Alright, back to work! Herc, the disclaimer please!

Hercules: "You got it. DarthKingdom doesn't own Kingdom Hearts, Disney, Square Enix, or whatever else he wants to use except his O.C.s."

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Chapter 39: Underworld Search

Riku and Nehrut rushed at Hades with their blades, ready to cut him in half. They were mere feet away from him, when Hades vanished in a burst of smoke and reappeared behind them.

"Over here!"

They turned around and struck at him, but once again their blades only met air. Hades was directly behind them. He flicked them both on the back of the head, and sent them sprawling back at the others. They each stood up, rubbing the backs of their heads.

"How did you get here Hades?" Hercules asked, striding into the arena, preparing for a fight.

"A little friend of mine gave me a hand with that, and he's agreed to help me with another matter. Do you know what's the first thing I'm going to do? Now that I'm out of interdimensional jail?"

"Nothing good!" Sora said, stepping forward.

"Exactly! I have a brand new fighter that I'm just dying to break in. And he's real eager to meet you again, Wonderboy." He started casually strolling around the arena with his hands behind his back. "Invitations to see the fight have already been sent out, and this arena will be packed again within the hour."

He suddenly stopped, and then feigned surprise and concern. "Oh! But wait... If you're all off with dear 'ol dad... then all kinds of 'accidents' could happen here without you!"

"There you go with the 'accidents' again." Sora said.

"Bring on this fighter of yours, we can take him." Herc said confidently, though taking one small step to block Meg from view.

"Uh uh uh." Hades said, wagging his index finger at them. "Only four contestants in the arena at once. Tournament rules."

Phil scowled, "Unfortunately, he's right."

"I choose the Keyblader, the princess, and the dark kid to go up with Wonderboy against my new guy." Hades said, pointing at Sora, Kairi, and Riku in turn. "And the rest of you, stay away."

"You're on." Hercules said immediately, cracking his knuckles menacingly.

"Perfect! I'll expect you four here." He snapped his fingers, and disappeared.

"That can't be all he's up to," Kairi said, "There's obviously something more to this whole thing."

"You're right. He's got some sort of plan," Mickey said, "But what?"

"He'll probably try to take over Mount Olymous again." Herc said.

"He never quits, does he?" Sora said.

"Maybe he wants to keep you four occupied with this fighter while he takes care of his actual business elsewhere." Nehrut said. "He believes you four to be the greatest threat."

"With good reason." Riku said smugly.

"We'll split up, then." Mickey said. "You four will stay here. Donald, Goofy, Axel and I will go to Olympus and warn the gods. Nehrut, Bariss, and Yuffie will search the Underworld for any suspicious information."

"Sure, give us the hard job while you lounge up on Olympus." Nehrut said.

The group went their separate ways, Mickey's four to Mount Olympus, and Nehrut's to the Underworld.

"WAIT!" Hercules called out to Nehrut. He turned around, and Herc flipped something to him like a coin. Nehrut caught it, and took a closer look. It was a circular, gold pendant about three inches across, with a lightning bolt on it.

"It's the Olympus Stone, you'll need it."

"Thanks, Herc." And they walked away.

Sora began warming up with Kairi, hoping dearly that they would be alright.

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Nehrut led the group down through the gates of the colleseum and down to the Underworld. Jiminy's journal had described this place in great detail, and he wasn't looking forward to searching the whole place.

When they reached the foot of the staircase, they were hit by a blast of icy cold air. They always said that death's grip was a cold one, so it only made sense that a place filled with damned souls would feel the same. He could see his own breath.

Bariss and Yuffie were on either side of him, weapons in hand just in case. They stood on a circular bit of rock that branched off in two separate directions. The River Styx was around them, and off in the distance, they could see the massive Underdrome –now in ruins.

"This place is creeping me out," Yuffie said. Her usual cheery disposition was gone now, replaced by dread. She clearly needed comfort right now, so he sent a wave of calm through her mind, and Bariss's as well.

"So where do we go?" Bariss asked.

"I'm going to try something..." Nehrut sat down on the ground, cross-legged. He closed his eyes, and inhaled deeply. His mind left his body, and searched along the path leading right. He found several minds along the way; small, primative, instinctive minds holding only the disire to hunt for hearts. There were a slightly smaller number of more complex minds, cold and calculating, entirely emotionless.

Heartless and Nobodies. He pulled his mind back to his body briefly, and related this to the girls. Then he left them again. Much, much farther, he found two minds.

One was similar to the Nobodies he had felt along the way. But it was clearly more intelligent than the others, and darker as well. The other was much different. It definitely had emotions, for he could sense anger, greed, jealousy, and pure hatred. That one was definitely Hades, regardless of the fact that he didn't display these emotions too often.

Satisfied, he withdrew his mind, and returned to his body. His eyes popped open, and he smiled. "Found him." He declared, standing up.

"Hades? Where is he?" Yuffie asked.

"Down the path on the right. He's got a friend with him too. Probably the one who let him out of purgatory, or wherever he was. Maybe we should head that way for a little old-fashioned eavesdropping."

Bariss smirked, "I can do that..."

The three of them ran into a large chamber off the right path, with at least a hundred foot diameter. The place was mostly bare aside from the torches of blue flame sticking in the stone walls. They ran across it to the opening on the other side. Halfway across, a horde of Heartless appeared around them.

"Never fails..."

His sword was already in hand, and he was rushing at a Bookmaster. He dodged a fireball, and ducked under a shard of ice it shot at him. Three feet away from it, it closed the book it read it's spells from and swung it at him. He jumped over it and slashed it a few times across the chest. He took to the air and eliminated three Hook Bats with one swing. He landed on top of a Morning Star, and plundged his blade into the top to the hilt.

Bariss struck down a Shadow with her whip, and another, and another. She stopped for a moment to spin around and impale a Bookmaster with her sai. She pulled it out as she lept over it and smashed a Shadow. She then wrapped her whip around a Morning Star, and using all her strength, swung it all around her. The massive Heartless smashed all the enemies surrounding her. She flexed her wrist, and the Heartless was freed. It smashed into the cave wall, cracking it.

Yuffie threw her shuriken at a Morning Star, it stuck into it. She rushed up to it, grabbed her weapon and pulled it out by pushing against the Heartless with her legs. The Heartless died as she touched the ground. She bashed an oncoming Hook Bat with the weapon, and then tossed her dagger at it's partner. She pulled it out of the fallen Heartless and stabbed it into a Shadow while throwing the shuriken through four more of them plus a Guard Dog.

The melee lasted for a total of five minutes before the three heroes (possibly junior heroes) finished off the last Heartless. They continued on through the Underworld's maze of dark tunnels, crawling with Heartless and the odd Nobody.

They didn't find anything worth mentioning to their friends until they entered a long room lined with torches on the walls. There were windows along the sides that showed the River Styx flowing on far below them. Nehrut wasn't entirely sure where they were, but Hades was close.

At the other side of the room were two small green and purple demon-like creatures. Nehrut recognized them from the journal as Pain and Panic, Hades's henchmen. They were pacing up and down by a demonic-looking, black and grey chariot. The image of a face was on the front, and the sides resembled bat wings. Harnessed at the front was a scaly black dragon-like creature with red eyes. It tried to take a bite out of Pain or Panic whenever they got close enough.

Apparently, this was some sort of hanger. The other side of the room had no wall, opening up to the Underworld's great black 'sky'. Pain and Panic hadn't noticed the three of them yet, so they quickly hid behind one of the two pillars on their end of the room. And just in time.

From the doorway they had entered from came Hades, followed by the man Nehrut had only heard of from Bariss and Riku: Ruxik. They were talking.

"Oh this is gonna be sweet...!" Hades was saying, "Those Olympian snobs will never know what hit 'em."

"Unleashing the titans." Ruxik said, nodding in agreement. "Nice idea. So where do I come in?"

"See, my boys are locked up tight. No way I can open their jail myself, at least for another eighteen years. So I'll need a Keyblade."

"And what of Sora and Hercules?"

"They should be all tied up with Nessus while we do it. I even got the princess and the dark kid there too. We'll have taken Olympus before the match even starts. And even if they win, we'll be ready and waiting for them."

"Their allies may be able to get to Olympus before we do, however. There's another Keybearer and a telepath with them, and others."

Hades simply waved it off. "We'll deal with that if we have to. After all, there's no way they could know exactly what we're up to."

"Fine. Just remember..."

"Yeah yeah yeah, I know kid. I join your little band of evil buddies. Works for me."

Nehrut glanced at the girls standing behind him. Unleashing the titans? He seemed to say. They couldn't let that happen. He nodded to them, and they nodded back. They silently agreed that they'd have to keep them here.

They sprang out from their hiding place and attacked.

Well, they started to.

Halfway across the room, they were stopped by what looked like a giant cage of crackling electricity. They were surrounded by vertical bolts of flowing white-hot electricity. They were effectively trapped. Hades and Ruxik turned casually around, smirking.

"Wow, you three are idiots." Said a female voice from behind them. They turned around to face the speaker.

Standing there was a woman in an Organization coat. She had short, thin blonde hair that seemed to stick to her head. Apart from two long strands that started at her forehead and went to either side of her head to where they sort of resembled antenae. Her eyes were bright teal, and just her smirk was enough to get one's blood boiling.

The Savage Nymph. Organization XIII's number twelve. Larxene.

Shoot.

Larxene walked casually around them to stand next to Ruxik. She put one arm on his shoulder and leaned casually against it. To an observer, this may have been a flirtaceous gesture. But it was likely that it was just an act, unless Nobodies felt a different type of attraction.

A question for Axel.

The three villians outside the cage were smirking widely at their prisoners.

"Well, look what the cat dragged in..." Hades was saying, "Excellent work, babe." He attempted to put a hand on Larxene's slender shoulder. It was slapped away immediately.

"So," Ruxik said, taking a few steps toward the cage, "You must have heard our little chat then. Well it won't make a difference kids, you're not going anywhere."

"So what will you do?" Bariss asked, not looking at all afraid. "Kill us?"

He fixed that cold smirk that was so horribly remeniscant of Riku's on her. "Oh, not yet slave." Said 'slave' bristled. "I'm sure that my master would enjoy squeezing the life out of you. And Xaynew would certainly like to crush his brother... If you're lucky they'll be quick."

"And judging by your luck so far..." Larxene said with a devilish grin, "They won't be. Can I kill the other girl, Ruxy?"

Nehrut just managed to smother a snort. Yuffie couldn't supress her grin despite the fact that they were comprehending killing her.

"Not quite yet, Gorgeous." Ruxik said, placing a hand on her shoulder with more success than Hades.

So they do feel something...

"This one has been a friend of Sora and his allies for a long while now. She'll be more valuable as a hostage than a corpse."

Nehrut's eyes flickered ever so briefly to Yuffie's. So the Brotherhood hadn't learned about Riku and Yuffie yet? Well, the less they knew the better. Ruxik would be dogging her every move if he did.

"Then can I at least get rough with them?" Larxene asked, giving him a very credible puppy-dog pout.

Ruxik looked at the three for a moment, and then said, "Knock the telepath out."

"YES!!!"

A flash of excruciating pain, then paralyzing numbness, and Nehrut was out like a light.

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Ruxik smirked as Xaynew's brother fell, twitching to the floor. Bariss let out a cry of fear and shock and bent down over his inert form, checking his vital signs. Yuffie glared daggers at Larxene.

Larxene just grinned and laughed shortly. And to everyone's surprise, she turned and pressed a huge kiss against Ruxik's lips, which he returned.

"C'mon, c'mon, we're on a schedule here." Hades said impatiently.

Ruxik pulled away. "If any of them get out of line, you know what to do."

"This will be fun."

With that, Ruxik walked into the chariot with Hades, Pain, and Panic. The creature at the front let out a screech and took off into the sky.

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Yes, I paired Larxene with Ruxik. I don't know what on earth possessed me to do it, but the deed is done. For some reason, I like her. She's sadistic, homicidal, traitorous, and manipulative, but I like her...... I need therapy.

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