Looming Darkness: Daybreak

by Shadow Horizons

Part I. Sora, Kairi and Riku are looking forward to a somewhat normal life. However, Maleficent has returned with powerful new allies, seeking revenge and control of Kingdom Hearts. All the while, an old enemy's revival is close at hand. Will our heroes be prepared? Or will they be consumed by the everlasting darkness? Rated M for language, violence, and some adult themes.

36. The Cornerstone of Darkness (Part II)

I won't bore you with words. I'll save that for the bottom notes.

Disclaimer: I do not own Kingdom Hearts, Disney, Final Fantasy, or Richard. I only own my original plot and characters.

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Chapter Thirty Six: The Cornerstone of Darkness (Part II)

Saturday, July 3rd, 4794 P.C.

Destiny Islands

Chamber of the Cornerstone

"That's it?" Jevenan said. Keila was shoved aside as the Nobody forced his way into the room. "That's the Cornerstone?"

"You sound disappointed." Jonathan limped up to the entryway, peering in after the Nobody.

The Nobody scoffed. "The Cornerstone is the very epitome of Darkness. This… bauble, cannot possibly be the Cornerstone."

"Quite the architect you are," Jonathan muttered. "The Cornerstones of Light, Darkness and Harmony are no different than the cornerstones that provide the foundation to support a building. Granted, they're supporting the whole Realm of Light, but you get the point."

He limped his way across the threshold and into the chamber. "But we aren't here to discuss the purpose of the Cornerstones, are we?" Quick as could be, he placed his hand carefully against one of the stones lining the wall.

A dull grinding sound filled the chamber as the stone was pushed into the wall. The faint sounds of ancient, hidden mechanisms echoed from behind the walls for a moment before the chamber door slammed shut behind the Templar. Light flared up along the walls, floor and ceiling, revealing a faintly shimmering shield.

"So that's how it is then." Jevenan sighed. "I suspected that you were going to pull something like this. You complied with our demands quicker than I imagined you would, considering you're supposed to guard this place above anything else."

"If it makes you feel any better, I tried activating the other traps earlier." A victorious grin spread slowly across Jonathan's face as he spoke. "To my disappointment, it would seem that their mechanisms have worn out from old age. Can't say I'm too surprised. This place has been around since the fifth Keyblade War nearly six thousand years ago."

"You do realize that you've trapped yourself in here with us, yes?"

"And we'll die here together." The Templar's tone hinted at his resignation to his fate. He glanced over at Keila. "Sorry. But I have no other choice. I can't let anyone get their hands on the Cornerstone. And I sure as hell don't plan on letting anything happen to my daughter."

The Nobody turned his back on Jonathan, facing the Cornerstone instead. Silence prevailed in the chamber for several moments. Jonathan's eyes never once left Jevenan's back and Keila was left wondering when one of them would attack the other.

"You came up with this plan rather quickly for a man so close to Death's doorstep," the Nobody noted. "And it almost would've worked too. We can't create portals of Darkness down here. And the seal you activated would make it impossible to use brute force to escape."

Jonathan's eyes narrowed. "What do you mean 'it almost would've worked'?"

"Did you think we would not come prepared?"

The Templar's eyes grew wide in shock as a gunshot echoed from right behind him, followed instantly by the blinding pain of a bullet tearing through his back. The room spun as he collapsed to the ground.

Gasping for breath, Jonathan tried desperately to turn his head and face his assailant, but his muscles refused to respond. The faint clacking of heeled shoes on the stone floor filled his ears as the assailant approached. Standing above him was a woman clad in a red dress under a white overcoat decorated in a thousand red roses. Clutched in her hand was a small side arm.

"I recognize you," the Templar wheezed, ignoring the blood that he was starting to cough up. "Echidna Parass. You're with the Apostles of the Star." Echidna smiled coldly down at him. "How did you get in here?"

"The same way we're going to leave," she replied. Her cold gaze turned toward the Nobody. "Do you have it?"

Jevenan stuck a hand directly underneath the Cornerstone. A dull thump filled the air as purple tinted lightning arced along the Cornerstone's surface. Rather anticlimactically, the Cornerstone fell into the Nobody's open palm. He examined it for a brief moment, rolling it back and forth in his palm before tossing it to Echidna. The instant she caught the orb, the shielding preventing escape from the chamber flickered briefly and died.

"So, the Cornerstone was powering this temple," Keila noted. "That's… pretty clever, actually."

"Which means I can now do this," Jevenan said. He almost sounded pleased (as if a Nobody were capable of such a thing). With a snap of his fingers, a Corridor of Darkness formed to his side, swirling with it's black and purple energy.

Echidna turned to leave "I'll take this to Maleficent. Finish up with your business on the Islands and return to the Castle quickly." With her free hand, she drew a circle in the air before her. A portal of swirling blue energy manifested itself and grew until it was large enough for a single person to step through. Without another word, she stepped through her portal and vanished.

"That just leaves us with the small matter of what to do with you." Jevenan turned his attention once more on the fallen Templar. "You're not long for this life, from what I can tell. Not with the amount of blood you've lost from our spat earlier. And the bullet in your back." He knelt down on one knee, putting him nearly on level with Jonathan. "So here's what I'm going to do. I'm going to leave you here, bleeding out. No one coming to help you. No way of escape. And you can join the corpses in the previous chamber. And, as you lay here, I want you to know that I'll be up there on the surface. And I'll be hunting down your daughter."

Jonathan gritted his teeth against the pain and spat in Jevenan's face. "Burn in Hell, you bastard." To his credit, Jevenan didn't so much as flinch.

"And when I find your daughter, I'm going to beat her within an inch of her life," he droned on, rising up once more. "All the while, I'll be sure to tell her that it's all because you chose to save your own skin instead of protecting her." He grinned maliciously. "She doesn't need to know the truth after all."

"I'll kill you!" Jonathan roared. He struggled to push himself up with one arm, only for the Nobody to kick it out from under him. "I swear I will see you killed." Jevenan peered down at him for a moment. Then summoned one of his arm blades into existence.

"No. You won't have the chance." The Nobody lunged forward, plunging his blade deep into Jonathan's chest and twisted the blade. "Thanks again for your help, Templar." Jonathan howled as the blade was pulled free from him. Faintly in the gloom and through the blurriness of his pain-affected vision, the fallen Templar was forced to watch as Jevenan's silhouette stepped through the portal of Darkness and was gone.

-LD-

Fatum Central Square

A piercing scream filled the square as a Berserker raised it's hammer high above its head, ready to bring it crashing down on a young woman's head. The sound of the hammer rushing downwards filled her ears, nearly drowned out by her own screams.

Seconds ticked by and the blow never came. The woman opened her eyes and immediately took sight of an armor-clad teen standing between the Nobody and her. In his hand was a blade that she couldn't clearly make out, but half of the hilt was an angel's wing. His other hand was tightly gripping the shaft of the Berserker's hammer. The Nobody's arms were shaking heavily as it tried with all its might to bring down the weapon, but the teen didn't budge.

"Are you hurt?" the teen turned his head slightly, peering back at the woman through long silver bangs. A stiff shake of the head was all he received in response. "Good. Then you can still run. Head for the north district. The Defense Force has the path to there cleared." The woman didn't need telling twice.

Riku kept an eye on her until she was out of sight before he shifted his focus back to the Nobody before him. "Right then. Where were we?" His grip tightened against the shaft of the Nobody's claymore as he began to apply pressure back to it. The claymore fell back, slowly at first, but then rapidly losing ground as Riku gained momentum. Riku shoved, the sword flew back and left the Berserker wide open. In that half second he had, Riku took his perfect opportunity, and slashed the Berserker twice across the chest before burying Way to the Dawn into its body up to the hilt.

The Nobody burst apart in a shower of white sparks and munny, and Riku quickly pocketed the cash while keeping an eye out for more enemies.

"Very good, Riku," Dawn said. "According to my calculations, this will bring your current bank balance up over forty-three thousand munny. These creatures really are quite lucrative."

Riku grumbled as the numbers flashed in gold on the HUD in front of his eyes. "Great, Dawn, but I don't need to see it right now. In case you didn't notice, we're in the middle of a war zone."

"And I thought that you'd be pleased," Dawn pouted, retracting the number, but only minimizing it so that it still blinked close to the lower-right corner of his vision.

"Dawn…"

"What? You'd be excited too if you knew all the bells and whistles this thing comes with! Did you know I can change the language interface to one of seven hundred languages? Seven hundred!"

"Great!" Riku twirled the Way to the Dawn in his grip before running it through the head of an Creeper as it lunged toward him. "How about you turn the motion tracker back on? I could really use it at a time like this."

The upper left hand corner of his HUD was briefly filled with an image of Dawn as she stuck her tongue out at him. "I thought you said it was distracting?"

"I changed my mind!" Riku snapped, deflecting a volley of energy bolts fired by a group of Snipers. "Turn it back on!"

"Stop being so wishy-washy," Dawn griped. She snapped her fingers and the motion-tracking system reactivated. Her image vanished just as red lines outlined the objects in Riku's view, fluctuating with every movement. A small circle flared to life, just on the upper right edge of the HUD, displaying a series of smaller red circles dancing around a yellow one at the center.

"Hey, could you also get rid of that munny counter?" It vanished from his vision just as three of the red dots on his mini-map vanished and reappeared in a tight circle around the centre yellow dot.

Reacting on instinct, the armored teen leapt into the air. The lances wielded by three Dragoons passed only through thin air. He twisted, Thunder magic gathering along his Keyblade as he took aim. An impact between his shoulder blades ruined it, and he misfired the spell into the ground. Riku rolled away to his right, and something heavy slammed into the ground where he had been standing, cracking the stone and kicking up debris.

Though dust and debris clouded his visor, a distinct red outline took form around the offending attacker, revealing the form of another Berserker slowly lifting its claymore out of the ground. The silhouettes of the three Dragoons leapt down directly in front of him, each moving to attack. Even with his vision slightly impaired, it made no difference to Riku; he knew how to fight blindfolded.

He made them look like they were standing still, quickly striking all three Dragoons with a flurry of hits from his Keyblade that left them staggering before slicing all three apart with one more stroke. He turned around, still seeing the Berserker outlined in red through the darkness and the dust. It's body was shrinking as it reached up to hold onto its claymore high up the grip, and the giant hammer-like sword began to glow with blue light.

Riku leapt out of the way as it commenced its attack, and even tossed a few Dusks into its way. The Berserker mashed them like potatoes beneath its weapon, and Riku kept out of the way as it chomped down towards the ground, and flew around in a wide arc.

"Riku, I have detected-"

"Already on it, Dawn," Riku answered, catching sight of the Berserker flying up above him and charging its weapon full of energy. He leapt out of the way just as the claymore cake crashing down and escaped the powerful close-range shockwaves of pent-up power. The Berserker returned to full height, and Riku quickly stabbed it in the back. The Berserker burst apart, and Riku's eyes quickly tracked the movements of the Nobodies around him.

He swung Way to the Dawn, deflecting a shot from a Sniper Nobody right back at it and scoring a perfect headshot. Red dots swirled around the centre yellow dot on the map in the upper right corner of his vision, though one of them had just vanished. A Dancer came at him, reaching for his ankles. Riku dodged her, jumping into the air and spinning with a twist that sliced the Nobody through twice, and cut apart the other Dancer coming at his other side equally. Riku landed, crouched. A Dragoon came at him; he killed it, slipping underneath its lance and stabbing it deep in the chest.

"Is this the best they can do?" Riku asked, shaking his head pitifully.

No sooner had the words left him, than a Sorcerer rose up in a flash of white, flanked on all sides by Snipers, Dancers and Dusks. Dawn gave a small sigh.

"Any other questions you want answered?" Red exclamation points appeared over the Snipers on Riku's HUD. "On the bright side, now you can test out the tracking feature I uncovered."

The Way to the Dawn came up, countering one of the Dancers as the Nobodies attacked. "You're enjoying this!" He spun and drove his Keyblade through the arms of another Dancer, pinning it to the ground below. The Nobody looked up at Riku just as he brought an armored boot forward in a powerful kick.

He rolled to the side as the Dancer faded away. Three bolts from the remaining Snipers struck where he had been not a second a later. Three red arrows on the edge of Riku's HUD gave him a general idea as to where they were. The Sorcerer, however, seemed determined to prevent him from attacking the Snipers. Cubes of solid, rose colored magic formed in front of the Nobody.

The cubes launched at him. He thrust his hand out in front of him. A spherical barrier of darkness surrounded him, effortlessly deflecting the cubes. He raised the Way to the Dawn up to eye level and took aim at the Sorcerer. An orb of swirling blue and black magic launched from the Keyblade and rocketed straight for the Nobody, only to be intercepted by more cubes.

"This is getting nowhere." Riku let out a groan of irritation as another bolt from a Sniper narrowly missed him.

"Look on the bright side," Dawn chimed in cheerfully, "There's only four enemies left!"

Golden light surrounded Riku's right hand as he stared down his opponent. "Bright side. Right." The light spread from his hand and quickly enveloped the Way to the Dawn, extending well beyond where the blade ended. Small, curved black spikes formed along the edge of the blade, each nearly six inches in length. Smirking beneath his visor, he placed his free hand against the crossguard and clenched tightly. "I think it's about time to wrap this up." He yanked his hand back from the Keyblade, dragging a chain-shaped cord of light with it. The Way to the Dawn gave a roar like the start of an engine. The spikes quickly became a black blur as they began to move along the blade.

He lunged forward with a tremendous burst of speed as the Sorcerer's cubes rapidly formed a wall between them. Riku brought the Way to the Dawn down on the cubes, the Sunblade magic effortlessly tearing into them. More cubes formed as the Sorcerer moved further away from Riku in an attempt to save itself. The Sunblade raged on in its Wielders grasp, and the Sorcerer's defense fell with ease.

Riku leapt back as the wall of cubes continued to form, slowing him down even with the Sunblade active. He drew his blade back and gripped it tightly with both hands. He vanished in a flash of light and reappeared just behind the Sorcerer, Keyblade extended out in front of him. Quick as could be, Riku spun and brought his weapon down on the Nobodies shoulder. The Sorcerer shook and convulsed as the Sunblade dug into it, shredding its way down the its midsection.

Riku let out a sigh of relief as the unmistakable sound of clinking munny and vanishing Nobody filled his ears. "You sure knew how to get on my nerves, you know that?"

The inside of his visor flashed a red warning right across the center of his vision. A split second later, a Sniper's round struck his shoulder, sending him stumbling forward. With a growl of irritation, Riku twisted around and prepared to attack. To his surprise however, the last Sniper was already fading to mist by the time he had it in his sight.

On a balcony high above him, Sora stood proudly, Kingdom Key resting on his shoulder. The brunet waved down at him. "Hey, Riku! There you are! Wait, is that you!? Where'd you get the kickass armour?"

The Sunblade's light spikes slowed and faded as the roaring engine sound dwindled into silence. With a simple thought, Riku's helmet vanished, allowing him to grin back at Sora.

"Master Xanthos, and here I was, thinking I was doing all of the work." The Way to the Dawn vanished in a flash of light. "Where've you been for the past half hour?"

"There's Heartless all over the place." Sora leapt down from the balcony. "I've been trying to find Kairi and the others."

"Any luck besides me?"

Sora shook his head. "I was with Nanaki a few streets back, but we got separated when she took off after some Invisibles."

"Then why didn't you stick with her?" Riku frowned. "Lead by example and all that, Master Sora." Sora let out a laugh.

"It's not like I had a choice. I'm running from a Seraph."

"A what?"

There was a loud crash and a rain of debris as a building next to where Riku was standing practically Heartless that emerged was about seven feet tall. Its skin a dark, purplish-bruise color. Black mist hung around in place of its head with two pairs of glowing yellow eyes floating in the center. On each hand it had seven long black claws in place of fingers. Emblazoned on its chest, just below its neckline, was the Heartless emblem.

"That," was Sora's reply.

-LD-

"Fancy meeting you here," Nikki said as she sliced the Divewing through the last two Shadows in the immediate area. She turned to look at him properly, adjusting her hair slightly under her hood. "Prince, right?"

"A-actually, it's P-Pence, "he replied, his cheeks turning pink while he averted his eyes. His throat felt dry, and his heart was pounding.

Dammit! Why can't I freaking talk to her?

"I figured that you'd be with your friend, Hayner," Nikki added nonchalantly, "or getting to safety. No offence, but you don't really seem like the fighting type."

"I'm not, really," Pence muttered, looking down at the weapon in his hands. "But, Hayner and I got separated, and this shotgun I picked up only has two rounds left. I'm just glad I ran into one of you guys."

Great job, Pence, he berated himself, now you made it sound like you're a coward. I'm such an idiot!

Nikki sighed. "I bet you are; now you won't get yourself killed. Stay close and keep up. Neither of us really know the layout of this city. They could get the jump on us from anywhere."

Pence nodded but didn't say anything. His throat felt constricted, preventing him from saying anything else it deemed as stupid. The street was barely lit, only a quarter of the lights along the side functioning and nearly all of the added decorations and lighting for the Sun's Shadow Festival wrecked.

Pence wracked his brain in the gloom as he walked behind Nikki, trying desperately to come up with something to say to break the ice with Nikki and not dig himself a bigger hole.

"Say, uh, what do you think we should do?" He asked.

"Find the others and fight Heartless along the way," Nikki answered. "Olette and I split up a little while ago after clearing a square. She went with the Destiny Islands soldiers to make sure they didn't die, and I left to find the boss."

"The boss?" Pence asked. He turned his head, thinking that he saw movement out of the corner of his eye. There was nothing there but the wooden wall of a shop front.

"There's no way these Heartless are all here on their own because they felt like it," Nikki reasoned. "It's far too large and coordinated. Somebody unleashed them here, and they had to have known that there were so many Keyblade Wielders here at the time, too. There's no way Maleficent's intelligence is that shoddy, not with the people she has working with her. So I'm going to find out who did it and beat the why out of him."

"Really? All by yourself?" Pence asked.

"I may be just an apprentice but I can handle myself," Nikki answered, perhaps a bit sharper than what Pence felt his comment warranted. "Master Jenna has faith in me. I can do this."

"I-I never said you couldn't," Pence quickly countered, increasing his pace to catch up since Nikki seemed to want to speed through the street. He caught sight of something it looked like Nikki hadn't. "Hey! Watch out!"

Nikki turned her head, and was sent flying as a Darkside punched her. She struck the side of a building and crashed right through it. Pence shouted her name and rushed in through the hole before the Darkside could do anything else. Nikki was lying in a pile of rubble in what was somebody's kitchen. Bits of wood and stone from broken counters covered her front, and blood flowed down from a wound on her head.

"Bastard!" Nikki grumbled as she lifted her head up. "Cheap shot."

"Are you okay?" Pence asked quickly. "You're bleeding."

"I'm fine, and I'm going to take that guy out, so would both of you zip it," Nikki fired back. She paused, and lay back down in her rubble pile. "On second thought, I'm not. I need a little time to rest."

"Well here is not going to cut it for that," Pence told her. He reached down to help her up. "Come on, let's get to someplace safe before they come after us."

"Where, though?" Nikki wondered. "These things are all over the city." She stood up, swaying slightly on sketchy balance before righting herself.

"I don't know, but out of here through the front door isn't really an option right now," Pence said, looking around. The Shadows were just skulking around by the hole in the wall, seemingly unwilling to enter the house after them. "Well if they aren't following us let's make another exit," Pence declared, turning towards the large glass window next to the sliding glass door. He pressed his shotgun up against his shoulder and braced himself while keeping his knees nice and loose.

"I'm sorry, whoever owns this place," Pence declared, and pulled the trigger. His shotgun blast was loud in their ears, and the sound of the glass breaking broke through it like a knife. He and Nikki kicked the broken shards at the bottom away before fleeing into the yard.

"Look!" Nikki said. "It looks like there's some kind of temple across the street. Maybe that's why the Heartless aren't following us."

"I've never heard of the Heartless to avoid holy places," Pence said.

"Neither have I," Nikki agreed. "Maybe they have set up some kind of protective enchantment around the place?"

"Well we should just get there right now," Pence said as they reached the wooden fence around the small yard. "It looks safe enough."

The building was large and white, with a sunrise created of many rose, yellow, and red gemstones on the face of the central tower that rose up out of the square block that the majority of it appeared to be from the angle they were looking at it. A small lawn grew in front, with palm trees flanking the large double doors in lines of four down both sides of the path to the doors. There were faces in the windows, some looking panicked.

Pence felt the ground shudder under his feet and turned his head in the direction of the noise. The Darkside was starting to come around the corner in the street, coming after them.

"Let's go!" Pence said, and vaulted over the fence. Nikki was right beside him, but stumbled a little on her landing. The doors to the temple opened as they started to book it across the road, revealing a pair of men.

"Come on! Come on, this way!" They shouted. "You're almost here!"

The moment the two teens crossed the threshold of the yard they felt...something, as if they had just passed through a curtain of water but remained completely dry. Pence shook his head anyway, and only turned his head when they reached the door. The Darkside and other Heartless had come right up against the lawn, but had stopped just before the first blades of grass. It was as if some invisible force was keeping them out.

"Get inside, quickly," one of the men said. "The barrier keeps them out, but you'll be safer inside the temple."

"Thank you," Nikki said, stepping inside first. Pence followed her, with the two men coming inside after them. It was as they were locking and barring the door that Pence saw crossbows across their backs and quivers bristling with bolts hooked to their belts. "What is this place?" Nikki asked.

The awe in the female teen's voice caused Pence to turn around, and he felt himself hushed as he looked upon a very large marble statue, easily twenty feet tall or more, of a man riding on the back of a great bear. In his right hand and raised to the sky was a composite recurve bow, and on his back rested a quiver filled with arrows.

Before Pence or Nikki could even ask who the statue was of, the two of them were ushered away from it. "You're in the temple of Arcturus, the Dawnbringer ," one of the men who had opened the doors for them said, guiding them further into the building. "You're injured. Come this way so that we can get a look at you."

"Very well," Nikki said, reaching around her person for something. "I'm sure that I just need to rest a bit, though." She pulled out a thin metal rod that had a strange red cord inside of it, which she yanked out. Pence watched as Nikki pushed up the left sleeve of her black cloak and wrapped the cord around her arm, and then pressed down on the top of the rod with her thumb. The rod suddenly split into two rods, and a very thin screen stretched out between the two as Nikki looked at it with her lips becoming very thin. She rolled it back up, pressed the button again, and unwound the cord from her arm. It shot back inside of the tube. "Yeah, I definitely need some rest."

"Nikki?" Pence asked.

"My mana's shot," Nikki told him regretfully. "I used up too much when Olette and I were fighting a horde of Heartless in that square a little while ago." She grimmaced and wiped some of the blood from her forehead. "Not to mention this hurts."

Pence didn't know what to say, so he said nothing, and kept walking. There were people huddled together along the sides of the walls, in groups of families, friends, or strangers, all of them taking refuge inside from the Heartless beyond the temple's doors. Soldiers and temple guards like the one they were following paced the halls, but there weren't many of them.

The pair were led through a door into another room. This one was also filled with people, but many of them were on cots or mats and the room also smelled of blood. One woman, presumably one of the temple's healers, looked up as they entered.

"Two more," the man leading them said. "The girl needs to get looked at for sure."

"Yes, thank you Jorry," the woman said softly. She nodded her head and the man, Jorry, left the way he came. She turned her attention towards Nikki and Pence. "Come. This way please. You're safe here."

She led them to a few empty chairs against one wall close to another open doorway. Pence and Nikki sat down after a simple gesture from her and she immediately knelt in front of Nikki. "My name's Redheart," she said as she pushed aside Nikki's hair to get a look at the cut on her head.

"Nikki," answered the girl, staying perfectly still to let the woman work.

"Nikki, that's a nice name," Redheart complimented with a smile. She reached down for her bag and pulled out a few disinfectant swabs. "Fortunately for you this cut isn't so bad," she told Nikki while she cleaned it up, Nikki unable to withhold her wince at the alcohol. "However, it does look like it's starting to develop some swelling and bruising. How did you get this?"

"A Darkside caught her off-guard and punched her through a wall," Pence answered.

Redheart looked at him sharply. "A Darkside? No, nevermind." She turned back to Nikki. "Remove the cloak please."

"What?" Pence asked.

"Okay," Nikki said, immediately beginning to obey.

"What?" Pence repeated.

"From what you just said she's suffered severe impact trauma to her abdomen," Redheart explained. "I'll need to do a thorough examination of the area and I can't do that while she's wearing this black cloak. Besides," she gave him a shifty look, "don't you like seeing your girlfriend when she's not covering everything up like this?"

Pence immediately felt his face flush and he found himself speechless while Nikki finally (in Pence's mind) showed signs of embarrassment. She looked away from the temple healer without delay, her cheeks regaining colour at a rapid pace. "He's not my boyfriend," she said quickly.

"G-g-girlfriend?" Pence asked, finally managing to get his tongue to work. Nikki's eyes met his, and for a moment they were both silent as they simply looked into one another's eyes. Hers were deep, like a river of milky chocolate. The moment lasted only a second, but it seemed like it lasted an eternity before it ended as both he and Nikki regained their wits at the same time. His next words were lost in the jumble created between him and her as they both refuted Redheart's idea that they were dating, as they had only interacted a couple of times before finding each other on the street a few minutes prior, and at best were acquaintances or friends of a friend would be a more accurate term.

All of which caused Redheart to laugh.

"What's funny, Redheart?" another healer asked.

"Oh nothing, Gloria," Redheart answered. "I just assumed that this young man and woman who came in together were dating, that's all." Nikki shed the cloak, pointedly not looking at anyone while a nearby patient who was shirtless but bandaged up commented with a humoured laugh of, "Kids."

Pence then looked at Nikki again, and he carefully ensured the safety was on his shotgun before he put it down, because otherwise he might have fired it by accident since his stomach started to do somersaults and he did not know what would happen next. Underneath the black cloak, Nikki's brown hair was let down, long enough to reach a quarter of the way down her upper arms, and her bangs were held out of her eyes by a silver and lapis lazuli hairclip. Tiny garnet earrings rimmed with silver were in her earlobes, catching the interior lighting just right enough to sparkle. As far as her clothes went, Nikki's top was a slightly subdued light blue t-shirt with the rod of Asclepius on the left sleeve in white, and a light yellow sash around her waist above a white skirt.

There was still a blush on her cheeks, which made Pence's heart rate increase as his thoughts whirled but focussed on one point.

Okay Pence, she's gorgeous, she's a Keyblade Wielder, she can kick hordes of Heartless butt, and she is so far out of your league that the moon is closer, but she's around your age. Remember, she's still a high school age girl; she's normal!

Nikki's sudden gasp woke Pence from his thoughts. She was clutching her arm up in front of her and facing away from the healer, whom had just touched her chest around her stomach.

Redheart's mouth had formed a very thin line as she gave Nikki a stern look. "It appears you're hurt more than just that bump on your head."

"It's nothing, I'm fine," Nikki refuted. "Besides, I've had worse than this."

"Hearing that does not make me happy," Redheart said. "Now remove the shirt, please. I need to check on the extent of your injuries."

"I said I'm fine!" Nikki answered. "I reject your diagnosis."

"Nikki," Pence started, "you got punched through a wall! If you're hurt you should really get looked at."

"I'm fine," Nikki repeated. "I can't let a little thing like this stop me. I've got to take out whoever's controlling the Heartless. This is my first time on my own; I'd dishonour Master Jenna if I let myself get taken out of the fight like-uah!" Her face scrunched up in pain and mouth opened soundlessly as Redheart firmly placed her hand against Nikki's stomach.

"You must be a very brave young girl to have held in that you were in so much pain," Redheart declared simply, "and I don't know what you were doing, but your fight ends here."

"I'm...fine..." Nikki squeaked out.

Pence growled and snatched her arm by the wrist. The sudden contact caused Nikki to look at him, startled. For a moment, Pence froze at her expression. She appeared frightened, like an injured fawn surrounded by wolves, and it was probably from more than his sudden action. Then his frustration won out and he thawed.

"Stop being so stubborn!" Pence hissed. "You're hurt and you told me yourself that your mana levels are garbage. You can't fight right now, even if you are a badass Keyblade Wielder, so suck it up and let Redheart tend to your wounds."

"Then who's going to go looking for that boss that unleashed all of these Heartless here?" Nikki snarled.

"I will," Pence answered definitively, not quite sure how much of his answer was baseless machismo.

Nikki scoffed. "You? Please. You don't have a Keyblade, you aren't trained to fight, your shotgun only has one round left, and you don't look like you could handle a day at the gym, let alone a pack of Heartless. Drop the macho act, nacho man."

Pence felt a solid lump of lead drop into his stomach, but he ensured his face was stone-cold. He didn't answer her as he stood from the chair and left the gun behind.

"Hey, where do you think you're going?" Nikki asked.

Pence remained silent as he left the room.

He walked, not caring or knowing exactly where he was going within the temple. He barely noticed the layout of the temple or even the colour of the walls. Nobody questioned him walking around. This was a place of peace in a time of trouble; walking around was a perfectly normal thing for him to do. The floor shuddered beneath his feet a few times, maybe four, and he heard some people whispering fearfully that the monsters were trying to break through the barrier.

Eventually he found himself standing in front of the statue he'd seen when he and Nikki, no, don't think about Nikki, had entered. There was writing on the plinth below where the bear stood that Pence hadn't had time to notice before.

ARCTURUS, LORD OF LIGHT

Pence looked up at the statue, staring into the eyes of the man riding the bear. They seemed large, larger than their physical size, as if the entire island could fit inside of them like an ant in a ten gallon bucket. They were so large that they threatened to swallow Pence up inside of the white marble that made the statue.

Then the statue was looking at him!

Every muscle in Pence's body froze. From his heart to his diaphragm and even the tiny tissues in his toes, everything stilled under the soul-piercing stare of the statue. He was naked, exposed, insignificant as dust in the solar wind. There was a definite sensation of falling backwards, yet he never touched the floor behind him, and his eyes swam with the image of that man's eyes boring into him. Pence felt his mind on ice, something was touching him, probing him, learning of him.

And it felt...good. Better than good, in fact, it was a pleasant sensation. Despite the complete paralysis of his body and the overwhelming might of the statue's eyes, there was no fear in Pence's mind. A gentle wind was sifting through his ears, whispering to remain calm, that he was safe, that everything would be alright.

The statue started to move. No, move wasn't quite right, the statue lived. Pence's chest unfroze as the breath of the bear touched his nose, and he began to breathe as well. The bear sniffed at him, and turned its head to look up at its rider as best as it could. The man looked down at his mount, and then at Pence again. Pence watched in awe as he lowered the arm that held the magnificent white composite recurve longbow, and started to extend it towards Pence. With trembling fingers, Pence reached out towards it.

"Are you interested in the statue, young man?"

Pence blinked and turned to look at who had spoken. There was a man standing beside him, robed in white and carrying a staff capped by a sunrise symbol like what was outside on the building's central tower. Pence looked back at the statue, and saw it frozen in place in the same pose he had first seen it in.

He shook his head. Had that all been in his mind?

"Uhm...yeah," Pence answered slowly. "Who is this statue of?"

The priest stood next to him, and looked up at the statue. "This, my child, is Arcturus the Sun God. The Dawnbringer, Lord of Light, Son of the Morning Ray, these are the names he is known by. Here, he is depicted riding on the back of his friend, the great bear Callisto, and wielding Corona, his bow."

"A Sun god?" Pence asked. "But I thought that Destiny Islands already had the Sun Goddess Sol, the Guiding Light? Isn't that what the story of this festival is about? How can you have two Sun deities?"

The priest chuckled. "An apt question. Sol is indeed the goddess who rules over the sun and all it provides for these islands, but Arcturus is a greater deity of larger power and scope. While Sol nurtures and guides us, Arcturus protects not only us here on Destiny Islands, but across many worlds. He is the god of all suns, of Light itself, and ever he cherishes life and happiness. He is a good god in the truest sense, even if he is sometimes single-minded about it. It is he who remains vigilant and watchful, despising evil in all of its forms, waging war against those who desicrate life, and keeping the great darkness in check." The priest looked away from the statue of his god and down at Pence, who was still enraptured by the piece of art. "Considering the current times, would you care to hear a local tale about him that has been passed down through the many generations?"

Pence nodded his head. Something was drawing him to this god, and he wasn't sure what.

The priest raised his arms, and looked around the entrance chamber of the temple. He looked at Pence, at the guards by the door, at the families watching outside through the windows and at the people huddled by the walls. "Come! Forget for now our troubles outside, and come together so we may hear the tale of Arcturus and Corona."

Before the priest could even begin, the temple shuddered from an even greater tremor than all the prior ones before put together. The walls and ceiling by the door started to come down with a thundering crash, struck by some kind of mighty impact. Pence looked up immediately, and his eyes widened when he saw through the flying rubble at what had caused it.

There was a giant black fist. It slowly withdrew, and along with the shouts and the screams of the civilians Pence could see the head of the Darkside that owned the fist peering into the building.

"They've broken through!" One of the temple guards shouted as Shadows began to hop in over the ruined walls of the building. "Defend the temple with your lives, men! The darkness cannot win here!"

Pence stayed rooted to the spot as the guards and Heartless clashed while everywhere else people fled the scene. A crossbow bolt flew straight into the stomach of a Shadow, punching it back before the Shadow vanished in a puff of darkness. Another three Shadows rose out of the ground behind a different guard, slicing his back open with their claws while he was turning to face them with his runeblade. He cried out in agony before his body vanished, leaving behind a glowing pink heart that floated for a moment before it was consumed by darkness and vanished.

"Let me go! I've got to help!"

Pence really didn't want to have anything to do with Nikki right now, but he couldn't help but look for her voice. She was charging towards the battle with the Divewing out in her hand, or at least she was attempting to charge towards the fighting. Redheart and a male healer were behind her, grabbing her arms and trying to pull her back. Her entire chest was covered in white bandages, as well as one on her forehead that had a splotch of red on it from the cut there. Including her white skirt, she might have passed for a girl dressing as a sexy mummy for Halloween.

The Darkside still standing over the rubble of the walls saw her right away, and raised its hand back behind its body. Nikki, despite having two adults pulling her back, had nearly made it level to the statue now.

Pence snapped out of his stunned reverie. "Nikki! Get out of here!"

"Get out of here yourself!" Nikki snapped back, bearing the Divewing Keyblade in front of her after finally throwing off the two healers. "You have no place in a fight!" Pence glanced back at the Darkside and dropped to the ground, shouting at Nikki to get clear.

The Darkside's hand swept over him, crashing through the statue of Arcturus and smacking Nikki again, along with about two hundred pounds of broken stonework. She barely had the ability to let out a shriek of surprise and pain before she collapsed into a wall for the second time in under twenty minutes. The Divewing clattered out of her hand and against a stone.

"Nikki!" Pence shouted. She was down on her stomach, one of the legs of the bear over her back and keeping her pinned. Blood was again soaking through the bandage on her head, and Pence could see some reddish spots beginning to appear on pieces of her torso that he could see. The Darkside had returned its arm to its proper place, and was looking down at the fallen Keyblade Wielder. It had a clear path through the ruined wall towards her; all of the guards were occupied fighting the numerous Shadows that had come with it.

Pence rose and took a step towards her and stopped, feeling something under his foot.

Nikki reached out with her hand towards where her Keyblade was with trembling fingers. She was in trouble; that much she knew. Before it had just been the scrape on her forehead and a mass of bruised tissues, maybe possibly extending to a rib. With the amount of pain she could currently feel, Nikki was generally certain that at least two of her ribs were fractured and that her skin had suffered lesions in multiple places. The Divewing flashed into her hand, and while gritting her teeth and trying to bear through the pain of having her back crushed by a hunk of metamorphic rock, she turned the Divewing's tip towards the floor and attempted to use it as a cane. Maybe she'd be able to get some leverage with it that'd help her back throw the rock off of it; then she could make that Darkside pay for mocking her.

Her arms shook. Her body wailed in pain. The pressure from the bear arm stuck on her back dug into her spine. "I...am...a Keyblade Wielder," she struggled to say out loud. "I...am the Apprentice...to Keyblade Master Jenna...and I...will not go down like-!"

Nikki choked as she looked up, the stone still refusing to budge even with all the strength she could muster going into moving it, and the Divewing clattered uselessly to the ground again. The Darkside was nearly on top of her, staring passively down at her. She could feel the hunger in it; she could feel it hunger for her heart, and the fear she had been keeping buried unveiled itself in the tears that leaked from her eyes.

Someone suddenly stood in the way. Red shirt, blue jeans, a messy eruption of black hair held up by a headband; it was Pence.

"Idiot…" Nikki whispered. "Run!"

"No way," Pence told her, defying the Darkside in front of them, "not when I can still fight." Nikki then noticed something clutched in his hand. It looked like the weapon that the statue had been holding.

"You dolt!" she hissed. "That's no bow, it's only stone!"

Pence grinned. "Oh really?" With a single fluid motion, Pence placed an arrow from the quiver that had been on the statue's back onto the bowstring. Nikki narrowed her eyes at it. If it was all part of the same marble statue, how come the arrows were able to come out of the quiver? Weren't they carved into it, and wasn't the quiver part of the body of the statue? Why did it look like they were supposed to be individual pieces? And the strap on the quiver fit too comfortably on Pence's back. Wait, shouldn't the bow itself still be stuck to the statue guy's hand?

He thumbed the bowstring as he nocked the marble arrow to it, and Nikki saw it vibrate. Her eyes widened. Pence stood straight, bow held out in his left hand while he began to draw the arrow back. Nikki could almost see his muscles moving underneath his shirt as Pence began to speak just as the Darkside began to rear back for another punch, this one one that would probably send the two of them to oblivion. "You were right, Nikki. I haven't been trained to fight. I don't have a Keyblade and I don't know how to use a sword. Even an idiot can use a gun, but this is a weapon I have no trouble with. Now, shine!"

All of a sudden the carvings within the silver-white bow that Nikki had not seen before started to glow with golden light. She looked at it in awe as the arrowhead on Pence's nocked arrow began to glow with the same light, while for a moment it appeared that there was a spark of lightning around it. Pence loosed his arrow, and the golden-tipped projectile flew through the air in a flash to strike the Darkside right in its forehead. A great explosion of golden light lit the temple's entry hall, and all combat stopped as every eye turned towards the light. Seconds later when it cleared there was no Darkside to be seen.

"Heh, a bow that takes this much strength to use and I get a headshot on my first arrow," Pence declared with a grin. "I'm a genius."

Nikki could only watch, mouth agape, as Pence drew another arrow, nocked it, and drew back to full draw by his ear in only three more seconds. This time she could see the lightning crackling around the arrowhead as he drew it from the quiver. Pence took another moment to aim while his arrow gained the golden glow coming from the bow, and loosed. The arrow filled with light streaked through the air and struck a Shadow dead centre of the torso. The Shadow burst apart into darkness.

Pence fired another arrow, and then another. He didn't miss either shot, wiping out both Shadows. The whole thing was over a few seconds after that, with one of the guards striking down the last Shadow.

There was only silence after that, as everyone stared at Pence in awe.

-LD-

There she is, Kairi thought, sprinting along the seashore and catching sight of her quarry. Ocean's Toll was clutched tightly in her hand, vibrating from Kairi's anger, humiliation, and hunger for retribution. "KIMBERLY!"

The blonde bimbo turned her head and appeared to sneer. "Well, look who's back for more. I guess slaves really can't escape from their masters."

"Shut your fucking mouth!" Kairi shouted, charging. She brought her Keyblade up in both hands and hurled it back down towards Kim's head. The other teen, whom Kairi noted was still in that infuriating dominatrix outfit, quickly raised her Keyblade up to block Kairi's. There was a shockwave as she stopped Kairi's advance cold, but then her eyes widened as she slid back a few feet and her arms momentarily went numb from the force of the blow.

"You have something of mine," Kairi growled, "and I am going to rip it off of you."

"What? You mean this thing?" Kim asked, laughing while gesturing at the necklace prominently featured above her chest. "I already told you, slave, that it looks much better on me and not gutter trash like you."

"FIRA!"

Kim laughed as she dodged the fireball Kairi had hurled at her. "I thought I told you before, slave, you just aren't strong enough to beat me, unless you're only getting me warmed up to continue where I left off!"

"If you think that you are going to touch me again, you're dead wrong!" Kairi retorted. She launched her body towards Kim, kicking up a spray of sand behind her while winding up for another attack. Kim raised her own weapon to block, and missed as Kairi's swooped in underneath it and struck her on the boob.

Kim looked like she was ready to explode in fury from the sheer audacity of Kairi hitting her, and especially right there. If she hadn't been wearing her Keyblade Armour, she most certainly would have sustained a pretty serious injury from the amount of force Kairi had used.

Kairi landed and crouched. She spun while Kim was still flailing from her successful attack and pointed her Keyblade at her foe. "Thunder!" A cracking bolt of lightning burst out of her Keyblade and nailed Kim in the chest. Electric sparks jittered all over Kim's body while she ground her teeth into a fine powder.

"Hrrrr..." Kim growled, her voice rising in intensity. There was no conceivable way that this girl she'd beaten into submission earlier was getting the upper hand on her! "You bitch!"

Kim rushed at Kairi, swinging her black Keyblade for Kairi's head. She was too quick for Kairi; she knew that. Her Keyblade sailed through the air on a collision course for the redhead's brain. It didn't even matter that Maleficent wanted Kairi alive; this was an insult that Kim would not permit to live.

Kairi's head wasn't there. Kim's eyes widened in shock as Kairi moved her head impossibly quickly in order to avoid the attack, dipping just underneath. Kairi slammed Ocean's Toll into Kim's chest again, grinning.

"You're fighting on my turf now, Kim," Kairi declared, jumping forward and striking Kim again before she could adequately regain her footing. "This is sand! You won't find me so easy to rape now, you lonely whore!"

Kim snarled, and the black outfit that her armour had appeared as glowed with golden light for the third time that day, and Kim now stood armoured in black and red from neck to toe, with an open-faced helmet shaped like a cobra. On her neck Kairi still saw the necklace Kim had snatched from her, glinting in the ambient light.

"If you think that that's supposed to intimidate me, keep dreaming!" Kairi shouted, launching another attack. This time Kim kept up with her, matching Kairi stroke for stroke. Kim wasn't exactly being pushed back, but Kairi wasn't gaining any ground either. Like before, her inexperience in fighting a foe who wielded her sword in her left hand left Kairi at a disadvantage, but this time Kim's inexperience in the fickleness of sand and its effect on movement and footing worked in Kairi's favour. What Kairi lacked in technique she was able to make up for in positioning, slipping away from Kim's blows when it looked for certain that Kim had her and landing strikes that Kim had thought her impossible to make.

A thunderbolt struck Kim in the back, right after she made an attack from which Kairi seemed to vanish with how quickly she'd dodged it. Kim turned around, catching Kairi sneering at her in confidence, and screamed in her throat. "I'm going to fuck you to an inch of your life you worthless slave! Force!"

"Reflect!" Kairi shouted simultaneously with Kim's declared gravity spell. Kairi's honeycomb protection erected immediately, countering the increased gravity she would otherwise have been subjected to, leaving her wide open. Kim backed away immediately, slipping up a little as the sand acted as cushions beneath her feet.

It wasn't enough, though.

"Burst!" Kairi shouted, and her shield came apart, condensed into many magical orbs of blue arcane energy. Many of them struck Kim as they expanded and exploded outwards in a ring around Kairi, knocking the girl off of her feet. Kairi took full advantage of the moment she had, and quickly reached Kim's body as she lay on her back. "Fira!"

Her fireball impacted Kim dead centre of the chest, pushing Kim further into the sand and keeping her down for another precious moment. Kairi kneeled, and very quickly snatched her necklace back. "I'll take that!" Kairi hissed, and took off running before Kim could retaliate.

Kim kicked sand all over the place as she scrambled to her feet and turned in the direction Kairi had gone, but stopped dead as soon as she had.

Kairi was gone.

Growling in frustration, Kim grit her teeth and seethed. "Learned how to turn yourself invisible, eh?" she asked pointlessly, seeing the sand get kicked up even though nobody was there. "Well guess what you dumb slave? If the sand is your ally, it's also mine. It's telling me exactly where you are!" She raised her black Keyblade and pointed it in the direction of the running sand. "Blizz-!"

"Thunder Blade!"

Kim's eyes widened in shock. That voice had come from behind her! She was only able to turn halfway before Kairi's electrically charged Keyblade struck her back. The electric charge was gruelling on Kim's nerves, far worse than any of the prior spells that had struck her. The physical strike of the Keyblade had assisted Kairi in getting through the anti-magic wards imbued in the armour, or maybe her magic was just that much more intense right now. Kim really couldn't figure it out.

How? She was over there! How is she behind me!?

"How'd you like that?" Kairi taunted her. "I already told you, I will never be your slave!"

Light blinded both of them suddenly as it surged from Kairi's left hand. It died down a moment later, Kairi noticing a weight in her hand that hadn't been there before. She and Kim both looked down in shock.

The Oathkeeper was in her left hand, running parallel to Ocean's Toll in her right.

"What in the...?" Kim asked, stunned, before her lip curled. "How did you do that? How did you, pretty little princess, gain the power of two? Answer me!"

Kairi stared down at Oathkeeper, jaw slack in surprise at the sudden appearance of another Keyblade. "I don't-" Kim was quick to cut her off with a swift jab at her stomach. Kairi sent a silent prayer to the heavens that Kim's Keyblade tip didn't end in a point, or the fight would've been over then and there. Sand was thrown into the air as she crashed rear-first to the ground.

"Gotcha now!" Kim's triumphant shout filled Kairi's ears as the blonde swooped in, ready to deal a decisive blow.

Kairi wasn't having any of it. In one fluid motion, she buried her foot in the sand and kicked upwards. Kim recoiled as the sand struck her in the eyes, screeching loudly from the pain. Not missing a beat, Kairi aimed both Keyblades at Kim's chest and let out a furious shout. Twin balls of fire raced from each Keyblade and blasted Kim off of her feet.

The attack did little more than put a small distance between the two of them, but for Kairi, it was more than enough. She was already back on her feet and ready to keep going. Unfortunately for her, so was Kim.

"You just don't know when to quit, do you?!" the blonde roared as she charged at Kairi.

Ocean's Toll was brought up between them, intercepting the slash aimed at Kairi's stomach. "It's better that what you've got planned!" Kairi spun her Keyblade around in a wide circle, forcing Kim's Keyblade to stab at the ground. Kim stumbled forward, her head nearly knocking into Kairi's chin. With her left hand, Kairi struck at her exposed back with Oathkeeper's pommel, sending Kim sprawling face-first into the sand. Grinning triumphantly, Kairi leapt away from her opponent, keeping as much distance between them as possible.

Kim yanked her head free from the sand, coughing and spluttering. "Damn you!" She spat out a large glob of sand as she stood. "Oh that's disgusting."

"You deserve worse," Kairi muttered.

"Worse? I deserve better!" Kim retorted, pushing herself through the sand to get to her feet."Do you have any idea on just how much of my life I've spent training to wield a Keyblade? For as long as I can remember! That's how much! But here you are! Miss High and Mighty herself! Princess of Heart, Keyblade Wielder, dual-wielding, and dating the Keyblade's Chosen One! You haven't earned any of that!" Light flared around Kim's shoulders as the helmet to her armor writhed like the snake it resembled before fully encompassing her head, solidifying in a fearful manner that really did make her head look like a cobra. "I, however, have earned it! I'm in the top five of all my brothers and sisters and I'm going to take what's rightfully mine!"

An orb of swirling purple magic formed on the tip of Kim's Keyblade as she took aim at Kairi. "You've got the advantage here on the sand, but what if I robbed you of that?" The orb pulsed and more than tripled its size. "Drift!"

A squeak of surprise escaped Kairi as the gravity around her vanished and she was lifted into the air.

Oh, shit! Not good!

Kairi looked over at Kim in legitimate terror as the armoured teen approached. After Nanaki had used the same spell on her earlier, Kairi already knew that right now she was completely at the mercy of whatever forces acted upon her. Kairi quickly pointed both of her Keyblades at Kim, desperately screaming, "Thunder!"

She missed. Her aim had been off and both bolts struck beside Kim on either side, melting tiny portions of sand. Kim was standing in front of her now, Kairi hovering in the air and leaning backwards while slowly rotating in that direction. Kim wasn't even smiling. "Now this looks familiar," she said. "Wouldn't you agree, my little slave!" Kim shrieked out the last word while striking Kairi's side with a diagonal uppercut that had all of her strength behind it. Kairi screamed as the blade cut through her black cloak and into her skin, and Kairi began to get disoriented as the power behind the attack sent her into a wild, unstoppable spin.

If Kim struck her again, Kairi had no idea. Her right side burned in pain as her blood leaked out, her head was dizzy as her brain went everywhere inside the confines of her skull, completely unable to get a sense of up, down, left, right, or sideways; and she was really wishing that she hadn't had all of those margaritas or eaten so much of her cake. Kairi's stomach threatened a revolt and her throat tried to form a barricade based on the grounds of not knowing where it would end up.

Naminé, if you're going to do anything else, do it now please!

Something impacted Kairi, and she realized after a moment that it was the sand. The spell must have ended. She tried to focus her eyes, but it was a lost cause; her equilibrium was too messed up at the moment, and her body reacted to it. Kairi couldn't even coordinate her hands to pull her hood over her head; it was all she could do to keep propped up on her elbows. Her side hurt, hot blood leaving from the wound Kim had opened in her to soak her black cloak and stain the sand red. The sand in front of her face reeked of vomit, and some clung to her chin and burned her nose.

She could hear Kim talking, and it felt like Kim was standing right over her again. Kairi was right about to try a disoriented swing at her, but her stomach's revolt was far from quelled.

"...pitiful," Kim was saying. "Time to say goodnight, slave. We're going to have a nice, long, reunion after you've met Maleficent. You will not enjoy it, but I certainly will."

Kairi looked up. Her head was still swimming, but she saw enough to understand what was going on.

Thanks, Naminé, she silently thought, sending her sister all of her gratitude. Kairi could see Kim standing above herself, but several feet away. There was a mirror image of Kairi, blearily looking up at the armoured blonde with an identical pile of vomit and blood-stained sand beneath her, while Kairi herself remained unnoticed; the recipient of an invisibility spell of Naminé's. If it hadn't been for this little trick of theirs, Kim would certainly have gotten the upper hand a lot sooner, and Kairi would be experiencing hell all over again, probably with Naminé forced to watch and await her turn.

A faint screeching filled the air, like metal being shredded in a blender, growing louder with each passing moment. It took her less than a second to spot the culprit. A massive ball of fire was falling from the sky, just over the play island in the distance. The fire seemed to have grabbed Kim's attention as well, stealing it away from the illusionary copy of Kairi.

A split second before the fireball made impact against the island, Kairi realized just what the fireball was. The Kingdom was about to crash nose first. A sudden weight dropped in her gut followed immediately by panic. She knew what happened when fuel laden vehicles crashed at high velocities. And she knew more than she wanted to about what happened when something exploded from her physics classes in school.

Reacting on instinct, Kairi squeezed her eyes shut and curled herself into a tight ball, protecting her head with her arms. "Naminé! Take cover!" Whether her warning was heard in time, Kairi didn't know. A bright flash of light lit up the night beyond her eyelids. Not even a second later, an earsplitting roar filled the air as an invisible shockwave of super heated air slammed into the beach. Faintly, Kairi could hear Kim cry out in surprise as the blast knocked them further inland.

Kairi rolled to a stop, a ringing in her ears muffling the rest of the world. She opened her eyes and nearly threw up again from how badly the world was spinning. When it no longer felt like she was going to collapse if she stood up, she took a look back at the island. A wounded squeak escaped her.

The entire island was engulfed in fire. The massive tree at its heart burned like a small sun against the dark of the perpetual night. Flaming pieces of debris from the explosion were falling across the sea, some of which reached the beach where Kairi lay.

A cold hand found Kairi's shoulder and shook her out of her initial shock. Naminé's voice, though muffled through the ringing in Kairi's ears finally reached her. "Kairi! Hello? Can you hear me?"

"Naminé?" Kairi said slowly, turning to look at her sister. Naminé's worried expression filled her vision. "Naminé, what just happened?" Blood was running down the side of Naminé's face from an unseen wound hidden by her hair. "You're bleeding!"

"I'm fine," Naminé sighed, "I hit my head when the shockwave knocked me over. We got off better than Kim, anyway."

"What do you-" Kairi began, but stopped when she realized that someone was screaming in pain nearby. Looking around, she caught sight of Kim, kneeling on the ground near a large, jagged-edged piece of the wrecked Kingdom that had crashed into the beach. Kim was clutching her right arm close to her chest and shaking violently. It took Kairi a moment to realize what was wrong due to the darkness, then she saw it. Lying on the ground along the side of the Gummi shard was Kim's severed hand.

"She deserved it though." Naminé's voice was cold and lacked any sympathy for their enemy. "And now we have a major advantage." She glanced up at the burning island in the distance. "For crying out loud. I told him to protect the Keyhole! Not blow it up with a space ship!"

Kairi looked at Naminé blankly. "Told who to do what?"

In response, Naminé pointed at the island. "Richard. I told him to protect the Keyhole. Now look at what he's done. Sora is not going to be happy when he finds out that the Kingdom is gone. Kairi where are you going?"

Kairi had risen to her feet, and she carefully placed one foot in front of the other as she walked towards their downed foe. Kim was half screaming and half sobbing in agony, cradling the stump of her hand very close to her chest. Her helmet had been blown off, allowing Kairi to see every emotion on the blonde's face in the burning light of the fire.

Kairi stopped, standing over Kim with both Keyblades in her hands, blades pointed down towards Kim's neck. Kim looked up, and sucked in a sob. "Do it," she snarled. "Finish me, you ungodly lucky bitch. Take your revenge."

Kairi raised both Keyblades above her head, and stabbed them down.

Kim looked in complete shock at the metal inches away from her eyes.

"I hate you so much," Kairi said through clenched teeth. "I never would've thought that I could hate someone so much. So congratulations. You proved me wrong." Kim winced as Oathkeeper's tip moved closer to her eye. "But I'm not going to let that hate dictate what I do, unlike you. I'm letting you live. Not because I don't want to hurt you, but because I want to. I'm choosing to stay my hand, you insufferable whore." Twin flashes of light lit the darkness on the beach as Kairi dismissed her Keyblades.

"I'm not you." Kim's eyes widened in anger. Kairi's voice was full of pity. "I'll never be you. I'm better." Kairi turned her back on Kim and began limping back toward Naminé.

"You'll rue this day, Kairi!" Kim screamed. "I don't want the pity of some self-righteous peon! I'll make you wish you'd killed me you-!"

She stopped short. The gleam of metal right in front of her eyes surprised her. Naminé held the tip of her Keyblade a scant few millimetres away from Kim's face.

"Choose your next words carefully, Kim," Naminé warned. "I may have been Kairi's Nobody, but I am not her, and I won't hesitate."

"Naminé!" Kairi hissed.

"No, Kairi," Naminé answered, her eyes not budging from Kim. "She's vile. She works for Maleficent. She deceived all of us into believing she was our friend and divulge our secrets and plans to her. She stole the present from Sora that you loved so much and she raped you, my sister. That means she stole from and raped a part of me. I may have been a part of you, Kairi, but I am not you. Unless Kim sincerely chooses to take your mercy and repent towards the Light, I will slay her if she makes a move."

Kim laughed through her extreme pain. "'Slay me'? What the fuck did you hit your head on? I understand the little tricks you two played on me now. What makes you think that a novice illusionist who wouldn't fight me directly could even hope to defeat me? The sister of a slave is just as much a slave. You aren't my target and not worth my time, so get out of my way or die."

"You aren't in any position to be making threats," Naminé reminded her, pointedly placing her Keyblade against Kim's throat. Kim, wisely, held her tongue.

Kairi wasn't quite sure what to think of the current situation. She had been the one who had been horribly violated, yet Naminé was the one seeking revenge. No, Kairi realized, looking at Naminé's posture, not revenge. Justice. Naminé... Kairi sniffed as a tear came to her eyes. Suddenly she was feeling vulnerable again.

That feeling vanished as Roxas and Axel, both of them on fire, landed with an almighty thump into the sand in front of her.

"Ow! Shit! Light! It burns! It burns!" Roxas roared, immediately beginning to roll around to smother the flames in the sand.

"Quit being such a baby," Axel commented, getting up off the ground and dusting himself off, putting out the flames with surprising ease.

Kairi stared blankly at them for a fraction of a moment. Then anger swelled up inside of her. If they were going to be here, then they could've stopped Kim before she had done what she did to Kairi. And that made her furious. Furious at them for not being fast enough. Furious at Fate for being such a bitch. Furious at the whole damn situation. "Where in the nine hells have you two been!?" Kairi raged, storming up to the two of them.

"Inside the belly of a Behemoth," Axel answered. "Long story. Don't do it, princess, it's not pretty. What's up with you?"

She froze as his eyes met hers. In an instant, her rage dissipated, replaced by shame. How could she blame them? There was nothing they could've done. They hadn't been planning on getting to the beach. If not for Naminé, Kim would've won. Plain and simple. "It… it's nothing..." Kairi whispered, suddenly finding that she couldn't bear to look at him. She unconsciously clutched at her upper arm as she turned away. "I'm fine," she added even more quietly, hopefully quietly enough that Axel and Roxas couldn't hear.

Roxas didn't seem to hear, his attention focused on Naminé as she threatened Kim. Axel however, was a different story. His eyes narrowed as he stared down at Kairi, leading Kairi to clutch tighter at her arm and shift away from him.

"I'm fine," she pleaded, her voice cracking as a wave of various emotions she had been suppressing since Naminé freed her now threatening to spill over. Axel glanced over at Naminé and Kim. Comprehension dawned on his face for a split second, and it was immediately replaced by a cold anger.

"I see," he said quietly. "Don't worry, Kairi. I won't let that harpy get her claws on you again." Twin circles of flame surrounded his hands as he summoned his chakrams to him. He moved to stand behind Naminé, holding his weapons loosely in his grip. "If she gets past you, she's mine," he whispered.

"Axel you don't know-"

"I do," Axel told Naminé quietly. "I saw it in her eyes. I may not have all the details, but I've got more than enough to go off of. Speaking of, when this is all said and done, you're going to tell me everything. We clear?"

Naminé could only nod. "Crystal," she whispered, ensuring her voice was only audible to Axel. It was bad enough that he had an idea of Kairi's ordeal; she didn't need Roxas to suddenly know about it too.

"Hey! Get back here, you!"

Everyone but Kim looked up at the shouting voice, and all were completely shocked that they hadn't heard or seen the approach before now. Axel leapt out of the way as the spinning torso and head of a Guard Armor zoomed above the beach in the light of the bonfire that used to be the play island. Chasing it were Hayner, Olette, and Nanaki, all three of them packed in what looked like a really uncomfortable grouping onboard Nanaki's skimmer.

Roxas spat out sand as he raised his head. "What the hell?" Nobody answered him as Olette shifted her position.

"Nanaki! Pull us into a spin! Hayner, I need a boost!"

The Guard Armor spun around and around in the sand whipping it up and blasting the grouping nearby with Axel constantly scrambling out of its way. From what they could see, its body was already riddled with cracks. Nanaki threw the skimmer to the left, and Hayner did his very best to assist Olette. She pushed off of his cupped hands and soared through the sky with the Aublade directed in front of her, flying straight as a spear and plunging deep into the Guard Armor's body.

A feral cry disturbed the sound of the Guard Armor crashing to the ground beneath Olette's Keyblade before it could disintegrate. Kim had suppressed her pain beneath sheer fury, and loosed herself at Kairi with her Keyblade wound up and ready to slice up the Princess of Heart in her still-good sword hand. Her battle-shout was wordless, a primal uttering of the desire for vengeance and the fight against a bitter enemy. Naminé's eyes widened in horror and fury, but not at Kim, at herself for allowing herself to get distracted. Kairi herself barely had time to look, but her indigo eyes were filled with nothing but terror as her assailant came at her again while she was completely vulnerable.

Kim suddenly halted in mid-air, and everyone looked at her in complete surprise with her blade only about a foot away from slicing through Kairi's cloak and biting into her flesh. Kim herself seemed dumbfounded by her sudden stop, or why it was she couldn't move her arm. Her still-bleeding stump of a hand painted the sand by Kairi's feet completely red. Kim's head roved around, searching for the cause, until she finally registered the pressure around her chest, ankles, and sword arm. She looked down at her body, and her eyes widened when she saw that she was being restrained by her own shadow!

"That's enough of you, sister."

Two people that none of them could have ever suspected emerged from a portal of darkness. Kim was flung backwards as Keila commanded the shadows to throw her away with a faint wave of her hand, though her words had been laced with deadly venom. Naminé saw an opportunity and began to move less than a heartbeat after Kim took flight. As soon as Kim landed once more, Naminé was on top of her, pressing her Keyblade against the dark Wielder's throat with one hand and ramming her mutilated wrist into the coarse sand of the beach with the other. No amount of prior suppression could help Kim, and she screamed in greater agony than when the limb had first been severed as the grains of sand dug into the frazzled, virgin nerves of her muscle tissue.

Kairi only had eyes for the other person, however, and the Wielder of Shadows was the least of her concerns. Ice cold terror gripped her heart as the fires around them revealed the blood rapidly draining from the man using Keila for support.

"DAD!"

Naminé looked around at Kairi's horrified howl, just in time to see her tear by in a blur. The redhead continued to shout and sob that one word, slipping on the sand in her haste to get to her father as Keila slowly laid him down.

"He wouldn't let me get him to a hospital," Keila explained as Kairi fell to her knees beside her father. "He kept saying that we had to find you first."

"I'm right here, Dad," Kairi said softly, clutching at his bloodstained hand and doing her best to fight back the tears rolling down her cheeks. "What happened to you?"

"I had to make sure you were safe," Jonathan said, smiling weakly up at his daughter. "I won't let them get you."

"We can worry about me later," Kairi whimpered. "You're still bleeding!"

"That's what I've been saying," Keila huffed. "He needs a hospital. Now. Point me to the closest one and I'll get him there."

"There's one just a couple blocks inland from here." Kairi wiped her eyes with the back of her hand. "I'll help you carry him." Keila nodded.

"I'm just so glad that we found you before Jevenan," Johnathan sighed. "Almost last words that bastard Nobody told me before he left me for dead were that he would beat you within an inch of your life."

"I'm fine, Dad," Kairi said with a frightened sob as she helped Keila lift him up. That was a bold-faced lie, but there was no way that she was going to tell her father about what had happened to her while he was in this state.

She stopped, feeling fresh blood and a touch on her cheek. "I've failed you, Kairi," he whispered. "I allowed the enemy to get the Cornerstone."

Kairi had no idea what her father was talking about or if the blood loss was making him delirious. She shushed him, insisting that he needed to rest.

There was a sudden scream from somewhere off to Kairi's left, and she turned her head. Naminé was up on her feet, screaming her head off and running her hands all over her body like she was trying to remove a hundred frightening creatures from her skin. Kim was back on her feet in triumph, eyes drunk from something Kairi couldn't understand. Perhaps it was pain, perhaps it was something else. Dark, disgusting blood was oozing out from that sand-covered stump on her arm. She was laughing like a deranged berserker, and her Keyblade flashed into her left hand.

"We have the Cornerstone!" She declared, jubilant. "Now all we need is the Princess! You're mine, slave! I'm going to finish what I started, and you're going to become my new fucktoy when Maleficent's done with whatever the fuck she wants you for!"

Axel and Roxas immediately got in her way, both chakrams ablaze and Keyblades shining, but Kim just laughed and shouted. Their knees hit the sand as a gravity spell hit them, and Kim raced past the two. Olette and Nanaki both recovered from the initial shock from Naminé's screaming and Kim's deranged laughing and converged on the blonde with their Keyblades beared. Kim still kept laughing insanely, and pointed her Keyblade and the stump of her arm at the two. "Hemataga!"

Thick spikes of iron shot out from both with the force of cannonballs. Olette and Nanaki both fell back onto the sand, screaming in agony as their shoulders were pierced and left impaled by the spikes, their arms going limp beneath them. Kairi looked at Kim in complete terror as everything fell apart around her. Hayner was too far away and watching Olette squirm and scream in horror. "Do something useful for a change, bitch, and keep her steady," Kim rasped insanely at Keila as she approached. "She's my prize! I'll be getting all the glory for this one!" Kim stopped suddenly as her own shadow grasped her ankle.

"No, Kim!" Keila spat. "You're vile! Nobody's going to be turning Kairi in to Maleficent today! I made a promise and I intend to keep it!"

Kim paused, and appeared to be contemplating something for a few seconds while the screams of the girls she'd inflicted pain upon danced into her ears. "So you're a traitor again, now are you?" Kim asked rhetorically. "Then I guess I finally get to remove your ugly face from my sight. It's good to be me."

Kim slashed at the shadow holding her back and lunged forward, laughing in malicious bloodlust at being given a reason to eliminate the 'sister' she had loathed for so long and for getting the opportunity to redeem herself to Mother for her earlier failure against that sicko, Devin. She'd kill Keila, steal Kairi, and then live like a queen over all her other siblings with Maleficent's support.

Her Keyblade encountered resistance as it cut through skin and spilled blood on the sand, but Kim's laugh died in her throat as a wicked sharp piece of metal slid into it at the same time. She was granted only the briefest of glimpses at the enraged face of a man she'd just seen bloody and dying in the arms of Keila and her target before intense heat embroiled her body and she saw no more.

Lying speechless on the ground, Kairi couldn't tear her eyes away from Kim as her body suddenly caught fire around her neck, right where the dagger had pierced her. Her father at the very last second used up all that remained of his strength to push both Keila and her off of him, slipped the dagger that Bael had given Kairi, that she'd completely forgotten about, out of her belt, and stabbed Kimberly in the throat with it. In so doing, however, Kim's Keyblade dealt him the final blow, piercing his chest one last time and running through to the other side.

They stood immobile like that, Kim's Keyblade buried in Jonathan's body to the hilt, and her body burning around the bloodied dagger in his hands. A sharp screech of metal being torn apart filled the air as Kim's Keyblade fell apart, pieces of ruined Lightsteel falling to the sand at Jonathan's feet. No one who could was able to utter a word, until the one least likely to be saying anything spoke up over the quieted agonized wails of Olette and Nanaki.

"So that's where it was," Jonathan murmured. "His Heatsteel dagger was with you. No wonder Bael was defeated. Kairi...you've been given a...kingly gift."

"Dad…" Kairi squeaked, watching as his grip on the dagger slackened and he began to fall. "DAD! NO!"

She caught him just as he was reaching the ground, but he was so heavy even so that his weight carried her down with him. "Dad! Daddy! Naminé get over here! Heal!"

Jonathan's breathing was shallow as the magical green vines wrapped around his wounds. The bleeding barely showed any signs of slowing down as Kairi tried again, pouring all of her mana into her efforts. Naminé was beside her, having recovered from whatever fit had come over her. Kairi could barely see the blonde through her tear-filled bleary vision.

"Heal!" Naminé shouted, trying again to make the magic work. "Heal, dammit!" She was aware of the others watching them. "Help," she pleaded. "Someone, please! Help!"

Kairi pounded her blood-covered fists on her knees. It was useless; the bleeding refused to stop! Her entire body was shaking and cold, despite being coated in her father's warm blood.

He touched her cheek.

Kairi looked at his face, startled by the touch. There wasn't any pain in his eyes. "I love you so much, Kairi."

"Daddy..." Kairi whimpered, just like she was a little girl again and coming to him with an owie. She sniffed deeply. "No, you can't die, Daddy. Not yet. You still need to walk me down the aisle, and to be there when your grandkids are born, and spoil them rotten as they're growing up."

"I'll miss that," he whispered, "but they'll do fine without a grandpa, so long as they know he died keeping their mother safe."

"You can't leave us yet!" Naminé sobbed. "I barely know what it means to have a father! You can't die, not now." He moved his hand over to touch Naminé's cheek, and she grasped the hand tightly and wept against it.

"But this is what it means," he said softly. "To give everything to protect your little girls. Naminé...I want you to take my ring."

"Y...your ring?" she sniffed, looking at the hand she had been holding against her cheek. Now that she looked at it, there was a ring on his middle finger. It was a silver band with two thin red lines running parallel along its surface.

He shifted his gaze to the third who was close-by, the one he hadn't met before today. "You'll...do as you said?" he asked, his voice growing fainter.

Keila nodded her head, finding tears staining her eyes as well. "I will. I'll do everything I can. They won't get their hands on Kairi, not today anyway."

"Good," Jonathan sighed. "Then I can rest easy."

"Dad no!" Kairi cried.

"I'm so proud of you," Jonathan's voice was barely above a whisper. "So very proud of you."

"Stop talking like that!" Kairi shouted. "You're going to be fine! You have to be fine! Don't leave me, Dad."

"You and your mother stay strong now, my loves...stay strong...protect the worlds…love..."

His hand suddenly felt limp and heavy in Naminé's grasp.

-LD-

Sora groaned, blood running down his arm as he and Riku finally made it to the beach. A cold drink of lemonade was in Sora's right hand, free and clear from the blood on his left. "Man, Kairi is going to be pissed at me for taking so long to get back."

"Hey, that Heartless was one tough son of a bitch," Riku reminded him, panting heavily as well. Though his armour had spared him from acquiring any bloody wounds like Sora, he felt for sure that he had some bruises that would last a week or more. "You're saying that you, Kairi, and Naminé took down two of those things before? Damn, that must have been one heck of a fight."

"I concur," Dawn piped up. "Its attack pattern was rather confusing at first."

Sora glanced over at Riku, his best friend's face hidden by his helmet again. "I'm totally jealous, you know. Your ship came with an AI and now it's in that spiffy armour of yours." Riku chuckled, then sighed in resignation.

"The island's on fire," he said softly.

"I know," Sora answered. "Fighting's always tough, but this is our home. I can't believe it's been hurt like this. This is painful."

"Look, I think I can see them," Riku said a minute later. "Wait, didn't you and Kairi leave by yourselves? Why is-" Riku stopped speaking and picked up his pace. "Something's wrong."

It only took a few more steps, but then they could hear the sobbing. Neither was sure what or who it was from or whether the sobbing was from physical or emotional pain. They picked up pace, and very quickly they could see that Kairi and Naminé were both on their knees with a brunette, the three of them hunched over a still figure on the ground.

Sora stopped at once about ten paces from them, just now catching sight of who it was on the ground in front of him. A cold hand squeezed his heart until it felt like it would either stop or burst, and his stomach turned and turned until it had at least twenty knots in it.

Kairi was on her knees, hugging close the body of her unmoving father. The Mayor was dead; his girlfriend's dad was dead.

Dead.

The lemonade he'd brought dropped to the ground with a soft thwump. The Kingdom Key appeared in his hand in a flash, his grip so tight on it that his knuckles were white. "Who did this?"

Kairi and Naminé's sobs slowed, and everyone present looked up at the sound of his voice. Only now did Sora notice that Olette and Nanaki were here too, large iron spikes driven into their shoulders and being set in place by Axel and Hayner for later treatment. Roxas was standing behind Naminé, a hand resting consolingly on her left shoulder. A second corpse lay feet from Jonathan's body, charred beyond recognition and still burning.

"Sora..." Kairi sniffed.

"Who did this?" Sora repeated. His eyes shifted over to the brunette kneeling beside Kairi and Naminé. He knew her. She had attacked him back in Radiant Garden. "You? Did you do this?" Keila gave a start as she realized Sora was talking to her. "Answer me!"

"I didn't harm him in any way!" Keila shouted, rising to face him. Sora recoiled for a moment, seeing fresh tears in her eyes too. "Jevenan wounded him first, and would have simply killed him if he hadn't needed him, but my sister Kim was the one who dealt the final blow!"

"Kim!?" Sora asked, shocked. "But, but why would Kim...?"

"She never was our friend, Sora," Kairi murmured, her voice quiet but loud enough for all to hear. "She used some kind of illusion to make us all think that she had been our friend for years. She pretended to be you, and she...she almost..." Kairi covered her face with her hands, and she shook her head before falling back onto her father's body.

Sora turned around, taking two steps as if to march away. Riku quickly intercepted him. "Where are you going?" he whispered.

"I'm going to get that guy who nearly killed her dad," Sora growled, moving to push past Riku.

Riku stood his ground. "No. You are not leaving Kairi like this just to get revenge," he intoned seriously. "Just look at her!" Sora did, and Riku could immediately see the conflicting emotions battling it out underneath his facial muscles.

The brunet Keyblade Master looked back at Riku. "You get him, then." With that, he dismissed the Kingdom Key and went straight to Kairi's side. She was in his arms almost before he opened them, sobbing with a medium amount of volume and shaking from grief into his shoulder.

Riku glanced over at Keila again. "So what are you doing here then?"

"The Mayor and I made a deal," she said, somewhat uneasily and averting her eyes from everyone. "When I first saw him, he was already in terrible shape from when Jevenan attacked him. We cut a deal that would allow him to live long enough to say goodbye to Kairi and I would ensure that she not be taken to Maleficent."

"And what was his part of the deal?" Riku asked.

Keila kept her eyes averted, chewing on her lip. "Kairi, your father was a very brave and honourable man. He did everything he could both to protect his daughters and his mission. Be as proud of him as he was of you."

"I asked you a question," Riku reminded her, stepping closer and removing his helmet.

Keila looked up. Her face immediately paled as if she'd seen a ghost. "You..." She took a step back. Pure terror etched onto her face. "That's not possible."

Riku's eyes slowly widened in recognition. "I know you," he said slowly. His look of recognition switched immediately to one of anger. "You tried to kill me!"

Everyone turned to look at Keila, who was becoming more and more visibly distraught by the second. "How did you survive?!" She demanded, voice wavering and rising in pitch. "I stabbed you! You fell off of a cliff in the middle of nowhere! That fall had to be at least five hundred feet and you landed on your head! I saw your body. Your bones and neck were completely shattered! You were dead! No one could survive something like that."

The Way to the Dawn flashed into existence as Riku advanced on Keila. "Yet, here I am, alive and better than ever." Keila stumbled back and fell on her rear as she tried to escape. "Why did you try to kill me?! What have I ever done to you?!"

"Nothing! Okay?!" Keila snapped back. "I didn't have a choice! I was just following orders!"

"Orders?" Riku scoffed. "I'm supposed to buy that?"

"It's the truth!" Keila's fear was gone, replaced by indignation. "And its not like I was even able to beat you fairly anyway!"

Riku paused in his advance. "What are you talking about? I know your face, but who are you and how did you beat me?"

Keila's eyes nearly popped out of her sockets, and her fave turned into a snarl. "You've got to be kidding me. You're joking, right? There's no way you'd forget that!"

Riku leveled Way to the Dawn at her. "Do I appear to be in a gaming mood? How did you beat me you damn cheater? Dawn, do you remember?"

"Nope."

Keila beared her teeth and stomped to her feet, summoning her own Keyblade to her hand. "You kissed me you jerk!"

There was dead silence. Sora gave a small cough and shot Riku a curious glance.

Riku snapped out of it first with a quick shake of his head. "Nu-uh! Nope. I did not kiss you."

"Yes, you did!" Keila shouted. "There was no way I could beat you fairly, so since you were being all, 'ooh, stop fighting, Keila, I thought we were friends,' I feigned injury, you came over to check if I was fine, then I kissed you and you...and you...you kissed me back. It felt like I was melting, like I meant something to you...and then I stabbed you with a crystal shard and pushed you off the cliff."

There was some more silence, before Riku broke it again. "Nope. Didn't happen."

Keila screamed through clenched teeth. "You are the worst man alive!" She prepared to charge.

"HEY!"

Both of them stopped dead in their tracks as Kairi yelled at the two of them. Furious tears were in her eyes.

"I really don't care what happened between you two right now, but would you kindly take your lovers' quarrel SOMEPLACE THE FUCK ELSE!?" Riku tried and failed to meet Kairi's eyes, instead choosing to stare at the blood-stained sand beneath her feet. "I don't care if you've been trying to kill each other or whatever the hell your problem is! My dad is dead, but you two choose now of all times to bicker like toddlers?! Get some damn perspective!"

"Kairi, I..."

"No, shut up, Riku. I don't want to hear it."

"Sorry…" Riku said softly. Kairi hung her head, hiding her face against Sora's shoulder.

Riku looked back over at Keila. "Okay, you mentioned that someone else attacked him beside Kim. Tell me who."

"Jevenan," Keila said immediately. "He's the leader of Maleficent's Nobodies. Maleficent sent him here to retrieve the Cornerstone of Darkness."

"And he had to attack Jonathan to do that?"

Keila shook her head. "I don't know if attacking him was necessary. Jonathan's the only person who knew how to get to the Cornerstone. Jevenan threatened to hurt Kairi if he didn't cooperate. Jonathan did, but only to use traps to kill Jevenan's Nobodies. But the Cornerstone was still taken and now Jevenan is looking for Kairi."

A look of realization dawned on Riku's face. "That was part of Jonathan's deal? Lead Jevenan to the Cornerstone and you'd keep Kairi safe?"

Keila nodded.

"So Maleficent wins anyway!" Roxas exclaimed.

"Not quite," Keila was quick to say. "Maleficent won't get Kairi, and she needs her, but she did get the Cornerstone of Darkness. However, you guys have the Cornerstone of Light. So she doesn't exactly win per se, but it's more along the lines of achieving a balance with you guys." She blinked and placed her chin in her hand before looking up at the clouds lit only by the reddish light from the blazing fire behind her. "I'm not sure if this makes me a traitor or not," she said anxiously. "But, getting rid of that total bitch, Kim, and Jevenan definitely works in my favor."

The Way to the Dawn clinked against Riku's armor as he rested it against his shoulder. "Look, I may not like, or trust you, but I can put that aside if you help me hunt down this Jevenan guy. I'm not about to let you out of your deal with him until we're absolutely positive that Kairi's safe from these guys."

"Alright," Keila said. "But this truce only lasts for today, got it Master Riku?"

He spun the Way to the Dawn around in his hand twice before planting it into the sand. Keila did the same with the Darker than Dark, and the two came together to shake hands. "The next time we meet after this, we meet as enemies."

"Deal," Keila replied, finalizing it with a definite shake and break.

"Well, isn't that just touching?" A voice called out across the beach. "Enemies putting their differences aside to achieve a common goal. How… cliché." Riku and Keila both froze as a pair of blades were placed against their throats. "Imagine my surprise to find you here, Keila, helping out the enemy. I wonder what Maleficent will say?" Jevenan leaned in between the two Wielders, the details of his face becoming visible in the firelight. "For shame."

"Go soak your head in acid, you worthless Nobody," Keila growled.

"If only I had a heart, your insults might have the slightest impact on me," the Nobody taunted. "But let's get straight to business. If the Princess will kindly turn herself over to me, I'll let your little friends here walk away alive and well. I think that's a fair deal."

Sora's grip around Kairi's shoulder tightened like a vice. "You are not taking Kairi," he said, venom lacing his voice.

"This is a one time offer," Jevenan said, a smug look forming on his face. "None of you are in any position to turn me down if you care for their safety." The pressure of the blades on Riku and Keila's throats increased, drawing the faintest traces of blood.

"Then it's a good thing I don't."

With a loud fwoosh, a bright ball of flame struck Jevenan square between his shoulders, sending him flying face first into the sand. Richard stood just a few yards behind him, robe tattered and still on fire in some places.

"Nobody puts Richard in the corner!" the warlock declared.

The Way to the Dawn flashed back to Riku's hand as he lunged forward. "Get him!"

Twin fire covered chakram spun forward faster than anyone could move, slicing into Jevenan's sides thrice until they flew back to Axel's grip. Gravity twisted and warped around Jevenan, weighing him down and crushing him into the sand as Nanaki aimed her uninjured arm in his direction. Beside her, Olette had summoned her Aubade and aimed it in the Nobody's direction. No fewer than a dozen Keyblades of various shapes and sizes appeared in a shower of sparkling light, each floating above Olette before each Keyblade rocketed forward and nailed Jevenan to the ground. Riku and Sora leapt into the air above him, Keyblade's aimed downward and ready to deal the killing blow.

Thick tree trunks burst out of the ground beside the Nobody and struck both teens from the air. Olette's Keyblades were cast aside as Jevenan stood back up. Jevenan twisted his hand in Nanaki's direction. Vines rose from the earth and twisted together to form a large knot before slamming into the incapacitated Wielder.

"Your attacks were cute, but it'll take a lot more than that to keep me down," the Nobody taunted. "Care to keep trying?"

"Sure." At the sound of Keila's voice, Jevenan turned. Keila swung her weapon down on him with an overhead strike. Jevenan raised his arm blades, perfectly poised to intercept her strike. To his surprise, she wasn't attacking with her Keyblade, but instead the ironwood staff she had been keeping strapped to her back. Oath Breaker struck against the blades, and the blades turned instantly to dust.

"What?!" Jevenan exclaimed, eyes wide in fear as Oath Breaker descended. It struck against the top of his head with a thunk.

For a brief moment, nothing happened. Then the night was split as Jevenan let out an unearthly howl of horror and pain. His skin was torn away from his muscles as it was torn apart atom by atom. His muscles unraveled and disintegrated. Blood vanished into dust. Organs withered away as though they had never existed and his skeleton exploded violently. In less than a second, Jevenan was wiped from existence.

The others stared in total shock at where the Nobody had once stood. Keila balked in terror down at Oath Breaker. She didn't understand what had happened. She was confident she had been using the Darker than Dark. When had it been replaced with Oath Breaker? Oath Breaker shivered as though satisfied in her grip.

"Okay," Richard said, breaking the stunned silence. "Where can I get one of those?"

Keila almost dropped it, her hands were shaking so much in absolute fear of the staff she held. "This...is not cool," she said. "Totally not cool. I know I was all for getting rid of him, but that? Oh god."

Riku slowly got back to his feet, carefully eyeing Oath Breaker as if it would suddenly charge at him. "Are you going to be okay?" He asked Keila gently.

"I'll be fine," she said with a shudder. Behind her, a portal of Darkness opened up. "I just… I have to go." And go she did, stepping quick as could be into the portal and leaving the stunned group behind.

The others recovered fairly quickly after that. Axel and Hayner did their best to numb the pain from the spikes in Nanaki and Olette's shoulders. Riku left to get paramedics to the beach as quickly as he could. And Kairi and Naminé returned to grieving over Jonathan's body while Sora and Roxas held them tight.

The battle for Destiny Islands ended not with a bang, but with the sobs of two young girls who had lost their father.

-Daybreak-

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Okay, before anyone starts harping on me for it, I do like Kairi. She is my favorite female character in the series (Aqua does give her a run for her money though. -Shire & Shadow). It's just the whims of Fate that she has had to go through so much crap these past couple of chapters. Good things happen, in (most) fiction to those who suffer adversity, though. The night is darkest before the dawn and all that (Dark Knight quote. "And here...we...go." - Shire). I digress.

I've got to say, it feels good to be rid of Kim. When I first drafted her, her purpose was to fill a role and provide someone outside of Sora and Co. to interact with Riku's side of the story (I accidentally thought that she was Kim Possible and would go on adventures with them. - Shire)[And I laughed at him. -Shadow]. That changed when I created Keila though. Which left me with the question of what I was going to do with Kim. I had no purpose for her, I had no plans to use her ever again. But that left me with a character that was unresolved and was now a loose end to me. Thus, Kim the fucking psychotic bitch was born again, only to be killed off. Loose end: resolved. (We still did not originally intend for Kim to be as much as a psycho bitch and have issues as much as she did, though. That ended up playing out on its own. -Shire) [Seriously, all these characters write themselves most of the time. -Shadow](And with 300? brothers and sisters, you've got to have at least a few crazies in the family. -Shire)

As for Jonathan's death, I had it planned out for the longest time. When I created who he was and what he did (being a Templar, not just the Mayor), I also knew that he would die during the Sun's Shadow Festival. He didn't initially go out like a hero though. I'm glad I had that changed.

Jevenan's demise was better than I had initially planned. Using Oath Breaker on him was one of my favorite things to write.

Important news:

After discussing with my beta and Shire Folk, I have decided to have this story arc be the end of Daybreak. There is still ONE more chapter left in Daybreak though, so don't fret. After the upcoming epilogue, the second part of the Looming Darkness saga, Nightfall will begin. So, be sure to follow me, not just this story so that you'll be in the loop when I release the first chapter of Nightfall.

I'm launching a Facebook group as of today titled: 'Where Darkness Gathers'. Link to the group is on my Profile page.

Shire Folk is now official co-author (as needed), due to how much we've been collaborating on both of our stories.

Less important stuff:

Assassin's Creed IV: Black Flag was released. I've played it. I loved it. I can't stop playing it. Please send more rum. I'm out.

Assassin's Creed II is currently being played through by Shire Folk as he aims to get through the series to reach Black Flag. He's loving every second of it. Claudia is a manipulative little sister and Ezio is a pushover older brother. [And I take credit for getting him involved in the series, and Mass Effect. He still hasn't touched Halo yet because he hates Microsoft since they abandoned PC gaming. I hope to change that. But don't let him in on it. HAHAHAHAHAHA -Shadow] (I REFUSE to get an XBox One! Not even for RYSE: Son of Rome! - Shire) [I'm getting all next gen consoles except the Wii U. I don't judge. -Shadow] (I convinced him to get into Sony's good books with the PS4, and the demo KH vids from it didn't hurt at all. - Shire)

Anyway, hope you enjoyed this chapter, and Daybreak as well. Remember to follow me, and join the Facebook group. Or follow me on Twitter. Links to both are on my profile page.

Please look forward to the Epilogue of Daybreak, coming soon!

Aspicio, diluculo Infinitas Noctis.

-Shadow Horizons

May the Grace of the Valar Protect You

-Shire Folk