Two months later...
No, but in all seriousness, getting a job and writer's block completely destroyed my ability to get this chapter done. At least it's here now? And with lots of hand-holding to make up for the wait!
...that, and the last Anxclof POV section of the fic. I know her final decision might seem a little odd, all things considered, but she's basically done with revenge and that's how I showed it. Anyway, yeah, this is the last bit of Roxas obsession we're getting (except for scenes with Axel, lulz), but she will reappear in the next arc, for reasons that will be made obvious later.
Enjoy!
Disclaimer- Don't own Kingdom Hearts.
It was ironic that whenever Anxclof particularly hated herself, she ended up here.
She could hear every drop of the perennial driving rain battering against the awning that sheltered her, and tried to focus on that instead of the most obvious problem. When she had opened that dark portal back in Hollow Bastion, she hadn't really had a destination in mind – just somewhere, anywhere, that was distinctively removed from the corridor where she had fought and defeated Char.
Even more ironic, then, that this place – the main haven of the man who had endeavored to escape Hollow Bastion with his followers; the place that she, in turn, had strived so hard to leave behind – had popped into her mind at the last possible second and led her here.
Which brought her back to the here and now: Anxclof had walked out of the portal into the center of the deserted town and charged straight for the nearest haven from the rain, as the downpour had soaked her within seconds.
It reminded her all too strongly of that night after she had brought Roxas back, only to lose him again to Char's dogged desire to keep Sora alive; when Anxclof had lost herself to grief and sought shelter in Twilight Town's Sunset Terrace. Although her clothes and hair had dried by this point, leaving only an uncomfortable sensation where the fabric met her skin, Anxclof still couldn't hold back a tiny shiver and clutch her jacket more closely around herself at the memory. There were so many disturbing parallels between then and now she would have screamed, had she less common sense.
Both times, though, she had failed to subdue Char in time; nigh on three weeks had passed between then and now – three weeks of plotting and worrying and reminiscing and stewing in the heat of her own anger – and nothing had changed.
A part of Anxclof understood that she should feel even the slightest hint of triumph at having at least brought Char down. At having had the satisfaction, just for an instant, of seeing those ice-colored eyes lowered in surrender and the glint of the ceiling lights on Anxclof's Keyblade as she raised it to deliver the final blow.
And yet…
She winced, a sound that straddled the border between a whimper and a snarl escaping her. It hurt to remember, but she knew she had to do it if she wanted to get to the crux of the matter: why she had let Char go in the first place.
I can't just chalk it up to Riku showing up and increasing Char's odds of winning; I know that much. Anxclof narrowed her eyes and clenched her fist, ignoring the way the shallow scratches on her palm protested at the contact.
So close… she had gotten so damn close. Once Anxclof had let her desire to avenge the boy she loved tug her along and pull the strings of her powers into visibility, a rush of pure energy had come over her. That reaction always came when she used her powers, a fact that had worried her during her early days in the Organization, but that she knew was normal; Roxas had had it happen to him more than once whenever he used his own powers of light, so she figured Nobodies always had that happen to them.
This time, though, something had changed. The liquid adrenaline that had seemed to rush through her veins carried not only the typical determination, but a certain fury as well. She couldn't explain it, but it reminded her of a prowling wolf she had once seen in her Organization days, when Xemnas had sent her on a mission to Beast's Castle. Focused, furious, concentrating only on the task at hand and how it would fulfill her. In the wolf's case, it was food; in her case, it was vengeance.
Vengeance… but for what? That, she supposed, lay at the heart of all this. Those emotions – those emotions that, according to Char, Anxclof couldn't even have – had overtaken her with all the force of a person with a heart, with all the strength of someone bent on revenge. The realization that this particular feeling – more of a hunger than anything else, really – must have come from Falcon's desire to avenge her parents flickered across the back of Anxclof's mind.
She was so sick of that. Of the fact that everything she felt, everything she experienced, derived from that source.
Roxas and Axel and her friendship with them had been the only things she could call her own.
She didn't even have those anymore, though, did she? Axel had left, driven away by her ferocity and single-minded devotion to Roxas. Aloud, Anxclof scoffed; like he was even one to talk, considering he had actually gone through with kidnapping Kairi to lure Sora.
Of course, killing two people isn't exactly saintly, either.
When she thought about it, though, her methods didn't stray too far from Axel's. Either way, the end took the form of Sora's death and Roxas' revival.
Suddenly cold again, Anxclof stiffened against the shudder that rippled up her spine. Maybe she and Axel weren't so different after all. Odd, considering that she and Axel had next to nothing else in common. The only thing that had drawn the trio together and kept them that way was Roxas. Roxas, the boy she had loved – still did, she reminded herself with a sudden sense of heaviness – had been the common thread among the three friends. Really, it only stood to reason that with him ripped out of the proverbial cloth of Axel and Anxclof's lives, the rest of their friendship had nothing left but to unravel.
And even if Roxas came back, Anxclof doubted anything would ever be the same between the three of them ever again.
That was a topic she had avoided until now. Predictably, confronting it didn't make her feel any better; if anything, it only strengthened the burden that was growing on her shoulders and inside her chest.
Unbidden, the thought of the feral anger that had flared within her during the battle with Char returned to her mind. Thinking of it now sent an unpleasant shiver down her spine, and gave her a feeling of something oddly like shame, that she had succumbed to those feelings. It was strange; most people who had such fits of insanity – she figured she may as well call it that, since the moniker fit her behavior so well – could only recall said fits as blurry afterthoughts, but to her, the memory of her fight with Char played quite vividly in her mind.
In particular, the single injury the redhead had inflicted between dodging all of Anxclof's attacks and looking panicked rose to the forefront of the brunette's thoughts. As if on cue, her lower back began to sting fiercely, and with a grimace, she brought one hand to the afflicted area. Mentally, she scraped together her mana to use the one meager healing spell that she had bothered to master during her first few months of existence. Out of the corner of her eye, a green glow briefly appeared before it vanished, bringing with it a small sense of relief from the pain.
"Probably going to bruise," she muttered aloud, placing her hand back down on the ground. That would just be perfect retribution, wouldn't it? For failing to take down the girl that had taken Roxas away?
The female Nobody groaned, dropping her face into an outstretched palm. Now she was thinking in circles. Great. Perfect.
Then again, the fact that her mental process kept looping back to why in the hell she had spared Char was probably more relevant than the little stupid things it kept bouncing off of. Like the way she had felt during the fight, or how she had yielded to a mixture of both her powers and darkness, even though she was supposed to be immune to the deadly influence of both.
"All right, then," she muttered wearily. "Why couldn't you do it?"
The sound of the rain drumming against the pavement served as her only response.
It should have come so easily. Everything else had – the bloodlust, the hysteria, the way she had completely and utterly yielded to the dark anger her love had built up within her for so long…
She frowned and lifted her head to stare out at the rain again. The feeling of something being out of place had gone through her again at the very latter part, in much the same way it had as she had stood poised over Char with her Keyblade directed at her throat. Just like before, frustration surged throughout her entire body at the strangeness of feeling that way. After all, only her love for Roxas had kept her going on this seemingly-pointless quest for vengeance in the first place; only the promise of his eyes and his smile warming her life again had kept her from doing anything she would regret.
Why, then, did the reaffirmation of her emotions feel like a lie?
Anxclof glared at the ground and let out a huff, stirring the ends of her hair. Might as well prove Char right with that doubt, she thought sardonically.
Something stirred at the very edges of her hearing – something that differentiated drastically from the rain spattering the ground just beyond where she sat – and Anxclof jolted upward, alert at once. Her fingers groped unsteadily for her Keychain in much the same way they had at Riku's appearance back at Hollow Bastion, though this time the slight tremble to her grip arose from dread, not incredulity.
The noise came again. This time, her senses had pinpointed it closely enough to identify it as a shoe landing against the rain-slicked concrete. More specifically, the type of shoe that the Organization members typically wore.
Briefly, the female brunette chided herself at that overly-specific elaboration – only the Organization members would be here right now, after all – but then the footsteps came a third time and her fingers closed around the chain to her Keyblade. She hissed under her breath, wondering how long the other Nobody had been here before her grief-addled senses had picked it up. Stupid, stupid, stupid, she thought, with more bitterness than would have normally marked those words.
Then the footsteps halted. It took her a few moments of tense silence to realize the presence had gone.
She relaxed with her entire body, the bated breath oozing out of her and her eyes slipping closed as her fingers uncoiled stiffly around her Keychain. For some reason, when she thought of whose presence she had so dreaded, Axel's fiery red hair and acidic green eyes appeared in her mind, instead of the stormy gray and Heartless-like amber of Xemnas'. It made no sense, because Axel was at Hollow Bastion, for some reason she hadn't bothered to find out. If Anxclof knew him, though, Number VIII had gone there not to take out Sora, as she would have, but to tell the Keybearer he had kidnapped his precious princess and taken her here, to the World That Never Was. So Heartless could finish the job for them.
Axel's plans aside, though, Anxclof couldn't understand why such fear had gripped her at the thought of his appearance. Yeah, I kind of failed in the job I nearly went insane trying to do, and couldn't get our friend back… but I still don't get why I'm blaming him for getting so scared.
Blame…
A gasp tore itself out of her throat. Suddenly, she understood why she had spared Char.
The part of her that had known killing Char wouldn't solve anything had been right all along. Anxclof had been so desperate to find something – someone – to take the brunt of her anger and sorrow and love, that she had locked onto Char as Roxas' main tormentor and stayed there until everything had culminated in that battle in the corridors.
When that battle had come to a decisive end – Char kneeling on the ground, Anxclof eyeing her with barely disguised anticipation and excitement, the insanity clouding every fiber of her judgment – that part of her had risen again, pushing her from the darkness that lay beyond her murder.
Killing Char won't bring him back.
And for the first time, Anxclof realized, Nothing is going to bring him back.
Maybe that, in the end, was what did it: the catalyst that wove through the cracks in the already-crumbling walls of her determination and struck the weak point beneath; the hammer that shattered the floodgates and let every ounce of restrained fury and grief flow forth. In a bitter echo of her Other's action at the top of the Shadowed Desert's citadel at finding her world shattered, Anxclof found herself using only her elbows and knees for support, having had every other mental and emotional pillar of support yanked out from under her.
All she could think was, he's not coming back.
The thought – gods, you idiot, you may as well be honest and call it a fact – sent a probing thorn of anguish into her heart so sharp she actually gasped aloud. With that gasp came the first tear, which she obliged with a second, and a third, and a fourth, until the ground beneath the awning was becoming as dark with water as its counterpart just beyond.
"I take it that promise's still intact?"
"You're lucky. I had to figure this out on my own."
"I just want to know everything's gonna be okay, is all."
"We'll be fine. I promise."
"You guys sure have a strange way of doing 'favors'…"
"You can have this, if you want."
"I hate having to be subjected to what they want us to do. I hate not being allowed to feel, just because we're not 'supposed' to. I hate getting reprimanded for having friends."
"So what makes you think you're leaving without me?"
"I… I think I love you. Okay? That's all I wanted to say."
"I will be the one to save Roxas."
Roxas – the very reason she fought… She could never bring him back. Even if she did, like before, someone else would step in and make sure Sora was the Keyblade wielder who emerged alive; after all, a person with a heart made a much better savior of the worlds than a Nobody ever would.
Way back in their Organization days, she and Roxas had made an important promise to each other. They had sworn to leave together and go find their respective Others; while Roxas had known only Sora's name, Anxclof had had next to nothing to go on, and so, in his typical way, the blond had offered to go with her to help her. Recalling that fateful day, particularly how stupidly naïve they had both been, Anxclof felt her throat close up and a new bout of tears begin to swell behind her eyes.
She closed her eyes, ignoring how the action made said impending tears complete their journey onto one cheek, at knowing how deeply she had broken both parts of that promise. In the end, she had left by herself, for reasons she cringed even now to think of. The independent mask she had donned to hide her true feelings was a paltry disguise when she recalled how deeply petrified she had been of their mission's outcome. They would escape the Organization's talons, yes, but as far as they had known, meeting their Others would have been suicide.
Just the thought of losing Roxas that way – to a person, back then a concept really, who took the shape of a shadow in their minds – had terrified Anxclof. So she had panicked, and left on her own.
In that latter action, she had failed to adhere to the second half of their promise, though not for lack of trying. She had wandered around for what felt like ages, but what really must have amounted to a couple of weeks or so, bouncing from world to world but not finding anyone whose name resembled hers.
A chill rippled down present Anxclof's spine; she knew how this particular tale ended: sometime after she had left, Char and Riku had arrived and taken Roxas away, stripping him of his memories, his Keyblade, and his dignity, to force him to fulfill the role Anxclof herself had shied away from. By the time she had arrived back at the World That Never Was to see the boy she loved again, Sora was awake and equipped with both his entire heart and a certain nosy redhead.
The icy feeling appeared on the female Nobody's back again, though whether the feeling arose from anger or the dampness of her shirt, she didn't know. All she knew – the only epiphany that assailed her in the middle of that raging tempest – was that the feeling of obligation to fulfill her promise to Roxas had never diminished.
She thought of Falcon, her Other, whose sacrifice had gone to naught, and every emotion that the dark-haired girl had provided her with. Anger, amusement, pleasure, sadness, happiness, grief, love, and everything in between; so much emotion that she suddenly felt like a conduit about to run over with the force of the water held within. For a moment, Anxclof had the almost-traitorous thought, one that she knew the Superior would take umbrage at, that not having a heart was almost better than having to sustain every damned feeling in the world.
Roxas' presence, though, reminded her that feeling something was better than nothing at all.
Anxclof closed her eyes, then opened them again. Lifted her gaze to the cloud-darkened sky and held it there. Somewhere beyond, she knew, lay the Shadowed Desert, the world that her Other hailed from and likely still lived in, if the Heartless hadn't completely devoured it by now. Even though a year had passed from that last horrid memory of Falcon and Copperhead and his bloody betrayal, Anxclof somehow couldn't think the Shadowed Desert was gone. Falcon was more resilient than that.
She had to be. She had to.
Because Anxclof would find her, and take her place as the other half of the girl's heart.
For Roxas, if nothing else.
Oddly, as Number XIV rose to her feet, nothing resembling fear or sorrow or even annoyance at letting all this end so easily skittered across her consciousness and made that heart-shaped emptiness in her chest clench. No, she only felt a sense of serene readiness, one that she had never experienced before. It should have made her balk, made her wonder who the hell had kidnapped her original self and wiped it away for a virtual world – but even that thought carried far less vitriol than it normally would have.
The feeling that she had finally, at long last found a path she could be happy with took over any acrimony at accepting her fate so easily.
Anxclof wondered what Roxas would say if he could see her now, if he knew of this decision. The mental image pulled a mildly self-deprecating chuckle out of her, because she knew he probably wouldn't like it. Like the day she had left the Organization alone, he would more than likely demand why she thought she could do this without him.
Really, though, he had already fulfilled his end of the promise; Sora walking alive and well could testify to that. It was long past Anxclof's turn to do the same.
"Goodbye, Roxas," she whispered, and with the affirmation of her love clinging to the tip of her tongue, she opened a dark portal and stepped through it.
By the time Sora and Char caught up with Donald and the King, the Heartless that had seemed like a swarm of black, blade-wielding locusts from the castle bailey had swept in in full force.
Sora lashed out with his Keyblade, wincing as his sore muscles complained at the movement, and succeeded in eliminating several shadow Heartless in doing so. "Char!" he shouted hoarsely, over the battle cries of Cloud, who had leapt down to join them in this segment of the fight. In response, the redhead only spared him a jerk of the head to let him know she had heard, as she was too occupied with beating back a Heartless that resembled a spiky ball. "I think we can go on through!"
A silvery blur swung down, annihilating most of the robot Heartless who had abandoned the blur's owner to go after the Keyblade wielder. In his exhaustion, the brunette actually felt a burst of panic that one of his foes had just attacked; but then Cloud's stoic face and unruly blond hair appeared behind the flash of light created by his blade, and Sora allowed himself to relax, if only slightly. "Go on," Cloud grunted, pulling his massive sword out of the ground. "I can hold these guys off." Those dark blue eyes flickered toward the jagged crevice in the seemingly-impregnable wall of rock, before returning to the battle before him.
Guilt flashed in Sora's heart for a moment – these days, it seemed like he was always leaving his friends to fight a battle they couldn't win – but he just gave a single, determined nod. "Thanks, Cloud!" he called over his shoulder, hefting the Photon Debugger across the back of his neck and racing into the cleft.
He didn't stop running until the plain blue of the rocks that marked this area of Hollow Bastion began to clear out, making way for shining crystals that were normally reserved for areas much farther below ground. Under any other circumstances, he would have registered the beauty of the crystals embedded in the walls around him, but for now, he only summoned the Photon Debugger back to its chain form.
As he pushed the Keychain into his pocket, he found himself gulping in air with the fervor of a dying man and leaning down with his hands on his knees. Only then did he register the sound of slowing footsteps behind him.
Despite himself, he cringed inwardly. Way to almost leave Char behind.
Yet when he turned, he saw no annoyance or reproach on her face; only the same exhaustion that, undoubtedly, marked him. "Dammit," she swore under her breath. Due to the newly lit pallor of the area, the light that flashed in response to her swords vanishing illuminated the sweat on her face and the dust in her hair that much more prominently. "I… hate… Heartless."
Sora would have laughed, had he not agreed so strongly with that sentiment. "I hear ya," he sighed, allowing even his neck muscles to go somewhat slack and hanging his head.
He heard her sigh. "At least Leon and the others managed to get the townspeople inside before the real crap started. Can you imagine how much more difficult this would have been if we'd had civilians running around everywhere?"
A chuckle bubbled up inside him, but he held it down in time. With her phrasing, this whole situation almost resembled an episode of the superhero shows Sora had loved to watch when he was young.
Ironic, then, that now that he was one of those superheroes, he only wanted to go home.
His melancholia must have shown even with his hair obscuring his face, because when she failed to respond, he looked up to see her giving him an odd look. "You okay there?" she asked.
Watching her, Sora felt a pang of frustration that they had gone through so much together, and yet he still couldn't decipher her when she got like this. While he hadn't exactly known her as long as his other close friends, he had still fought at her side and spent enough time with her to know her little nuances; so why he couldn't figure out the emotions that lurked on her face and in her gaze now was beyond him. Worry he could discern there, yes, but beyond that… an emotion he couldn't name.
He abruptly realized she was still waiting for a response, as evidenced by her slightly arched eyebrow and tapping foot, and hastened to heed that unspoken expectation. "Uh, yeah," he said.
Char blinked a couple of times and opened her mouth to say something, when a loud squawk came from up ahead. Together, they glanced over in time to see Donald racing up to them, with Mickey trailing behind. "There you two are!" the duck huffed, putting his feathered hands on his hips. "We had to wait for you."
Char narrowed her eyes, but said nothing, which Sora thought was a little strange; she had never had any issue with rebuffing Donald's jibes in the past. It probably had nothing to do with the halfhearted little smile that stole briefly across Mickey's face, either. Still, the Keybearer didn't point out Donald's unnatural haughtiness either. "Well, it would've been easier if you'd stayed," he said. "Fighting all those Heartless was a lot harder without you and…"
His voice trailed off, but Char's elbow harshly driving itself into his ribs would have silenced him anyway. Immediately, every trace of aggravation vanished from Donald, and his shoulders slumped with all the gracelessness of a deflating balloon. "Oh, Goofy…" he murmured, shaking his head.
"Yeah," Char sighed, folding her arms. Only at that moment did Sora realize that Donald's exaggerated annoyance had only been an attempt to cover up his grief.
Ashamed at himself for not understanding sooner – how long had he known Donald, after all? – he turned away, suddenly fighting back the newfound heat that stirred behind his eyes. Even now, after the adrenaline of battle had all but wiped out his sorrow, said sorrow came rushing back in full force, much in the way a river finally pushed back its restraints.
"Are you two okay?" Mickey asked, clearly trying to change the subject. Sora looked over and saw that even the King's eyes seemed a little bloodshot. It made sense; Goofy had been one of Mickey's most trusted friends and knights, after all.
The breath caught in the brunette's throat. Had been,he had to start referring to Goofy in the past tense now, didn't he?
"Yeah, we're fine," Char said, in a fairly steady voice. Sora couldn't hold back his surprise as he swung his head to face her. After all of this, after they had lost one of their companions, he could not fathom for the life of him how she could still remain rational, especially after she had almost cried over Goofy's body earlier.
Yet now, just like earlier, he swore he saw a hint of something brimming in those icy eyes.
"Are you two hurt at all?" the mouse gently pressed.
Char shrugged and glanced away; Sora heard her mumble "not physically," and suddenly he wanted to cry all over again.
"Hey, fellas!"
The sound of the voice none of them thought they'd ever hear again startled them all so badly that even Char had to actually grip one of the protruding crystals to keep herself upright. Sora whirled around just in time to see Goofy himself standing at the cavern entrance, waving and grinning, like he hadn't just almost died not half an hour before.
"Goofy!" Donald and Mickey cried.
The knight had already run forward to meet them, and as he halted, he rubbed the back of his head. "Y'know, that really hurt."
"Aw, Goofy," the mouse laughed, leaping forward and embracing his friend.
Clearly, the force of the blow he had taken still affected him, because Goofy actually staggered back a ways. "Gawrsh, Your Majesty, I get bumped on the head all the time," he said, pointing at his head as he spoke.
Sora chuckled, more out of relief than anything else. He glanced over at Donald and Char to see their reactions. Char was still staring at the dog as though he had grown two extra heads instead of all but returning from the dead; the fingers that gripped the small outcrop of crystal didn't look like they would let up anytime soon, and her eyebrows had all but vanished into her bangs. He couldn't hold back the smile that spread across his face at how oddly cute she looked right now, a thought that skittered across the surface of his consciousness without a bemused denial right on its tail.
On the other hand, Donald seemed to have recovered from his shock and was marching forward, staff at the ready. Goofy watched curiously, clearly not having any idea why his comrade would bring his weapon forward; Mickey, however, picked up on the mage's intent and drew back just long enough to say "Donald…" in a warning voice.
But it was too late; Donald swung his weapon back, much in the same way as a baseball bat, and struck Goofy's leg with all the force his short arms could muster, broom handle first. The pain ripped a yelp out of him and his hands flew to the injured area. "That hurt, too," he whimpered, giving Donald an imploring look that should have mollified him.
However, Donald only drew himself up with a long, drawn-out growl. Goofy covered his head, bracing himself for another blow, but the duck only huffed, as though nothing he could say would convey his irritation. "Don't you ever do that again!" he shouted, shaking his free fist at the dog.
Goofy only nodded rapidly with a few mutters of acquiescence. Sora exchanged a smile with Mickey before looking back at their companions. "We're just glad you're okay, Goofy," the Keybearer said.
Behind him, Char snorted, pushing off the crystal to come toward them; as she moved into his field of vision, Sora saw she had carefully wiped every trace of shock from her face in the interim between his picking up on that and now. "As much as I hate to agree with duck boy… yeah, I agree with duck boy. Don't ever do that again."
Although her threat had no blades behind it – not at the moment, anyway – the low snarl that had embedded itself in her voice on the last part still coaxed a shiver out of Goofy. "Sorry, guys," he mumbled.
Donald rolled his eyes and continued berating his friend, while Mickey sidled up to join them. For some reason, Sora hung back a little, not wanting to interrupt the reunion of monarch and followers; their longtime friendship gave them more of a right to this than anything else. Now I kind of know how Char feels whenever we go to a world and see someone we already met.
At the thought of Char, he found his gaze drawn back over to her. She was looking on, arms folded, with what might have been a smile quirking her lips upward. When she saw him watching her, though, her arms immediately dropped to her sides and she jerked her head away from the scene. Sora frowned, thought he saw one hand making its way into her jacket pocket, but decided not to think on it too much; probably just embarrassment at his having caught her smiling, after all.
He turned away and gazed out just beyond this brightly-lit cavern, where the Great Maw lay. Even from here, he could see the swarms of Heartless permeating the clearing and giving it the illusion of a trembling gray floor. In the past, Leon had taken Sora, Donald, and Goofy out patrolling in the stark valley, but they had never taken this route to get there; even when Sora and the others had made the perilous journey to Maleficent's castle, they had simply descended the scarps at the edge of the courtyard where they had just fought Demyx to reach her castle. This route was unfamiliar to Sora, but the towers of Maleficent's castle in the distance told him they stood close to old territory.
While he and his companions had sought the meaning to the DTD and fought their way through the Heartless on the ravine trail, the sun had abandoned its position at the apex of the sky and begun to sink. Although the rain clouds high above still had not released their burden, a tiny gap between the impregnable gray blanket told Sora that late afternoon was upon Hollow Bastion.
Thinking of all the events of today – visiting Twilight Town; the virtual world; learning Char's secrets and her connection to Organization XIII; almost losing Goofy and getting him back again – Sora found himself wavering a little on his feet. After all, he could barely remember a day when he had done so much fighting, except when navigating through the End of the World in his last journey.
A light touch on his shoulder made him turn. Char stood there, her fingers slightly hovering where they had just tapped him. "We going out there?" she asked brusquely.
Even though her tone seemed determined enough, Sora could see the very small, nigh undetectable tremor in her fingers. She's scared, too. The thought comforted him, if only for a moment. "Yeah," he answered. Before his desire to keep his limbs intact could remind him not to, he found himself reaching up and gently clenching her fingers. "It's just Heartless, though – nothing we haven't handled before."
Surprisingly – or maybe not so surprisingly; she had let him hug her in the past, after all, a testament to her unpredictability about things like this – Char only stiffened briefly at the contact before relaxing. "That's what I'm worried about," she murmured, so quietly he had to strain to hear.
"Char?" he asked, almost afraid to hear what she had to say. The connection between her and Organization XIII's leader returned to the forefront of his thoughts, and he realized she had a right to be nervous. If one Nobody had appeared to take them on, nothing stopped any of the other Organization members – more specifically, the ones who had grown up with Char and knew exactly how to strike her mental weak points – from joining the fight as well.
That wouldn't be good… it's bad enough that all these Heartless are here. Although it didn't help matters that the Organization was sending these Heartless here in the first place, for a reason they still didn't even know…
"Are you two ready?" Mickey's quiet inquiry made both teens look down. The mouse stood there with his wizard and knight behind him, golden Keyblade already summoned to his side. Sora had a brief moment to reflect on the irony that Mickey and Anxclof wielded the same color Keyblade before Donald spoke up.
"We're gonna have to go out there, aren't we?" the mage asked, although his eyes were on Char and Sora's twined fingers. He narrowed one eye in amusement, and Sora quickly dropped his hand from the redhead's, not daring to look over at her expression.
Heat burned in his cheeks, but the brunette still mustered up a reply. "If we want to help Hollow Bastion, yeah. Leon and the others are still fighting the Heartless out there," he gestured in the ravine trail's general direction, "so it's up to us."
Goofy shivered visibly. "Y'think we'll be okay?"
Mickey opened his mouth to say something, but strangely, it was Char who spoke up. "We'll be fine," she said. "We've still got plenty of healing items, and if an Organization member shows up, we can always ask them about Kairi and Riku." These last words, she directed at Sora.
The Keybearer blinked. "Oh yeah, I forgot about that." If anything, maybe the one who had kidnapped Kairi would show his face. The notion made anger strengthen Sora's heartbeat and fill his veins. When that guy showed up… he would make sure to give him both a piece of his mind and his Keyblade.
Resolute, he looked at his companions. "Let's go, guys."
The five of them raced from the cavern and out into the Great Maw, weapons at the ready. When they weren't immediately assaulted by the sword-wielding robots, however, they skidded to a confused stop.
"What's with them?" Sora murmured, and Mickey let out a sound of agreement.
Char glanced around warily, muscles tensed, hating not knowing why the masses of Heartless she had seen from the crystal-filled cave had come to such an eerie standstill. Something tells me they're not just taking a coffee break, she thought wryly.
Something was wrong – if not wrong, then at least off.
Rows upon rows of them stood there, blade-arms lowered, with a new set of laser-like Heartless at their side. The lack of movement from the enemies that always seemed to be running about and attacking chilled her to the bone and traced a shudder up her spine.
"What's going on?" Donald hissed, clearly as apprehensive as the rest of them.
Char glanced over, only to whip her head back around when Goofy suddenly shouted, "Hey!" and pointed upward. She followed his gaze to the very top of the cliff face, wondering what had distracted him – and froze.
For the vestiges of the darkness that had just coalesced atop the precipice had vanished, to reveal a dark-clad, hooded figure. One gloved hand reached up and almost sinuously plucked away the hood, and the face that appeared effectively dashed all of Char's hopes of an easy victory.
Dark gray hair swayed in the wind as the Nobody looked at them below, and preternatural amber eyes that were visible even against the cloudy sky surveyed them in detached amusement.
Xemnas.
"It's the guy who's not Ansem!" Donald shouted.
"You mean his Nobody," Char corrected automatically, not taking her glower off the man on the cliff top. "That, my friends, is the Organization leader himself. Xehanort's Nobody. Xemnas."
She hadn't meant to sound dramatic – her clenched teeth would ruin that anyway – but Mickey nonetheless augmented it with a gasp. "Now I remember where I met Xehanort! I was visiting Ansem the Wise for advice on the gates that had recently started appearing… the doors that the Heartless were using to get from world to world. Ansem was afraid his research had caused everything. Then Xehanort came in, begging to carry out an experiment on the heart of all worlds. Ansem stopped him just in time."
"But he still did carry it out," Char spat. "As his Nobody, at least."
Maybe it was her hatred-enhanced senses playing tricks on her, but she swore she saw Xemnas' lips curl upward in a smirk. Excellently done, Charisa, she could almost hear him say, a brilliant deduction indeed.
Then, in a swirl of darkness, Xemnas had turned and stalked off, moving downward. Char followed his form with narrowed blue eyes, keeping her gaze on the apex of the cliff even after he disappeared farther below.
"He must be headed for the Dark Depths," Mickey said, tightening his grip on his Keyblade. "Let's go!" Without waiting for a response, he charged ahead, leaping from cliff side to cliff side to get around all the Heartless. Sunlight drifted in briefly from a gap in the clouds above, bathing his crimson-bedizened form in light and causing his Keyblade to cast a glare, before the clouds closed up again and Mickey vanished behind the crowd of gray and gold.
Evading the Heartless had been a clever move on Mickey's part. Gods only knew where Xemnas could vanish to if they wasted time taking out all these Heartless. "C'mon," Char called to the others instinctively, without waiting for Sora's confirmation. She caught Donald and Goofy exchanging skeptical glances, but refused to let them sting her pride.
If Sora noticed the two Disney residents' doubt in her display of leadership, though, he chose not to say anything about it. He just nodded, brows drawing down over his eyes in determination, and swung his Keyblade forward. "Got it!"
He made as if to take his place at the front of the group, only to halt in his tracks with a cry of surprise. As if on some kind of inaudible signal, the Heartless had jolted up from their stillness and moved to surround them; the sound of steel clanking was almost deafening.
Like so many times before, the four of them moved to stand back to back, weapons at the ready. As she shifted the hilt of one sword in her hands, Char felt a coil of actual dread begin to twitch in her gut. She tried to tell herself she had faced worse – fighting her way through a Heartless-filled Disney Castle sans Keybearer came to mind – and yet the nausea-inducing fear would not leave.
She understood the reasons behind it. Never before had she seen so many of them congregated in one place; the way she could feel Goofy's elbow trembling against her back from where he had bent his arm to accommodate his shield's weight told her that none of the others had, either. That thought terrified her more than anything else: that even the trio who had faced down the End of the World, even the veterans of battle, felt fear at this sight. Not even craning her neck to see over the hordes of Heartless before them gave her any view of the Dark Depths beyond, a fact that sent panic thrumming through her veins.
On Char's other side, Sora shivered, but he didn't let any trepidation show in his voice. "Move it!" he shouted at the rows and rows of Heartless.
"We can't let Xemnas get away!" Donald agreed, shaking his staff angrily.
"Right," Char muttered. Tamping down her fear, she risked a glance at the others. Sora, too, seemed to have had the same idea; he had already turned his head to look over his shoulder, and their eyes met for an instant.
"Hey," Goofy said, making them both look over. As one, he and Donald gave them thumbs-ups, and although even their smiles appeared strained, Char relaxed nonetheless. We'll be okay, she told herself with a firm nod that was more for herself than her allies. The thought hadn't been heard by the others, but she swore she heard Donald give a "Yeah!" before the duck and dog split up, racing toward separate sections of the swarm, which had already leaped up to meet them.
As lightning flashes and grunts of effort permeated the air, Char spared Sora one last glance. He was already looking at her, and even though it was only for an instant, she immediately picked up on the desperation in his eyes.
Please tell me we're going to get through this, the expression seemed to plead, and she felt every ounce of fear in her body drain out.
She had faced down an Organization member alone and lived; the least she could do was at least put up a strong front for his sake. For the boy who always had to don a mask of blithe determination, even when the very notion exhausted him.
She simply lifted one hand, uncoiled two fingers from the hilt of her sword, and saluted him with it.
Turning, she faced down the Heartless before her, readied her blades, and charged.
Sora found a grin spreading across his face, then whirled around and did the same.
Very quickly, the battle turned into an all-out melee. Into the sound of steel clashing repeatedly with steel; multiple pink hearts flying up in all directions as their holders fell; bright light flashing every time Sora managed to pin down one of the laser Heartless and control its deadly ray; the feeling of soreness beginning to build up in overworked muscles; already-formed bruises aching; sparks of magic shooting out where Donald, and occasionally Sora's, spells connected.
Above all, though, the knowledge of their king waiting just beyond – and, more than likely, taking on their main adversary all alone – hovered at the forefront of every exhausted mind and drove them onward in spite of their fatigue.
Char barely dodged one of the robot's swords, dancing back and practically into another Heartless' onslaught. She whirled to counterstrike; sweat dripped into her eyes and all but blinded her, but she still managed to attack in the right direction, as evidenced by the rather satisfying feeling of armor yielding to the pressure of her blades. She had a split second to flick her bangs out of her face and evacuate the sweat from her vision, to see her efforts had succeeded, before the Heartless she had been trying to evade landed against the small of her back.
Thankfully, its blade had remained at its side, so she avoided being impaled; nonetheless, it still served to piss her off. A growl of annoyance tore itself out of her as she lashed out with both swords. Struck by a sudden idea, she spun in a circle, blades still outstretched. The shockwaves created by the weapons colliding with every Heartless surrounding her made her arms tremble and threatened to make her drop her swords, but fortunately, she managed to maintain her grip.
Leaping back, she assessed the damage she had just done. Her assault hadn't done much beside make her a little dizzy – the Heartless still dashed toward her without a sign of slowing up – but at least she had eradicated the ones in the immediate area.
The one at the forefront of the pack reached her first and struck out with its blade, which she barely managed to block with one of hers. The free sword went into goring the robot in the middle. It stumbled backward, into one of its comrades, then suddenly jerked upward before vanishing.
Confused, Char looked up, just in time to see Goofy standing there, shield at the ready. A few shallow injuries littered his body, but some were remnants from the battle with Demyx. The moment she returned the dog's encouraging smile, he suddenly yelped and swung his weapon forward, free arm flying over his eyes as he looked away. The gesture proved a valid one, as an instant later, multiple Heartless slammed into his shield.
Recognizing her chance, Char raced forward, blades out in front, to help him. In spite of her muscles screaming in protest, multiple robots still yielded to her attack, and before long she had carved a swath forward. The empty space she left behind her was quickly filled again, but she forced herself to ignore that for now and instead slashed the crowd of robots that now lay slumped against Goofy's shield.
They vanished, their heart-shaped burdens floating up into the cloudy sky. Char took that moment to shout, "Are you okay?"
Goofy nodded hastily, already launching himself back into battle. He managed to mow down an entire column of Heartless before turning back to her. "Uh, what about you?"
"Fine," she called back – grunted, really, because three of them had chosen that moment to jump on her. One of them sliced shallowly into her upper arm with its blade, tearing the fabric of her sleeve. Snarling, she shook it off, laying into it with both swords when it fell on its back on the ground.
"There's no end to these things!" she finally screamed, once she had destroyed all of her assailants.
More nods came from the knight's direction, even as he pushed one of the robots into the ground with the edge of his shield. Apparently it was sharper than it appeared, because the Heartless' squirming soon stopped as it exploded.
"Where are Sora and Donald?" Char asked, inwardly shivering at the strange ruthlessness of Goofy's attack. She parried a Heartless' blow and slammed the hilt of one sword into its face when it failed to provide a counterattack, which surprisingly finished it off.
Goofy shrugged. "Further up, I think," he replied, pointing vaguely back toward the crystal fissure. Suddenly, he squealed again, bringing up his shield to block an attacking enemy. Char could just see his wide eyes over the top of his shield before he swung it to the side; as the Heartless had practically attacked itself to the brightly-colored weapon, it fell in the same direction, right into Char's blades.
She wiped it out with a few well-placed blows before shouting a hasty thanks in Goofy's direction and beginning to work her way up in the horde, back toward the cavern. The tiniest fear for the knight's safety flared in her heart before her common sense kicked in and lit it out; Goofy could fend for himself, head injury notwithstanding. His previous comment about getting bumped on the head all the time came into her mind, and she heard herself snort aloud at the memory, amused despite the situation. Somehow that doesn't surprise me at all.
Shaking the feeling off, Char narrowed her eyes against the moving mass of gray that had become her world; even the rain-heavy clouds were gray. Gray, gray, gray. Still, she reasoned, that should make it relatively easy to pick out the spiky brown head – or snowy white feathers; she did not care which – she sought.
Not so shockingly, the former appeared first. Distracted by her search for her other two friends as she was, the sight of a distinctively gold shape whipping out in front of her startled her badly. She staggered back, her eyes twinging at the abrupt change in scenery, but recovered long enough to strike it down. Once the laser Heartless had been taken out, she spotted a metallic-blue shape moving just beyond.
The Photon Debugger, she thought, and started forward again with new fervor.
"Sora!" she called before she could stop herself. That, predictably, turned out to be a mistake, as the rows of Heartless in front of her turned and lunged as one. However, what felt like ages of dealing with these creatures facilitated her effectively disposing of them; even though the empty space she left in her wake was rapidly filled by more Heartless, she ignored them in favor of proceeding toward that glimmer of blue at a steady pace.
She batted two Heartless on either side of her away with her blades and, at last, saw Sora. His form was currently cloaked in bright orange as he leaped up high in the air and blazed down again, ripping through at least ten Heartless in seconds before turning to another group and repeating the move.
Although he had mastered the attack on the way to Ansem's study, Char still blinked. Guess I shouldn't be surprised that he's doing so well, but still… He still looked relatively fresh, while soreness permeated her body so deeply that she was finding difficulty just in standing still.
When he ran out of the energy necessary to perform the fiery onslaught, Sora lighted down on the ground and glanced over, presumably to find more Heartless to take out, only for his eyes to widen. "Char!"
Said redhead tried to push aside the warmth that simmered inside her at the pure happiness in his voice as he said her name. "Hey, Key-boy," she greeted. Due to a robot suddenly deciding it had to slice her open, though, the words turned into a grunt of exertion as she blocked its blade. "Where's Donald?"
Sora shrugged, getting into his battle stance. "With Goofy, I guess."
Char shook her head. "No," she muttered around clenched teeth, "no, he's not. I guess he's fine, though."
Another shrug served as the Keybearer's answer, though the hesitation in the seemingly-careless gesture suggested she had given him something new to think about. "Yeah. Hey," he suddenly said, eyes on the Heartless that still had its blade against both of Char's, "I've got this. Hold it still?"
Char nodded, muttering a "hurry up" around clenched teeth at her tired arms beginning to shake under the weight of the Heartless' heavy sword. Dryly, she reflected that she really must be fading fast, if just one of them exhausted her like this.
An instant later, however, all of that fatigue flew out of her mind as a bright orange, glowing form shot past not six inches from her face. Thankfully, she managed not to fall completely onto her back in her surprise, but she did stumble back.
She blinked a couple of times, the visual residue of Sora's attack sending spots across her vision. "A warning would have been nice!" she roared, running back into the fray beside him.
Infuriatingly, the brunette only laughed in response.
Together, they swept through the Heartless in their path. Mostly, Char drew them together, and both teens took turns finishing their enemies off. At some point – maybe when she was knocking one Heartless away, in order to properly turn her attention to a small group that was advancing on her – it hit her that only a few weeks ago, she would have been overwhelmed by so many foes piling in at once. Only a few weeks ago, multiple enemies had presented such a huge issue for her that practically the moment the group had stepped into a battle at Hollow Bastion, she had had so much trouble. Yet now, perhaps because of her new strength and commitment to helping Sora win his battles, she had relatively little qualms with defending herself against so many Heartless at once.
Once the mass of adversaries had thinned out a bit, Char voiced as much to Sora. "You know," she said, slashing into a robot's steely hide and whirling to rend it with the other sword when it staggered, "when this whole thing started, I would've gotten my ass kicked in this battle."
Sora tilted his head at her over his shoulder. "Oh yeah," he said with a blink, "you weren't that good against multiple enemies. I remember that." He leaped up into the air, using the herculean lower body strength that constant practice with the Valor Form had provided him, to catch one of the laser Heartless and drag it down in midair. The next instant, bright light rent the air, and a startled yelp tore out of Char as she was forced to duck down to avoid the resulting blast.
When the light cleared, she dared to look up. Most of the Heartless around them had been cleared, leaving a streak of blue in the mass of gray-and-gold, and Sora was tossing the laser-firing machine out into the air. With a well-aimed Fira, he had finished it off.
He turned back to her; for some reason an idiotic grin had plastered itself on his face after his display of power, but that smile faded immediately at her annoyed expression. "Uh…" he began.
But Char cut his impending apology off with a muttered, "Save it," before turning and charging back into the fray. Already, the Heartless had thinned out considerably, and she found she had to expend less effort on keeping all of their blades off her at once. Good; we're almost done here, so we can go find Xemnas. The last thing we need is for that bastard to get away. Mickey was probably distracting the Nobody, yes, but that would only last for so long. Char wondered if the mouse had managed to detain the Organization leader with combat or with words – more than likely the latter, because even in the old days it had been just like Xehanort to –
No. She suddenly had to fight to breathe around a lump in her throat. Xehanort is dead, remember? Him and Braig, and Dilan, Even, Aeleus, and –
Dammit, but she couldn't even think the last name anymore.
Someone was shouting her name, she abruptly realized. Jerkily, she looked around for the source of the voice; before long, she found the bright white feathers and blue ensemble. At the moment, the duck was successfully keeping the Heartless around him at bay, casting well-aimed spells that managed to strike down several of them at a time, but his dark eyes were still fixed rather expectantly on her. The frown on his beak all but nullified the irony of his seeking her out, and not Sora or Goofy.
"Hey, duck boy," she shouted, not knowing whether or not to approach him to help. He would probably need it eventually, but he definitely would not accept her suddenly barging in the middle of his fight. Turning around brought her her answer to that quandary, as doing so brought her forehead practically pressed against that of a robot Heartless. An indignant hiss issued out of her into the heavy air as she sliced down with every ounce of strength she had left. Her opponent convulsed briefly in a caricature of death throes before disappearing, and she had to blink against the bright light of the pink heart that floated out of it and up to Kingdom Hearts.
"I think we're almost there!" This was Sora, who had apparently fought his way around the perimeter of the valley and defeated most of the Heartless hiding near the cliff walls. Looking around, Char realized he was right; the multitude that had seemed so daunting half an hour ago had shrunk down to all but nothing, as evidenced by the fact that the blue of Hollow Bastion's rock now usurped the gray that had been prevalent earlier.
She took that moment of respite to see who all had congregated here. Sora, Donald, and herself. Where had Goofy gone off to? In spite of her prior assessment that he could take care of himself, worry still spiked her heartbeat, as she could still recall all too vividly her oft-experienced grief at thinking he had died.
Then she spotted the knight's familiar orange-clad form weaving his way through the crowd, looking a little more scraped up than when they had fought side by side, but still full of energy. "Hey, fellas!" he called to them. Even from here, Char could see him set his shoulders and squint determinedly, just before his face all but vanished behind his shield and he dashed forward, effectively destroying the enemies in his path with one charge.
Sora laughed, while Donald let out a "hmph" and folded his arms across his chest. "You'd think almost dying would slow him down a little," he grumbled.
"That's Goofy for ya," the Keybearer chortled. Although he put up a good façade of amusement, Char picked up on the relief in his voice.
"You sound jealous, Donald," she commented.
"Jealous?" Donald snorted. "Why would I be jealous of that big palooka?"
At this point, Goofy had joined them and heard that last comment. "Gawrsh, Donald, you don't have to be mean about it," he mumbled, lowering his shield and rubbing his nose with one finger.
While Donald spluttered furiously and tried to amend his previous comment, Char exchanged a glance with Sora. He gave her a smile that was apparently supposed to encourage her, but she could practically see pieces of his mask cracking free and crashing down. She couldn't blame him for feeling that way, like every part of everything he had known was crumbling apart; she knew that particular sensation all too well. Saïx all but telling Sora that Riku had succumbed to darkness; learning their enemy wasn't who they thought he was; finding one of the people he and his friends sought, but not his best friend… and above all, Char herself telling Sora about Roxas, about his having known – for all intents and purposes, having been – one of the very monsters they were supposed to fight.
Spread out, these revelations might have had less of a negative impact on Sora's resolve. Thrown together into one day, they all but threw stones at it, shattering its glass surface a tiny bit at a time.
For that – she would have loved to think it was for nothing else, but she was done deluding herself and she knew it – Char made one sword vanish so she had a free hand and recreated the gesture she had made back in Ansem's study.
To his credit, Sora only spent about half a second staring down at her hand on his before glancing up at her again. She could only give him what she hoped was a gently calming look and pray he took the hint.
After all, she wanted to get a move on as much as he did.
He gave her a nod and a little smile before moving away. "Let's go take down a Nobody, guys."
Donald and Goofy nodded, hefting their weapons closer to their side. Exhaustion may have permeated their every movement earlier, but the promise of fighting alongside their king – maybe even of ending this arduous series of journeys – wiped every trace of that exhaustion from them, leaving only determination.
Sora gave them a thumbs-up and a grin before turning and starting toward the Dark Depths at a steady run. Char could only perfunctorily take her place at the back of the group, mentally whisper for the other sword to reappear.
You're being stupid. This is nothing to be worried about, she told herself firmly. And yet the feeling of something hollow yawning in her chest persisted.
Bemusement – and, gods damn her, worry – that Sora hadn't returned her hold.
The name Kairi darted across Char's mind then, with all the infamously fear-invoking tendency of a wild animal racing through the shadows. And it had much the same effect on Char; all of her well-buried fear about Sora never falling out of love with Kairi rose immediately to the forefront of her mind and made her clutch more desperately at the Oathkeeper Keychain in her pocket than ever.
She shook it off and refocused on the journey ahead. Her dedication to him and his cause still terrified her, in all honesty; having fought and almost died for him more than once didn't change that.
But it was all she had right now, and she would follow it.
Not too much to say here, except I feel like my writing style's getting progressively worse. D:
Review?