I'm too sick to say something witty, so straight into it!

Axel: "That's abrupt. DarthKingdom doesn't own Kingdom Hearts, Disney, Square Enix, or anything else."

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Chapter 89: Prince Down

Eric was running late. He was running very, very late.

He hadn't expected preparing the future nursery would take so long that he couldn't make the performance on time. Ariel would probably be upset with him, but if he was lucky, the surprise nursery would make up for his tardiness.

His ship was ready and waiting, just as he had requested. Nobody else was around, but it was easy enough to pilot it alone. He wouldn't be able to dock it by himself, but that was alright. He wouldn't need to.

He stepped onto the deck, and within minutes, was on his way out to sea. He had changed out of his clothes marking him as royalty, and instead opted for a plain white shirt and grey pants.

After nearly twenty minutes of sailing, he got to a specific point a few miles away from Atlantica. Eric dropped anchor, and then walked over to the railing. Triton had already cast a spell on him that would allow him to breathe underwater, but he would be the only human on the ocean floor.

He prepared himself to dive in, when he noticed a dark mass below him. He couldn't make out a specific shape, but it was only there for a moment, and then it was gone.

But it was just that one moment where he could see the shape that put Eric on edge. He still had his sword hanging from his belt, and he put one hand on its hilt now. He crept slowly back to the middle of the deck, and looked all over, drawing his blade slowly.

Everything was agonizingly quiet for several seconds.

And then, there was a soft noise. It sounded like something emerging from the water very slowly. And it was coming from behind him.

Eric ran over to the other side of the ship, and brandished his sword, only to find nothing there.

He searched the waters carefully, looking for the same dark shape that he had noticed before.

The prince saw it one second too late, before it burst from the water up at him.

!

Sora and company swam out of the stage area together, handing the crowd over into the capable hands, fins, claws, and tentacles of the Atlantica Orchestra, conducted by Sebastion. Though later, everybody would agree that the beginning of the concert was the best part.

"Hey, Nehrut, Bariss." Yuffie said. "Interesting song choice."

Bariss hadn't noticed, but she'd been humming the song quietly. Nehrut glanced at her with a smile, and she blushed.

Mickey, Donald, Goofy, and Axel met them moments later. "Roxas! Awesome job, dude." The pyro congratulated his old friend, despite the fact that he couldn't see him.

"Roxas says 'thanks.'" Sora conveyed. Then, he noticed Ariel, Triton, and Flounder swimming towards them. "How'd you like it?"

"It was great, Sora." Ariel said. But she looked very worried about something. "But, we've got a problem. Eric's... missing."

"What?"

"He never showed up for the show." She said, wringing her hands nervously together. "And I'm worried. It's not like him to miss anything important."

Sora traded a significant look with King Mickey. "The Brotherhood."

"We're splitting up again, aren't we?" Axel asked rhetorically.

"It is a big ocean." Riku said.

!

Sora, Kairi, Donald, and Goofy swam along the ocean floor. They had a very specific destination in mind, and they weren't looking forward to what they might see when they arrived.

Several miles away from Atlantica, things began to get dark. Eventually, Kairi had to resort to lighting their way, holding Destiny's Light aloft, and illuminating the ocean floor with a soft, silvery glow.

All they saw around them were huge, dark, twisted rock formations, among which unseen things slithered and crawled and hissed. Small underwater volcanoes also existed in abundance, casting eerie reddish light into their immediate area.

As the four of them swam slowly over a huge, deep gorge, Kairi asked, "Are we getting any closer, guys? Because I don't like the look of this place."

"Just a little farther, Kairi. We'll be there soon." Sora said.

And he was right. Within one minute of his statement, they were within sight of their destination: The long-since-dead remains of a massive leviathan, balanced precariously on the side of a steep cliff.(1)

Its insides were still glowing faintly with an eerie, foreboding light that illuminated its gigantic, gaping, toothy mouth from the inside-out. Even after more than a year of sitting empty.

"Ursula's lair. If Eric's been captured, this is as likely a place as any." Sora said, swimming toward it. Kairi followed after one second. They stopped when they realized Donald and Goofy weren't following them. They turned around, and saw them staring at the massive corpse with wide eyes, shaking slightly.

"What's wrong?" Sora asked, smirking. "Scared? We've been here before!"

"Yeah, but it never looked this scary!" Goofy explained, failing to keep a slight quivering out of his voice.

Kairi dismissed her blade, and extinguished her Light, casting the two of them into complete darkness.

"Sora? Kairi?" Donald's voice sounded panicked. "Come on, that's not funny!"

Two pairs of hands clamped around Donald and Goofy's throats from behind suddenly, causing them both to scream at the top of their lungs.

The water was abruptly filled with Sora and Kairi's laughter.

"Ahhh... Too easy." Sora said when he finally finished. "C'mon, let's go."

He and the still giggling Kairi swam toward the mouth of the leviathan again. This time, Donald and Goofy followed, albeit grumbling.

They swam though the entrance in the leviathan's mouth. There was no need for Kairi's Light when they entered. The sides of its mouth seemed to be glowing on their own, lighting the way down its long throat. They each kept their weapons ready for action at a moment's notice, proceeding slowly down the hallway that the creature's neck formed.

And finally, they crept into what had once been the creature's stomach, and Ursula's private chamber.

The 'walls' were purple, and fleshy, and the rib bones would be seen. At the far end of the room was what looked like a giant shell hanging from the top of the stomach. It was dark inside. An old, dirty vanity was on one side, and also a large cabinet which was slightly ajar. In the center of the room was Ursula's cauldron, black and empty. Pinkish strands of an unknown type of seaweed hung from the ceiling.

The place was completely empty.

"Be careful what you touch." Sora cautioned, creeping fully in. He swam towards the cabinet, and slowly eased it open with the end of the Keyblade. Inside were a number of old glass vials, which now sat empty.

Kairi slowly approached the shell, and lit her blade with her Light. With the silver glow illuminating the inside, she could confirm that it was as empty as it had seemed upon entry.

Donald and Goofy floated over Ursula's cauldron, looking nervously inside. Its surface was covered in a thin layer of sand. They looked at it for a moment, until Donald sneezed, kicking up all the sand in a huge cloud into both of their faces.

"Be careful what you touch!" Sora repeated.

"I didn't touch it!" Donald quacked.

"Just be careful." Sora said, moving around some of the items in the cabinet again. Donald swam to the other side of the room toward Ursula's vanity, which was still littered with old bottles that had contained some kinds of makeup.

Goofy however, was squinting into the cauldron as if trying to locate something specific within its depths. "Hey fellas? Do you see something here?"

"Like what?" Kairi asked, swimming over to the cauldron. Sora and Donald came after her.

"Like a pair a' little yellow lights down there."

After a moment, Kairi saw it. "Oh! What is that?"

Donald and Sora noticed it then. Donald reached down into it, and prodded the spot where the lights were. Then, they discovered that it was a reflection.

Everybody looked up slowly, and saw two yellow dots in the 'ceiling' on one side of the spinal cord. They stared at them for a moment before realizing that they were looking at a pair of eyes.

The eyes blinked once.

Twice.

And then a massive Heartless shot out from the fleshy ceiling. It looked like a very large moray eel. It had a gaping mouth filled with long, pointed yellow teeth that curved inward. Its dorsal fin was streaked with yellow all along its back. It had long, glowing blue lines in strange patterns along its sides. It was at least twenty feet long.

The Moray Shadow stayed where it was for a moment, staring them down.

Then, it uttered a loud hiss, and lunged at Sora. The Keybearer dodged to the side, and it struck Ursula's old cabinet, shattering it. Sora swiped at its neck, creating a small gash from which Darkness leaked.

However, he hadn't been paying any attention to the other end of the Heartless. Its thick tail came flying at him, smacking him full-on, and knocking him backwards, back into the throat hallway.

"Not enough room in there!" He shouted to the others when he saw Donald and Goofy get smacked into the shell in a similar manner. "Lure it outside!"

Kairi swam towards him, harassing the Heartless with quick bursts of Light as she did. It took the bait, and followed after her. The two Keybearers swam down the throat, keeping just a few feet between them and the Heartless.

They were back outside in seconds, and the Moray Shadow was right behind them, slithering out of the leviathan's mouth after them like a massive black tongue.

In the open ocean, they had much more room to fight it with. It lashed out toward the two of them, missing them by mere inches. The two teens swam up, aiming their blades at the creature. They fired twin Blizzaga spells at it, which burst against its dark skin with little effect.

It shook the frost off of it, and turned its head toward them. It opened its mouth wide, and sprayed a purple, gooey substance at them in a thin stream.

They dodged again, but Sora wasn't quite fast enough to avoid it completely. He felt a searing pain at the tip of his fin, and looked down after a second to see a blackened, burnt patch standing out against the blue.

Ignoring the pain, Sora focused on fighting. Donald and Goofy had gotten back on their 'feet' and were back outside the leviathan. The court mage immediately began firing Thundaga spells at the Moray Shadow, which had a much more noticable effect on it. The Heartless thrashed about as the bolts coursed along its body, before it turned its attention to the new arrivals.

It shot toward them, nearly clamping its jaws down on Goofy. A quick paddle in the opposite direction was all that kept it from succeeding. A blast of Light hit it in the side of the head, knocking it into the side of a large rock.

It hissed, and retreated into the rocks when Donald fired more lightning bolts at it. It slithered into the rocks, and soon vanished from their sight.

"Stay sharp, guys." Sora said, holding his Keyblade tight in both hands. "It'll be back soon..."

They floated back-to-back-to-back-to-back, weapons bared. They stayed that way for nearly a minute, scanning the rock formations all around them for any trace of movement.

But finally, after a few agonizing seconds, Kairi shouted, "There!" and fired a disk of Light from her blade at a point below them in the crevice. Sora spotted movement below them.

The disk of Light missed the Moray Shadow by inches, but still illuminated it for a moment, for all to see where it was. Donald fired a Thundaga spell down at it, which struck it full in the face.

Sora swam down to it, Oblivion at his side. He slashed across the side of its face as it lunged at him, its narrow teeth barely missing him. He shot up over its thrashing tail, and cut it across its back.

Kairi, Donald, and Goofy swam down toward it, and the Heartless turned its attention to them. It spat another jet of its purple slime from before at them, as they approached. Goofy moved in front of the other two, his shield on his back. He allowed the slime to connect with it, and it had no effect other than pushing him backwards into Donald.

Kairi kept going, and fired quick blasts of Light at its face. They exploded against its black skin, eliciting pained hissing noises from it. It accidently rammed its head into the cliff face trying to avoid the onslaught of Light.

The two Keybearers met up, and rushed at its head, intent on finishing it. At the last second, however, it came back to its senses, and snapped its head toward them. It opened its mouth wide, its huge teeth glimmering.

It snapped its jaws shut on Sora, who was nearly cleaved in two. He saved himself by sticking the Keyblade vertically out, keeping the mouth lodged open, rather like the trick he had once tried on Cerberus in the Underworld.

Before the Moray Shadow could shake the offending piece of metal loose, it was destroyed. Kairi pooled as much Light to her hands as she could hold, forming it into a basketball-sized ball of Light hovering between her fingers, and illuminating the immediate area.

"Shining Assault!" She lobbed it as hard as she could through its open mouth, and down the throat of the Heartless. It took five seconds, but then it hit something sensitive in the stomach area, and exploded.

Holes appeared all along the Heartless' skin, and silver light shone from its mouth. Sora quickly withdrew his blade from the dying Heartless' mouth, and backed away quickly, Kairi by his side.

They watched as the Moray Shadow thrashed around in its death throes, new holes appearing in its skin, and Light bursting forth from the new openings. Finally, after a few agonizing seconds, Light burst from its mouth, ripping apart its head.

The fading remains of the Heartless fell slowly down into the crevice, and a large, pink heart rose from it soon after it faded from sight.

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"There's the ship." Ariel said pointing, her fear and worry clear in her voice.

"It's dropped anchor." Nehrut observed. "That means that it's been stopped intentionally, and not hijacked."

"Ooohh, CSI. Real impressive." Axel said, chuckling.

"I'm just trying to help, Axel."

"Yeah, I know. But you realize that I have to rib you every once in a while since Roxas isn't as readily available."

Ariel, Nehrut, Bariss, and Axel stopped near the ship, examining what they could see of it. "I can't sense anyone on board." Nehrut said. "Let's see if we can find anything there, anyway."

He levitated the four of them out of the water, and up onto the ship's deck. It would be slightly awkward to move around on the deck with fins, rather than legs, so the telepath also kept them suspended slightly above the floor.

"See what you can find." Ariel said.

Bariss examined the railing. "Something happened here."

"And you can tell that how?" Axel asked.

"Look here." She beckoned for them to join her. "The railing is chipped here, and here." She pointed out two deep chips along the railing. "It was struck by some kind of weapon, probably a sword or dagger."

She pulled out her sai, and struck the railing unexpectedly, causing Axel and Ariel to jump slightly. When she pulled it back out, there was a similar mark. "See?"

"I don't know how you can catch this stuff, but I'm grateful." Nehrut said.

She smiled, feeling proud of herself. "So that means that somebody was fighting somebody. But briefly, or there would probably be more of these..." She added almost reluctantly, "Or a body."

Ariel looked extra worried, now. "Where is Eric?"

Bariss looked at her, sympathetic. "All that we know is that he fought somebody here, briefly. And that he isn't here anymore. So either he left safe and sound, and we've just missed him somewhere, or he was captured..."

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"Eric!" Triton was extremely surprised. Most of the off-worlders had gone off to search for the human prince nearly an hour ago. King Mickey, Riku, and Yuffie were currently searching the city of Atlantica itself.

Yet here the prince was, standing in his throne room as if he belonged there.

"Hello, Dad." He said, addressing his father-in-law. "I'm sorry I'm late, but I ran into a bit of trouble."

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What could this possibly mean? Well, we'll find out next chapter.

1) About the coolest evil lair I've ever seen.

Review please!