This chapter's a little shorter than the last two. Sorry about that, but that's just how it ended up being written. Next chapter, we're going to finally get to a new world. That's right readers, we're going to Asgard.
Chapter 3: Secret Meetings:
Earth – Whitmore Mansion:
S.H.I.E.L.D. Agent Alphonzo Mackenzie grumbled about the early morning meeting as he stepped into the old-fashioned elevator inside the mansion of the deceased billionaire Preston Whitmore. As much as he loved being part of the Society for Advanced Cultural Knowledge, he hated the unpredictability of meeting times. Nevertheless, the Society's dedication to its purpose ensured that nobody on Earth need fear the Heartless or Organization XIII. The S.A.C.K. had been protecting the people of Earth since 1912 and would only stop when the scattered fragments of the world were finally brought back together. Which, if Raina's prophetic dreams were any indication, would be happening within the next few years.
Although the Atlantean Crystal necklaces could extend one's life by centuries, Preston Whitmore decided not to extend his life too long, feeling that he'd lived a full enough life that he didn't need to worry about extending it. Cookie Farnsworth and Wilhelmina Packard, the cook and communications officer on Whitemore's original expedition to Atlantis, respectively, had felt the same way, and both had passed away during World War II. When he died, Mr. Whitmore left control of the company, and by extension, leadership of the Society, to Joshua Sweet, the expedition's medical officer.
Their research into the lore and legends of the Keyblade War had turned up several surprising results, like the discovery of the Reaper's Game, a form of the afterlife where the spirits of the dead competed for a second chance at life. They'd recruited a few members that way, such as Ludor, Isa, and Xiruk, former members of Xehanort's Organization seeking to atone for their actions, or Zack Fair, the warrior from ancient Greece who'd been murdered by the mercenary Sephiroth.
The Society had members all over the world. Jiaying, the leader of the Inhuman village of Lai Shi, had been a crucial member and enabled the S.H.I.E.L.D. Agents who were part of the society to prepare for the day when HYDRA's existence was finally exposed. The Pelekai family in Hawaii gave them a network of contacts in the intergalactic community. Lady Sif's membership enabled them to keep up to date on news related to Asgard and the other mythological realms. They had contacts in the magical world as well, but since the supernatural community was just as secretive as the Inhumans were, the S.A.C.K. couldn't overtly act on the intelligence their contacts gave them.
Atlantis had undergone exponential population growth in the last six years, when the island semi-mysteriously expanded. One minute, the city was the same plateau of patched up ruins it was before. Next, there was a flash of light, and then, Atlantis had been instantaneously restored to its pre-cataclism state. Everyone in S.A.C.K. figured that it probably had something to with the Keyblade Wielders setting the restoration of the world in motion, but they needed to actually talk to one for confirmation. Mack's thoughts returned to the present as the elevator reached the bottom level of the Society's headquarters and he stepped out.
"Morning Mack," greeted a black-haired man in his mid-thirties with a sword strapped to his back as the S.H.I.E.L.D. Agent walked down the corridor towards the briefing room.
"Morning Zack," Mack called back as he gave the resurrected hero a high five. Zack Fair had lived in ancient Greece alongside the mythical hero Hercules (and was able to clarify that most of the myths about him were either made up or completely exaggerated), and had been a surrogate brother figure to one Cloud Strife, a survivor of The Fall (the cataclysmic destruction of Radiant Garden at the combined hands of Xehanort and Maleficent). But then two years after that, he'd been murdered by Sephiroth, the result of an experiment to remove the darkness in a person's heart that Cloud had been the guinea pig for.
Zack had spent a few centuries in Elysium (the portion of the afterlife that most people referred to as Heaven), but eventually got bored and was offered a place in the Reaper's Game for a second chance to be a hero. Now he and the three ex-Organization Members were sharing an apartment in Hawaii. Mack had been assigned to help the other man adjust to the modern world, and had quickly ended up bonding with the overenthusiastic "puppy" as Zack's adopted father back in Ancient Greece liked to call him. Forcing his reminiscing out of his head, Mack took a deep breath before stepping into the briefing room.
He walked into the room to find the Society's original founders, Lady Sif, S.H.I.E.L.D. Agent Cobra Bubbles, Ludor, Xiruk, and Isa. Since Lady Sif was here, Mack was able to guess pretty quickly what this was about. The magical community was sending a delegation to Asgard to renew a treaty between the supernatural community and the Nordic realm regarding the former's desire for secrecy. Sif quickly confirmed his hunch and explained that she had received permission from Odin (who knew about the lore of the Keyblade but was not a formal member of the Society) to bring a team of S.A.C.K. members to Asgard as extra security in the event that someone such as Maleficent attempted to use the meeting as the opportunity to break into the palace and steal any of the powerful artifacts stored in Odin's vault.
The self-proclaimed "Mistress of All Evil" had been presumed dead by the Organization shortly before Ludor, Isa, and Xiruk had died, but given the track record of people who were presumed K.I.A. only to come back later (Akela Amador, Mike Peterson, Captain America, and even Coulson himself immediately sprang to mind), the S.A.C.K. wanted to be prepared for anything. They knew from Loki (who contributed information from his cell on Asgard) that Maleficent wanted the Infinity Stones in addition to galactic conquest. And since the Tesseract was on Asgard, the Society refused to take any chances. So an hour later, Sif, Zack, Stich, Mack, Ludor, Isa, and Xiruk were transported to an open field in the middle of nowhere and far away from any civilization where they took the Bifrost up to Asgard.
The Kiln – Conference Room:
"There are three objectives to this mission," Maleficent explained to the three men seated across the conference table from her. "The first two are simple. By attacking in the open again, we'll be telegraphing my survival to the rest of the universe, announcing to all the known worlds that I have returned. The second objective is to make the city's defenders focus on your group while the second strike team completes the third objective. Do I make myself clear?" The three men in front of her nodded in agreement. Good, she thought to herself. Now I just need to find a way of giving them what they want so I can keep them working for me. Empty promises will not hold their loyalty for long. We need their help and we need to deliver on our promises in order to keep it.
"And in return," the youngest of the three men replied, a warning tone in voice. "You'll help us find what we're looking for so that we can put our family back together." It was a demand, not a question or a request, and Maleficent knew it. On the one hand, she was unconcerned with them attempting to fight her. She was powerful enough that these children were nothing compared to her. But if they achieve their goal, Maleficent thought with a rare frightened shudder. Not even I can hope to last long in the face of their true goal. She needed to figure out a way to pacify them in a way that didn't involve her being killed for real this time.
After the three new recruits had been dismissed to prepare for their mission, Maleficent called in her council of advisers to discuss the loyalty of the new recruits. A few minutes later, Malekith the Accursed, Cruella De Vil, the Red Skull, and Captain Hook were seated around the table. Her husband, Hades, was busy putting their five year old daughter Lilith to bed. Meanwhile, the remaining members of her inner circle were busy preparing for their own assignments.
"They will betray us as soon as they have what they want," Malekith spat in disgust. The dark elf leader had spent the years between the rise of Organization XIII and Xehanort's demise scouting the universe for potential new allies for Maleficent. His contributions to the re-forged Hellfire Club were able to compensate for the loses suffered at the tail end of what the so-called "Daybreak Coalition" was now calling "The Xehanort War". Now, after six years of preparations and rebuilding, they were ready to step out of the shadows and begin their campaign of conquest anew.
"Obviously," Johan Schmidt, the infamous (on Earth at least) Red Skull, commented. "But we can prolong what they want by waiting to give it to them until after we have all six Infinity Stones. Then we can just kill all three of them easily in one strike." Everyone nodded their heads in agreement as Hades walked into the room and took his seat next to his wife. With the discussion on what to do with their new recruits once they'd outlived their usefulness ended, the conversation turned towards the upcoming offensive they had planned for later that day. Within a matter of hours, the Hellfire Club would make its presence known, and those who knew what was good for them would be trembling in fear.
Xiruk is the Riku Replica for those who didn't figure it out. I got the idea for the name from the amazing KH fanfic series Anitpode, which is an AU where Riku gets the Keyblade like he was supposed to instead of Sora like in canon, and examines the butterfly effect of that, and the Riku Replica is still alive in that version, and when he naturally finds out the truth about himself, he eventually decides to find his own name, and ends up borrowing the Organization's naming scheme.
The bit about Zack telling S.A.C.K. that a lot of Greek mythology was inaccurate is a nod to the inaccuracy of Disney's Hercules movie. Since the Disney version is what actually happened in this universe, I thought having the real-world mythology being the inaccurate one in this universe would be a fun little in-joke.
The puppy comment is a reference to Angeal Hewley, Zack's mentor in the Final Fantasy 7 prequel Crisis Core. I wanted to include some more FF7 characters while respecting the character connections without contradicting previously established details of the KH backstories for the characters who've already appeared. I thought having Angeal be Zack's surrogate father in Olympus Coliseum would be a nice nod to Crisis Core.
Yeah, I decided to have the heroes use The Xehanort War as the in-universe term for the battles against Xehanort's forces. I mean, the FF7 universe refers to everything that happened with Sephiroth in the original game as the Jenova War, so I thought, why not do the same thing for the KH universe? That deision has nothing to do with my choice of title for my KH3 fanfic though. I just picked TXW because I wanted something that sounded both cool and unique.