Chapter 16: Agrabah:
Castle of Dreams – Fa Family Farm:
Mulan and Shang laughed at one of Grandmother Fa's anecdotes as they sat in the living room of the house Mulan's parents had been living in for the last six years. It wasn't their family farm back in China, but because they'd all been on Radiant Garden when the Xehanort War ended and their world had been Tethered, they'd been stranded out in Coalition space. Nevertheless, they made the most of their situation. They'd moved out of the inn in Radiant Garden and bought a patch of land in the kingdom surrounding Castle of Dreams, and began building their family farm from scratch. Over time, they'd adapted to their situation and moved on from the tragic separation from their homeland.
Fa Zhou was due to return home from his deployment to the C.I.N. base in San Fransokyo later this evening, and since Mulan and her husband Shang hadn't been needed for any major conflicts with the Coalition army, they would be bringing Mulan's mother and grandmother to the spaceport to pick up her father. In the meantime, the couple passed the time on their day off by listening to Mulan's family tell hilarious stories from her childhood. As she looked back on her life, Mulan couldn't help but be amazed at how radically different her life was compared to only eight years ago. A little over half a decade previously, her largest priority was finding a good match and upholding her family's honor. Now, she and her husband were respected, high ranking soldiers in an army formed in service to an alliance of several vastly different kingdoms and nations. Her father was a highly ranked member of the Coalition's spy network, and her friends Yao, Ling, and Chen Po had all married the Emperor's daughters.
She was snapped out of her reminiscence by the ringing of the doorbell (an invention her parents had been fascinated by upon first seeing the more advanced technology of other worlds in the Daybreak Coalition). She immediately sprang up to get the door, smirking when Shang got up a second slower than her, recognized that she was going to reach the front door ahead of him, and chuckled as he sat back down in defeat. Behind her, she heard her mother asking Shang to turn on the television so that she and Grandmother could watch the evening news. Her heart sank in her chest as she opened the door to find Keyblade Masters Terra and Ventus standing at the door in full armor, accompanied by Commander Vanitas, her father's boss. None of them needed to say anything. Their facial expressions and the news report behind her told her everything she needed to know.
"…The Hellfire Club launched a series of aerial bombardments along the San Fransokyo coast earlier this evening," she heard the newscaster report from the living room TV screen. "While local law enforcement, C.I.N. operatives, and the Coalition air force repelled the aerial attacks, one Hellfire transport launched a kamikaze strike against the local C.I.N. base on Akuma Island. The facility was demolished in the attack, and every C.I.N. agent stationed on San Fransokyo was killed." She heard her family gasp in shock while she wordlessly gestured for their visitors to come in, tears welling up in her eyes as it hit her like a speeding train that her father was dead. She didn't react as she lead the three Keyblade Wielders into the living room and buried herself in her husband's arms while she heard the trio offer their condolences.
Terra and Ventus did what they could to comfort the older Fa women as her mother burst into tears upon receiving confirmation that her husband was not coming home. Grandmother Fa on the other hand, had wordlessly collapsed into her recliner chair as tears began streaming down her face. Vanitas hung back near the door awkwardly, unsure of what to do. While he had adjusted to living in society as best as he could, his upbringing had never been anywhere close to normal (hard to be by any standard when Xehanort was the closest thing he had to a father figure, and everyone knew what he was like), and so he often found himself wondering what to do in situations like this. There was one thing he did identify with, however.
As Mulan (because of the personal friendships many in the Coalition had with each other, it was generally considered a social custom to refer to people by their name instead of by their titles when they were off duty) sat down on the couch, Vanitas recognized the look she had in her eyes. It was a look that promised terrible retribution against whoever was responsible for her father's death. Revenge. Now that was something Vanitas could understand. Still, one could lose themselves by focusing too much on revenge. He was about to say something to the young woman when his phone rang. Great, he thought sarcastically as he checked the caller ID. It's the boss.
"I'm with Fa Zhou's family right now offering my condolences and helping with the usual funeral arrangements," he snapped as he answered the call. "This had better be important, director."
"I apologize for the interruption, Commander," Cassim answered over the phone. "But the Hellfire Club has launched an attack on Agarabah. They're only targeting the Cave of Wonders for now but I want to get at least one Key Bearer over there as quickly as possible to handle the situation before they start targeting the civilian population." Vanitas nodded in understanding. The Genie could keep the city safe under a high-powered Reflezza spell, but he couldn't hold the shield up forever, and sooner or later the Hellfire Club would find their way around the barrier. Not to mention the fact that even with the technology levels of the Coalition, Agrabah didn't have the resources to sustain a full-scale siege.
"Understood," the raven-haired man replied. "Terra and Ventus are with me right now. I'll pass on the message and make sure they get there as quickly as possible." With that, he hung up and turned to his companions. Once they were informed of the situation, they quickly raced out of the house and summoned their Keyblade Gliders to fly over to Agrabah. While the Order of the Keyblade was not part of the Coalition military, they still partnered with the different branches of the Coalition's military and intelligence agency simply because their role as guardians of the worlds required it and they wouldn't turn down any assistance.
Over time, that relationship had become more symbiotic. Keyblade wielders would help out the Coalition army or the Intelligence Network when it came to taking care of threats both large and small like Maleficent, and the various forces of the Coalition provided the Keyblade Order with a support network when facing down threats on the scale of Xehanort. As Terra and Ven's gliders vanished from sight, Vanitas when back to helping the Fa family with funeral preparations for Fa Zhou. Once that was done, he was heading back to Twilight Town aboard the Existentialist. He could take a Dark Corridor, but travelling by Gummi Ship would give him the opportunity to take a long overdue nape to refresh his mind and body for the battles ahead.
The Kiln – Conference Room:
"Now that we're all here," Maleficent began as she surveyed the small but trusted gathering of her inner circle. "Let's begin. While we dispatched Malekith and his Dark Elves to search for the missing Infinity Stones in San Fransokyo, the tactics he employed clearly indicate that he has his own agenda that is separate from ours. While we all have slightly different goals we at least agree on the fact that we want to leave people alive so that when we do conquer the worlds we'll actually have living subjects to rule over. Only Thanos would desire an empire of corpses, yet Malekith seems to be causing as much slaughter as possible. Loki, you're more familiar with figures of "Norse Mythology." What do you think of his loyalties?"
"We know from Malekith himself that the Dark Elves began their war with Asgard in retaliation for an attempt at genocide against his people made out of ignorance and prejudice," the Asgardian prince answered with a concerned frown. "However, what little historical records the scholars of Asgard have on his kind suggests that Malekith's goal is transform our universe into one of eternal night. While I question the veracity of this given that history is always written by the victors, it does make sense in light of his actions in San Fransokyo."
"I say we make him walk the plank," Hook interjected. "Metaphorically speaking, of course. Obviously it'd be bloody next to impossible to kill someone who's been alive for over ten thousand years just by throwing him into a pit of sharks."
"Now hold on a minute, James," Cruella de Vil added as she patted her stomach, where she was carrying her and Hook's child. "We can't just kill the Dark Elves now. If we attack them openly we run the risk of them destroying all of their technology. We need to plan this quietly so we can either reverse engineer their warships and weapons or else seize them for ourselves. Besides, from our research, the Aethir was apparently hidden beyond the reach of even the greatest of Asgard's sorcerers. While they're probably exaggerating in all likelihood, I have a theory. The Dark Elves were supposedly born from the Darkness at the end of the first Keyblade War. But for all their dark powers, according to Malekith, none have ever actually set foot in the Realm of Darkness itself."
"And King Bor would have known this," Diablo finished as he picked up the fashionista's train of thought. "And found a way to hide the Aethir in the Dark Realm itself. The one place where he knew that the surviving Dark Elves would never be able to reach by themselves. This is only speculation, but nevertheless, we need to make sure that this discussion never leaves this room. Malekith has developed a bit of a fixation on that stone in particular out of all the six. If we can withhold its location from him for as long as possible, we can delay the Dark Elves' extermination long enough to reverse engineer their technology." This solution received several nods of approval before all heads at the table differed to the Mistress of All Evil herself to hear her thoughts on the matter.
"I concur with my pet," the dark fairy stated. "We will withhold the location of the Reality Stone from Malekith while we maneuver him into a position from which we can eliminate him from our ranks. It will need to be swift and subtle. The last thing we need is any of his subordinates escaping and starting a civil war with the rest of the Club. In the meantime, we must carefully dismantle his power base. He's already attracted a few of our more… bloodthirsty members into his own circle of conspirators. We will need to diminish the amount of contact they have with each other or send them on suicide missions to reduce the chances of tearing our empire apart from within over differing opinions of leadership."
Her decision made, Maleficent dismissed her advisors and strode from the room towards the sleeping quarters in the prison's upper levels. Now that the meetings were over, it was time for her to spend time with her family. Hades had taken up the job of watching Lily during meetings that ran into dinner or their daughter's bedtime. Despite the fact that they were both fugitives living in an abandoned prison jury rigged into a makeshift evil lair/military base, Hades and Maleficent were determined to give their child as normal a childhood as they possibly good. For all the fact that their goals in life were to rule the universe with an iron fist, the two megalomaniacs genuinely cared for their daughter.
Agrabah is only going to be two chapters because I've used the plot to King of Thieves back in The Xehanort War, and because we've been there enough times already that we really don't need to spend a lot of time on this visit to the place. And to avoid padding the story with unnecessary chapters and forcing myself to run the plot in circles for a few worlds, I've cut out two worlds (Arendelle and Sherwood Forest) to streamline the story and avoid being repetitive with each world's story. After the Toy Story World will be a Black Cauldron world, and then the story will kick into high gear and move into the second act.
Anyway, plans are afoot. Maleficent and her inner circle are immediately distrustful of Malekith and the Hellfire Club inches closer and closer towards a brutal and bloody civil war (but won't actually come to blows in this story. I'm saving the payoff for KH5). After focusing on Maleficent and her supporters this chapter, next chapter will introduce some villains who're part of the pro-Malekith faction of the Hellfire Club. I added some Mades family fluff at the end since we haven't seen much of either of them since Loki's prison break and I thought it was long overdue. Hope you all enjoy.
And yes, I paired Captain Hook and Cruella de Vil. I was inspired by a hilarious sketch of the two on DeviantArt depicting Dr. Facilier from The Princess and the Frog as their love child. I laughed so hard I decided to throw it in for fun. No, Cruella and Hook's kid isn't going to be anyone important from Disney or Marvel, I just thought it'd be a fun little gag to picture the idea of those two raising a child together.
Yao, Ling, and Chen Po being married to the Emperor's daughters is a reference to the Direct-to-Video sequel Mulan II. That movie isn't canon in this story, but I like to give little easter-egg references to different elements of Disney's DTV sequels even if they're not part of the continuity of this universe.