in just a few days.

She grinned as she watched him and Xion exchange blows, their blades meeting loudly as the two jumped away to get a bit of breathing room.

'I guess this changes our training plan,' she mused.

With Sora improving so much in his physical attacks, it was time to start teaching him magic and once he grasped that, how to obtain the Second Release of his Keyblade.

The previous night -

The Heartless-like creature stepped into the lobby of Vexen's lab. After pinpointing the location of the three sources of light, the creature split into two so that it could chase after the two that split up. It followed them to the lobby before one of the targets left, leaving behind an unconscious teen sitting on a chair.

The creature was incapable of thought. Only instinct drove it forward, a voice telling it what to do in order to survive. Right now, as it stood over the unconscious teen, it told him something different than before.

Not to kill him like the others.

Instead...

The Heartless raised its right clawed hand before driving it into the teen's chest without the slightest sound or drop of blood, not even his clothes had been torn. Its claws seemed to melt into the body without problem, as if it belonged there.

Its body was enveloped in darkness as it melted into the teen's chest.

'Now sleep.'

It heard the voice speak within its mind, though it was difficult to hear.

'You were created using this boy's powers. You belong within him. Wake up once you are ready to consume him...'

The voice faded away as the Heartless entered a dark abyss. Doing what it was told, it went to sleep.

Waiting for the right moment wake up and consume its host.