[DarthKingdom walks in, soaking wet, clothes tattered, with an assault rifle over his shoulder and a large bit mark on his leg.]

Nehrut: "Where the heck have you been!?"

Sora: "We've been waiting!"

I don't want to hear it!

Anyway, sorry everybody for my long absence. I got sidetracked by quite a few things, and continuing this story had to take a backseat for a little while. But I'm back now! And my New Year's resolution is to try and update at least two or three times a month.

Anyway, I kind of left things off on an odd note, but the general 'format' of this story is about to take a major shift. So at long last, here we go!

Sora: "Great! DarthKingdom doesn't own Kingdom Hearts, Disney, Square Enix, or anything else he might use in this story he didn't personally create."

!

Chapter 125: Interception

A few months previous, Nehrut never had only dreamed of being able to kiss Bariss without fear of rejection. But, in the twelve or so hours since the Planet's Keyhole had been sealed, that was about all that he had been doing.

The two of them were on 'their' couch in the lounge, lost in each other. Bariss was holding herself above him, with his shoulders pinned to the cushions. They had been exchanging gentle kisses for quite some time in this position. The rest of the party had kept clear of the lounge to allow the two a bit of privacy.

"We waited way too long to do this." He murmured.

She laughed quietly. "Well then, we'll just have to make up for a few months of lost time, won't we?"

"That'll be fun." He leaned up to her, kissing her yet again.

"Geez, were you two at it all night?" Axel asked groggily, walking into the room with a newspaper in hand, and clutching a cup of coffee.

Nehrut groaned, and looked over at the grandfather clock sitting on one wall of the room. It was about eight o'clock in the morning –in galactic standard time. They really had been at it all night. Somehow, they weren't tired.

"I don't think that's any of your business, Axel." Bariss replied casually, before returning to Nehrut's lips.

"Well if you're going to suck each other's faces off, you could at least do it in another room."

"You're just jealous."

"Yes, that must be it." Axel rolled his eyes.

"You know," Bariss said slyly, "I hear that Liasa is still available."

Axel froze. "Who told you?"

"The spiky-headed Keyblade Master."

"I'll kill him." Axel muttered, stalking out of the room.

Once he had left, Bariss looked down at Nehrut. "I think I just bought us about fifteen more minutes."

"You are a brilliant girl." Nehrut grinned, pulling her down to him. They didn't even look up when they heard the far-off fight between Axel and Sora, which Goofy immediately set upon breaking up. Though eventually, Bariss started to giggle, and the two broke into peals of laughter.

"I love you." Nehrut whispered.

A few hours passed, and at around noon, the two of them had gotten some rest and Axel had recovered from his injuries. The party of ten was gathered in the kitchen/dining room, enjoying a light lunch.

King Mickey emerged from his grilled cheese sandwich for a moment. "Everyone, I have an announcement to make."

Naturally, this caught their attention quickly. Usually, when the King said something like this, it meant he had found a new concentration of Darkness hovering over a world, and would announce their next destination.

But instead, he said, "As you are all obviously aware, Nehrut and Bariss finally fessed up to their feelings for each other yesterday evening."

Nehrut and Bariss grinned, and many of the others chuckled.

"While this is wonderful news due to the fact that there's a little more love in the worlds," Mickey continued, "It is also good for another reason... Yesterday is one of the days I picked for the pool!"

Nehrut and Bariss gaped, while the rest of the team reached into their pockets, emerging with wallets and pouches containing munny. They each dumped out ten to twenty munny apiece onto the table. Mickey grinned and raked them in, dropping them casually into his own wallet.

"You had a pool...?" Nehrut said.

"Yeah." Sora answered with a grin.

"We figured we'd have some fun with your romantic tension." Yuffie finished.

Nehrut telepathically knocked Yuffie's chair out from under her, sending her crashing gracelessly to the floor. "Good to know that our love life is funny to you."

"We want half the munny." Bariss said to Mickey.

"Sorry. It's as good as spent." Mickey chuckled. He reached for a glass of water sitting on the table near him, and raised it into the air. "To Nehrut and Bariss."

Things got out of hand then.

The ship jerked to a stop, indicating that they had just jerked out of warp space. Everything that wasn't bolted down slid a little ways forward. This was disturbing; as the ship's equilizing systems should have prevented this.

A moment later, something rocked the ship with enough force to launch many of them from their seats.

"We're under attack!" Sora shouted unnecessarily. He was the first to his feet, and he rushed into the hallway leading back to the bridge. The others were behind him just moments later.

When Sora reached the bridge, he leapt completely over a bank of consoles, and into the pilot's seat. He switched the autopilot off by hitting a few switches, and jerked the ship hard to port.

The view outside was a mass of pitch black and purple space, dotted with silver and gold stars. Clusters of massive red-orange nebulae were nearby, giving immediate space an unsettling 'evil' appearance. In this particular section of the cosmos, asteroids of varying sizes were gathered. Sora observed lava bubbling from the surfaces of some of them, and guessed that they were all volcanic in nature.

Donald was the next to make it to his chair, surrounded by sensors and screens. He did a quick check."On our six! A few squadrons of Heartless vessels, and one really big ship!"

"Put it on screen." Sora said, switching into what he called his 'Commander Mode.'

A small section of the viewport suddenly depicted the space behind the Unity. As Donald had described, there were several small Heartless ships pursuing them. The majority of these ships were of the round blueish variety, with three spinning fins that fired lasers. Though these alone were no great threat, Sora didn't like the look of the sleek black triangular ones streaking toward them at higher speed.

Just behind these was a ship roughly the same size of the Unity. It was bronze, with red viewports, and had two large fins on its underside. It bristled with weapons.

This mysterious ship sent a quartet of proton torpedoes flying through the vacuum toward them. Sora guessed that those things had rocked their vessel moments before.

"Riku, intercept those torpedoes with laser fire, and then lay down fire on the Heartless!" He ordered. "Donald, how's the ship?"

"Holding fine." He quacked. "Our tail was scorched with the opening attack, but the shields are up now."

"Make sure they stay that way. Riku, torpedoes?"

"Taken care of."

"Nice." He turned his head to look at the others on the bridge. "Strap yourselves in, this is going to get messy!"

Without further warning, he propelled the ship forward at breakneck speed, juking easily around asteroids. This prompted a barrage of heavy laser fire from the large ship tailing them with the Heartless. Thanks to Sora's superb piloting, most of these bolts missed, though those that didn't caused an unsettling shaking of the ship.

The Heartless went ahead of it, executing their own attack runs against the massive Unity. For the most part, they accomplished nothing, and soon exploded in bursts of Darkness as Riku's laser bolts hammered into them.

Once, the line of fire from one of their laser turrets met with a relatively small asteroid, which exploded in a fairly impressive fashion, and took a handful of Heartless with it. Sora made a mental note of that for later.

"Incoming transmission!" Donald shouted.

"Patch it through."

A small section of the viewport now showed the interior of an unfamiliar bridge. There were three people there. A lizard-like creature sat to the left, a costumed man was on the right. A dangerous-looking woman in green sat at the pilot's seat.

"This is the Assailant." Shego said. "You should pull over, kiddo. This is a no-fly zone."

"By that, you mean that you're working for the Brotherhood, and are trying to kidnap us, right?" Sora replied dryly.

"Pretty much, yeah." Syndrome confirmed. "Smart kid."

"Either way, shortie," Shego continued, "Just shut down your ship, allow us to board, and this'll all go a lot more smoothly."

"Here's our answer." Riku said, arming a dozen proton torpedoes. In seconds, he had them locked onto the Assailant. "Goodbye, now."

Twelve torpedoes spiraled through space. Out of all of them, two struck asteroids, and took several Heartless with them as they exploded. Another three struck the Heartless themselves before they reached the large ship.

The remaining seven, however, took Assailant head-on. They struck the front of the ship, exploding against them almost all at the same time. One torpedo took it full in the bridge.

The ship kept advancing, firing rapidly as it came. Sora grunted in irritation upon seeing how little damage that had inflicted. That thing either had very powerful shielding or good armor. It possibly had both. Either way, the vessel had taken only minimal damage from the torpedo barrage, which meant that things were about to turn very unpleasant.

"Real scary." Randall replied casually. He looked down onto the console before him, and hit a few things.

A pair of large rockets (which were about the size of an average Gummi ship) launched from the underbelly of the Assailant, and streaked toward Unity at high speed.

Sora punched forward, spinning the ship to try and throw the projectiles off of their designated target locks on his engines. They still pursued him. Riku opened up on them with the laser turrets, though to their horror, the lasers didn't seem to have any effect. Sora surmised that they may have had their own shielding units.

It was time to think creatively, because sooner or later, those things would catch up with them.

Struck with inspiration, Sora all but shut down the engines, and allowed the ship to idle in space, not far from a particularly large asteroid.

"What are you doing!?" Donald exclaimed.

"Just trust me!"

The rockets closed in on them quickly, and were seconds away from colliding with the Unity, and making an unrecognizable mess of the warp engines and most of the ship, when Sora acted.

The engines roared back to life, and blasted the ship over the rim of the asteroid, barely skimming its underbelly along its surface as he did so. Barely one second later, the rockets smashed into the asteroid, and detonated.

The explosion ripped apart the chunk of space rock, and caused it to release an intense, fiery explosion of its own. It consumed the remaining Heartless, and scorched the nose of the Assailant as it pursued Unity.

Sora rocketed away, feeling rather proud of his maneuver.

"Incoming!" Donald quacked, killing the moment.

A dozen or so small projectiles struck the ship all over. There was a slight tremble that everybody could feel beneath their feet. There was an ominous rumbling from the back of the ship, and all of the electrical systems flickered down. The bridge was cast into semi-darkness.

"What just happened?" Kairi asked.

A very calm, feminine-sounding computer voiced intoned. "Power has been shut down by an outside source. Emergency backup power online. Life-support systems only are active."

"Oh, crap..." Yuffie said.

"Electromagnetic pulse... Can we get the engines back online?" Mickey asked.

As if understanding the King's question, the computer replied in its annoyingly calm voice, "Estimated time to reboot: Twenty minutes."

"Everybody stay calm." Sora said. "They want to capture a Keybearer, so they won't just blow us up while we sit here. All we have to do is fight them off when they try and board us, and then get away when the power comes back online."

There was a chiming from the console, signaling an incoming message. Apparently the communications equipment fell under the category of 'life-support' and hadn't been shut down by the EMPs. Donald pressed a finger to a button, and the bridge of the Assailant came into view once more.

"How'd you like the EMP mini-missiles?" Syndrome asked. "Made 'em myself."

"Here's the situation." Shego began with a cruel grin. "We're approaching your ship now, and will board you momentarily. Your ship will be locked in a tractor beam. Now, I know you're thinking about fighting us off on the inside. Well, not only are we more than a match for you, but just in case..."

Randall held up a small remote-like object. "When our ships connect, high-explosive devices will be attached to your hull. Any funny business and I blow the charges, ripping your pretty ship to shreds."

"Try anything, and you all die." Shego continued. "So, you'll understand why it'd be best to stand down. See you in a minute!" The screen went blank.

The ten of them sat there in silence for a moment, save for Yuffie's quiet groaning as a result of her sensitive stomach. This was worse than anything that had yet happened to them. There seemed to be no way out. Out of the front viewport, they could see the belly of the Assailant, hovering over them. Their bridge seemed to be in between the two fins on its underside.

"We're screwed, aren't we?" Nehrut said.

Sora was about to reply, when he felt an odd sensation. It seemed that something in his jacket pocket was rapidly heating up...

!

Shego, Syndrome, and Randall walked down the corridor of their ship which led to the entrance to the Unity. As they did, explosives were being fastened to the hull of the ship, and Randall was making last-minute adjustments to the remote detonator in his hands.

"How's the ship holding up?" Shego asked Syndrome.

The man activated a device on his left gauntlet, which contained state-of-the art computer and personal weapons systems. He called up a schematic of the Assailant, which immediately began to provide information on the status on their vessel.

He then proceeded to geek out.

"That pilot is awesome!" He exclaimed, pointing at a few sections on the bow of the ship. "The gunner's no slouch, either! Those torpedoes at the beginning of the fight nearly tore our shields apart! And did you see that maneuver with the asteroid? That explosion ripped through our shields and caused fifty percent hull damage! Nobody's ever done that to us befo-"

"Can it!" Randall barked.

"Yeah, this is why we never dated." Shego added. "Just get the repair drones started on the maintenance before the vacuum tears us apart."

Syndrome huffed, and hit a few more tiny buttons on his gauntlet.

The three arrived at a sealed door, which was actually on the Unity. Just before they opened it themselves, it hissed open, revealing the crew of the other ship on the opposite side. Each of them had defiant looks on their faces.

Syndrome pointed at them with one gloved finger. A beam of narrow blue energy burst from his fingertip, and streaked at Sora, who was at the head of the group.

Rather than the searing pain Sora had expected, he suddenly found himself completely frozen in place. He, along with everyone near him, was trapped in some sort of energy field, still connected by a narrow beam of energy to Syndrome's finger. With a twitch of his finger, the masked man pulled them into the corridor, floating slightly above the ground.

"Nice, huh?" He said. "Zero-point energy. Don't try to move, you'll just strain yourselves."

Randall performed a quick head count on the floating captives. "That's ten, just like the intel said." He smiled toothily. "Four Keybearers. Thinking what I'm thinking?"

"Bonus." Shego agreed, with a similar smile. "Alright, you two get the mark on them and stick 'em in the hold. I'll prep the ship for launch. Randall, don't take your eyes off them, and leave your finger on that convenient 'blow everything up' button."

"Count on it."

As the two of them walked their prisoners down the hallway, Shego glanced into the interior of the Unity. When her partners rounded a corner, and were out of sight, her eyes fell upon something unusual.

Sitting on the floor just inside the doorway was a small, silver pendant. Out of curiosity, she walked over to it, and bent down to pick it up.

The door hissed shut, and sealed itself behind her. At the same instant, light burst from the charm in her hand, and there was a loud roar.

!

"Now sit quietly, and try to behave yourselves." Randall said from the other side of the security field.

Sora and the others were in a containment cell. The evil mark had been applied to their foreheads, and their forearms and lower legs had been stuck in high-tech restraints that completely prevented their use.

They had then been thrown to the ground in an empty cell with three very thick walls. The entrance was blocked by a crackling wall of orange-colored energy, which Randall said would severely burn anybody that touched it.

"We'll be underway in a few minutes." Syndrome said. "Try not to squirm, or the field might prove to be a problem for you."

The two turned their backs on the cell, and walked out of the brig. The door slammed shut behind them, and there was a beeping noise as it automatically locked itself.

"Let's make this quick." Sora said, shaking his upper body just enough to let a silver charm slip from his jacket pocket.

It let off a brief flash of light, and a moment later, there stood Mr. Incredible. He looked just as he had when Sora had summoned him back at Adam's Castle, and when he had appeared to the group back at the bridge on the Unity.

The super helped Sora to his feet, and crushed the restraints on his arms with barely any movement. "How much time have we got until power comes back online?"

"Fifteen minutes." Sora answered as he destroyed the restraints on his legs. He quickly wiped away the mark on his forehead. He reached into his pocket as Mr. Incredible went to work on everybody else's restraints. "We need to hurry."

He dropped the charm to the ground, letting Kim Possible appear before them. She winked at him, and began to dig around in the pockets on her belt. "It's been a while since I used this." She said, withdrawing a small, circular metal object.

She tossed it into the energy field. It stuck there for a moment, and unusual ripples began to appear in the field. It beeped rapidly, and in seconds, the thing had flickered out of existence, and the metal ball dropped to the floor, smoking.

"Where do you get stuff like that?" Sora asked.

"Ten year-old super-genius." She replied casually.

"Really?"

"What, like you haven't heard of stranger things?"

"She's got you there, Sora." Goofy said.

"Alright, we need to get the detonator from Randall, and shut down the tractor beam." Mr. Incredible said.

"While Sulley holds off Shego." Mickey finished, withdrawing a small printed diagram of the Assailant (a ship which had been stolen months before from a military base on Shego and Kim's world) that the three Summons had provided. "We divide into three groups, and tackle all of them at once. Let's move."

!

The first group consisted of Sora, Kairi, Kim, and Axel. These four made their way as quietly as possible through the ship's corridors, working their way to the bridge. Fortunately for them, it only took a few moments to arrive at the correct doorway.

Kim produced a small device from one of her pockets, which seemed nothing more than a small, flat thing with a screen on the front. She slid it into the narrowest of gaps in the door, and pulled it back out a few seconds later.

He screen showed the inside of the large bridge. It was empty, save for Randall, who was sitting alone at one of the command chairs. He held the detonation remote lightly in his hands. He only needed a half a second to press the button, and blow the Unity (and likely, part of the Assailant) to pieces.

Kim pulled out another one of the little balls that she had used to short out the containment field in their cell. She whispered, "This shuts down any electrically-powered object within five feet, so I'll need to get it close."

"Make it count, then." Axel said, summoning his chakrams.

Kim took a deep breath, and clutched the little ball tightly in her hand. Kairi pressed a button by the doors, which hissed open.

In the microsecond before Randall could turn around to see who had entered, Kim had lobbed the device directly at him. It struck him in the side of the head, and activated with a loud beeping.

The tiny light on Randall's remote, which signaled that it was fully operational, abruptly went out. And before he could do anything about it, a narrow beam of Light had shot across the bridge, and struck him in the chest. He flew out of his seat, twisting wildly in the air, to smack one of the walls of the bridge.

Sora and the others rushed into the room. The Keyblade Master snatched the controller from where it had fallen, and stuffed it into his inside pocket.

But no sooner had he done so then he felt a solid impact on the side of his face. He fell to the ground with a grunt, but immediately leapt back to his feet to see what had struck him. He could see nothing.

But something smashed into his chest, and then his back, hip, and jaw. He fell back to the ground, winded.

Seemingly out of thin air, Randall materialized before him, his face inches away from his. He had very horrible breath. "Look at the big, bad Keybearer now."

A ball of Light shot at him, and he barely slithered out of its path. Sora got back to his feet, summoning Oblivion. He aimed a slice at Randall, who leapt backwards away from the attack. He landed on a computer console, and leapt completely off of it when Axel's chakrams flew at him.

He hit another wall, sticking to it with all of his limbs. He growled at them, and vanished. Sora only now realized that his skin changed color to blend in with anything around him. For all intents and purposes, he was a big, smart, deadly chameleon.

Fortunately, even chameleons cast shadows. Sora could see Randall's sliding rapidly across the floor toward him, and lunged forward. He felt the rush of air past him, as Randall slithered out of harm's way. He heard the solid 'thump' and a grunt of pain, when Kim leapt over to him, and kicked the disguised creature in the face.

Randall staggered away, his camouflage slipping away. For a moment, he turned an unusual checkered pattern, before vanishing from sight again.

!

The maintenance room sat a few floors beneath the bridge in which this fight was transpiring. This large, somewhat noisy room housed the equipment that controlled the engines, and much of the weapons systems.

As it so happened, the controls for the tractor beam keeping the Unity locked into place were down here as well. This was why Nehrut, Bariss, Mickey, and Mr. Incredible were here. They planned on causing as much damage as possible.

It would have been a lot simpler if Syndrome hadn't been overseeing the repairs to the shield systems in the room. A few hovering, spherical drones were arrayed around a large, complex-looking machine at one end of the room, which they understood to be the shield generator. It looked like several large, glowing blue rings had been stacked on top of each other and attached to computer monitors.

Fortunately, Syndrome had his back to them, and the loud rumbling of the machinery all around them also served to disguise their presence.

"We take him down, and trash everything." Mr. Incredible said.

"That's our plan?" Mickey said.

"I like it." Nehrut commented. "Simple, and easy to remember."

He reached out slowly with his hand, keeping his other on the hilt of his sheathed blade. Beside him, Bariss and Mickey had already drawn theirs. He focused his attention on the five hovering robots that were working on the shield generator.

Before Syndrome could so much as blink, he had launched the drones into his chest, denting them, and releasing gouts of sparks from their metal bodies. He shouted in surprise, and they hit him with such force that he flew halfway across the room.

The others sprang into action. Mr. Incredible leapt through the air, and pinned Syndrome's shoulders to the ground, whilst standing on his back, keeping a firm hold on his hands.

"Hey, Buddy. Miss me?" He growled.

"Not you again!" Syndrome began to squirm in his old enemy's grasp, trying in vain to get free.

"Make it fast, guys!" He urged, tightening his grip.

Nehrut turned his attention to the not-fully-repaired shield generator. He stretched out both hands, and with a great effort, ripped the cylindrical structure from the ground. "No shields for you guys."

There was an unusual noise from behind him. He turned, and discovered that Syndrome's boots appeared to be smoking. But before his eyes, he saw the man rocket forward, dragging the surprised Mr. Incredible along behind him.

"Rocket boots! What'dya think?" He exclaimed.

Syndrome somehow managed to make it into the air even with the very heavy man on top of him, and quickly performed a series of barrel rolls mere inches from the ceiling. He was barely able to shake Mr. Incredible off of him, and quickly pointed at him, catching him in one of his odd energy fields.

He stopped in midair, and threw the man as hard as he could into a bit of machinery on the far wall. Mr. Incredible went completely into this contraption, crumpling it like paper around him. He must have been very heavy.

Nehrut acted on instinct, and shot the shield generator up at Syndrome. Unfortunately, he saw it coming, and pointed at it, wrapping it in another energy field. He made the slightest gesture, and shot it right back at the telepath.

He punched out his hands, and the field stopped halfway to him. They continued like that for a few minutes, each of them trying to push it back at the other. When it looked for a moment that Nehrut would prevail, Syndrome shut down the field, and rushed to the side as the machine hit the ceiling inches away, breaking into pieces.

He pointed both fingers down at his four opponents, and fired rapid bolts of blue energy down upon them, which created small explosions upon contact with anything they touched. Bariss raised her shield, and the bolts pounded against it with greater force than she had anticipated, pushing her slowly backwards.

They continued hammering into her raised shield, until she finally lost her grip on it from a well-placed shot. One of the follow-up bolts was three inches from her eye when Nehrut's blade moved to catch it. The telepath himself moved into the path of the fire, his blade a blur around him as he caught the bolts.

"So how many times is this you've saved me?" Bariss asked.

"You know, I've lost count." He replied with a grin. "But I think we're about tied when it comes to saving each other."

Mickey leapt into the air, drawing Syndrome's fire away from Nehrut. He was very quick and agile, however. Syndrome barely missed the King every time.

Mickey jumped up onto a large generator-like machine, and leapt directly at Syndrome, blocking incoming fire in midair. When he was within range, his Keyblade lashed out at Syndrome's head. Only a desperate 'fall' backwards turned what would have been a fatal blow into a scrape across his nose.

But in the split second he wasn't paying attention to anything else, a large sealed metal container flew through the air, and smacked into the small of his back. He flipped through the air, and hit the opposite wall.

He growled at Mr. Incredible, and chucked the container right back at him. The super caught it easily in both hands.

!

Riku opened the hatch to the Unity, and saw the hairy blue mass that was Sulley fly past the doorway.

"Shego's stronger than she looks, then." Yuffie muttered, tossing her shuriken back and forth between her hands.

Shego herself ran past the doorway after Sulley, a scowl fixed on her face. Her hands were burning with bright green fiery energy, which cast her face into an eerie green glow.

The Keybearer leapt into her path, Way to Dawn held in a ready position. Donald ran over to aid Sulley, while Goofy and Yuffie joined Riku. Shego seemed very surprised to see them free. With an angry shout, she thrust her hands forward, spewing green, fiery energy toward them in a large wave.

Riku summoned a protective barrier of Dawn to catch the blow, and the energy splattered against it, leaving them unharmed. Shego didn't slow down, and leapt after the energy had dissipated, completely over the shield. She aimed a kick at Riku's head, which he was barely able to duck beneath.

Yuffie's shuriken flew at her head, nearly removing it completely. As it was, Shego ducked beneath the projectile, and leapt over toward the ninja, her hands burning with green energy. She swiped twice at her head, though Yuffie ducked beneath the attacks, feeling the heat of them against her face as they passed.

Goofy threw his shield at Shego's head at the same moment Yuffie thrust her fist (clutching a pair of kunai) at her stomach. With amazing reflexes, she punched straight down, knocking the knives from Yuffie's hands.

At the exact same moment, she reached up, and caught the shield as though it was merely a frisbee. She threw it back at Goofy, and just barely missed his head when he dove away from it. It lodged itself in the wall beside Sulley, who had just gotten back to his feet, and was rubbing a sizable bump on his head.

The monster rushed forward, backed up by Riku and his Guardian. The black creature threw the first punch, which she was able to avoid. But she wasn't quite fast enough to dodge the punch Sulley landed to her stomach.

It knocked her off her feet, but she was still able to regain her composure, and land lightly back on the ground. She didn't notice Yuffie appear directly next to her until she had driven her booted foot into her hip, sending her spinning back out through the hatch, and into the corridor that linked the Unity with the Assailant.

Riku rushed after her, and sliced horizontally at her waist. Despite the serious hit she had just taken there, she was able to leap out of his way, and then move back at him, aiming fiery punches at his head over and over. Each of these he turned aside with his blade, though with increasing difficulty.

She quickly pulled back and then released a large burst of energy at him, which filled the whole corridor. Riku hurriedly called up another shield, and watched as the walls buckled dangerously around them, threatening to give way.

Bolts of lightning flew past Riku when he lowered the shield, but Shego stopped the blast with her fists, sending them bouncing into the walls.

The battle came to a brief pause, then. Shego activated a communications device on her wrist. "Randall! They've escaped. Wonderful job on those cells. Seal the hatch and blow the charges, now!"

There was only static from the other end.

"Randall! Randall, come in!" She growled in frustration, and leapt away from Riku's next strike, and ducked under Yuffie's shuriken. She quickly switched channels. "Syndrome! They're out!"

"You think!? Augh!" What sounded suspiciously like an explosion echoed from the other end of the line. "They're trashing the Maintena-"

There was a slightly smaller explosion, and the link went silent.

"Sucks to be you." Riku said, swiping at her legs. "You know, with the ship falling apart around you, and all."

"Can it, peewee." Shego lashed at his head with another three very close attacks. Almost before she finished the third, there was a loud bang behind her, down the corridor. Everyone turned to face the source of the noise, and saw what looked like a large, bright pink lizard getting to its feet.

Randall stumbled up, and reverted to his natural coloration. A fireball struck the wall near him, and he slithered down the corridor toward Shego. "The controller is shot. We're stuck."

Sora, Kairi, Axel, and Kim ran after him, ready to continue their fight. When she caught sight of Kim, Shego snarled, and leapt toward her, hands blazing with energy. Randall rocketed directly at Sulley, his four fists flying to strike any part of him he could reach.

"Riku!" Sora shouted, blocking one of Shego's attacks. "Get the ship's systems online, it's been twenty minutes! We'll hold them off."

Riku nodded, and –with Yuffie and Donald- ran inside the ship. Sora, Axel, Kairi, Kim, and Sulley were careful to place themselves between the door, and Randall and Shego. Most of them were breathing heavily from the prolonged fighting aboard the ship, but understood that they wouldn't have to wait for much longer.

After a few short minutes, while the vessel behind them slowly came back to life, there was a commotion from down the corridor once again. Mickey, Nehrut, Bariss, and Mr. Incredible rounded the corner, and sprinted hard down the hallway, dodging Syndrome's blasts as best they could.

"Get in!" Mr. Incredible shouted to them. He leapt and drove his fist into the unsuspecting Randall's head, sending him crashing into the wall. Mickey jumped over him, and struck at Shego's face, narrowly missing her.

Nehrut made a fist, and punched his arm out, sending her and Randall flying down the corridor to slam into Syndrome. The three fell to the ground, in obvious pain.

"Move!" Sulley said, ushering everybody inside the ship. "They'll come to any minute."

Sora and Kairi saw all of them safely inside, keeping their Keyblades out as insurance, in case any of their three attackers woke before they made it in. This wasn't quite the case.

But what happened next was unfortunate.

Syndrome dazedly got to his knees, making subtle adjustments to his gauntlet weapon. With the small amount of strength he had remaining, he lifted his arm and fired an arc of greenish energy at Sora.

Caught unawares for once, Sora couldn't block it in time. It struck him in the chest, knocking him flat. It bounced off of his body, and struck Kairi in the chest, directly over her heart.

The others saw this, too late to do anything about it. "NO!" They shouted in unison, as though it would help anything.

In a rage, Nehrut leapt over his two unmoving friends, and thrust his fists forward. Syndrome was lifted into the air, and slammed with the force of a wrecking ball into the far wall, leaving a significant dent in it, and rendering him unconscious immediately.

Sulley ran forward, scooping up Sora and Kairi in his large arms. He ran inside with them, followed immediately by Nehrut. The hatch hissed closed behind them.

"What's their situation!?" Riku asked when he had brought them to the bridge. Sulley sat them down on two of the flight chairs, and strapped them in carefully with Goofy's help. They didn't move an inch.

"Pulse is normal..." Kim said, placing her hands to each of their necks.

"But no heartbeat!" Bariss said, a hand on Sora's chest. "Blood is flowing, but I can't-"

"How is that possible? What the heck did he do to them!?" Riku exclaimed angrily.

"Donald!" Mickey said to the bird at the navigation seat. "Plot a course for Radiant Garden! If anybody can help us, they're there."

As Donald began punching in the coordinates, Riku asked an important question. "Who's driving?"

"I will." Bariss said, sitting in Sora's chair. "Make sure that the guns are ready in case the Assailant starts firing on us."

"You took care of the tractor beam, right?" Sulley asked.

"Yeah." Nehrut confirmed.

"Explosives won't be a problem, either." Axel said, reaching into Sora's pocket for Randall's still-inactive remote. "This thing'll never work right again."

With a short noise, the Unity released itself from the grip of the Assailant, and gradually moved away from it. They had only made it a short distance, however, when enemy fire burst from the hostile ship's automated cannons, scorching the hull in numerous places.

While not as accomplished a pilot as Sora, Bariss was still able to keep them from harm after the initial assault, weaving in and out around asteroids to avoid enemy fire.

"We need to clear this field before we make the jump to Radiant Garden." Mickey said. "Keep dodging the fire."

"Asteroids..." Came a weak murmur.

All eyes were suddenly on Sora. His eyes were barely open, but they were glazed with pain, and his skin was deathly pale. He was still slouched in his seat, but his hand clutched at Kairi's with all the strength he had. She too, had her eyes barely open.

"Fire on the asteroids... explosion." That was all he said, before falling back into unconsciousness.

"You heard him." Bariss said to Riku.

"This one's for you guys..." He said to Sora and Kairi, though they were currently beyond hearing. He quickly marked several nearby asteroids as targets for the remaining fifty-eight proton torpedoes in the Unity's stores.

"Ready to fire." He announced.

"Hold fire a little longer, I want to put a bit more distance between us." Bariss said. She thrust the ship forward at high speed, barrel-rolling around asteroids and barrages of laser fire.

One lucky shot shook the ship, and rattled the bones of everybody on the bridge. "Fire!" Bariss shouted.

Riku wasted no time, and fired the torpedoes into the asteroids. They spiraled through space. Out of all of them, fifty of them struck the asteroids they had been targeting. The remaining eight accidentally hit others that drifted into the way. Still, the results were the same.

Massive explosions filled the immediate space behind the Unity, and around the Assailant. The explosions ripped into the shielding of the latter ship, rendering it almost completely ineffective as sections of the armor were destroyed by the pure force of the explosions.

The crew of the Unity didn't hang around to see whether or not the ship survived. "Coordinates locked in!" Donald pronounced. "Punch it!"

Bariss listened to him, and thrust the ship forward into warp space, just as the asteroid field around them erupted into a chain reaction of explosions caused by Sora's strategy. White light filled the viewport as they exited the combat zone, moving to the safety of warp space.

They finally breathed easier. But there was still further business to take care of.

"Contact Radiant Garden and let them know we have casualties." Mickey said, slipping into the role of leadership that he had never fully realized that Sora had taken from him. The King looked over at the unconscious Keybearers now, a sad, worried expression on his face. Their hands were still locked together. "In the meantime, bring these two to the medical bay, and let's see what can be done here."

Donald began the transmission to the Radiant Garden Restoration Committee, and Axel and Mr. Incredible lifted Sora and Kairi from their seats. Interestingly, they couldn't seem to remove their hands from each other, and gave it up before moving them farther back into the ship.

"Estimated time to the Garden?" Riku asked.

Donald checked a display screen while waiting for the RGRC, and groaned. "Twelve hours..."

Everybody left on the bridge remained silent until the Committee answered, settling in for a very long flight.

!

It's good to be back!

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