Disclaimer: I don't own the characters; all credits go to the game!

Vanitas came out of a black portal and stood in front of a station. The sky was coloured in orange and red at the sunset. His second target wasn't as simple as it seemed at first sight. He entered the giant clock tower that stood near the station and went all the steps up to see someone sitting on the edge of the clock tower.

"Keyblade wielder, let's fight."
The red-haired man turned around to see a man in full-fledged armour. He seemed to think a while before saying: "The name's Lea. Say, what's with the attitude?"
"Nothing, I just want to fight you that is all."
The redhead seemed to think a while: "I can't help it, but it feels like I know you..."
"Just fight me already; I'm here to win from you."
The redhead laughed: "You think you can beat me?"
"I wouldn't suggest it if I didn't."
"Let's find out, shall we?"

Axel immediately jumped up. This boy seemed familiar, but who was he? Just his presence put him at ease... Axel was probably just imagining it. He wanted to end it already, who did this guy think he was? Axel always won a fight. He had only lost once or twice... But that was with Roxas.

"Ready for this?"

Axel jumped off the clock tower on the plaza and Vanitas followed. Then a wall of fire surrounded the two and there was nothing else but the two of them in a ring of fire, it was Axel's trademark. He could do anything with fire and he would definitely use it against his opponents. Vanitas summoned his keyblade and answered Axel's previous question: "I'm as ready as can be!"

Axel smiled and summoned his own keyblade that he only recently got in his possession; this would be a bit of training for him with his new weapon. He would show the stranger exactly what he was capable of. Vanitas attacked Axel from the front and Axel blocked every hit. Axel let a wall of fire surround himself and Vanitas could barely avoid it in time. When the wall around Axel was gone, he immediately fired a fireball at Vanitas who disappeared into thin air. Axel was confused and got hit by Vanitas on his back. He turned around and they both attacked each other from the front. Then Vanitas disappeared again and hit Axel from above. Axel went furious.

"Two can play that game!"

And he walked in the wall of fire that still surrounded them. Vanitas stood in the middle of the circle of fire and he let the darkness take over control. A black aura surrounded him and his senses became stronger and faster. He heard Axel's heartbeat and he avoided all Axel's following attacks. He felt that Axel was almost out of energy and then Vanitas did something unexpected. He walked in the firewall himself and almost immediately, the fire started turning black. Axel fell out of his own wall of fire that was now being controlled by darkness.

"How can you... What have you done to my fire? It's damn black!?"

Vanitas didn't answer, but a black orb came out of the wall in the direction of Axel. Axel avoided it, but there was another one. And another one. And another. Finally, he couldn't avoid it and he blocked one of the orbs. But instead of disappearing, it exploded and turned into ropes that bound Axel. He couldn't move anymore! Vanitas stepped out of the wall of black fire while watching Axel.

"Well, I think you're kind of defeated..."
"But that was cheating! You used my own fire against me! Who are you damn it? I never lose! Show me your face! Maybe... are you... Roxas? Is that you?"
"Roxas? Never heard of him, I'm Vanitas."
Axel turned furious: "Who are you damn it? Let me go already! You already won..."
"I already told you, I'm Vanitas and I'm taking you with me."

Vanitas touched Axel's forehead and Axel fell asleep. It was easy after all. Vanitas lifted Axel and laid him over his shoulder to carry him to Master Xehanort.

"If they're all that easy-going then this shouldn't take too long anymore."

Vanitas didn't know why, but his chest felt so empty that it started hurting. The bad feeling didn't go away, he had to hurry. If Xehanort was right, then he would soon get rid of the feeling when he finished collecting the keyblade wielders. Unfortunately, he couldn't help but notice that with every keyblade wielder he caught, the bad feeling in his chest grew bigger and started to hurt more. He held his hand on his chest. If he would have to endure that feeling any longer, it would crush him. It was irritating, like his heart was in a battle with himself... But there was no time to think about that, the sun was already setting. He had wasted a day on these two and he had to get two more of them. So he summoned a black portal and brought the second target to the Master.

~~A while later~~

It was already night and the moon lit the path in front of Vanitas. He summoned a couple of unversed and sent them in the town. He smiled. They would hopefully stir things up a bit. If there were any keyblade wielders nearby, then they couldn't help but fight the unversed before they did a lot of damage. And he was right, a minute later, the town's alarm was set off and two people got out of a house nearby. It was a boy with long, white hair and a girl with short, raven black hair. They started attacking the unversed and the boy used a keyblade. The girl used knives, so that wasn't the second keyblade wielder in this town. Vanitas sent another load of unversed and gave them the purpose to split the keyblade wielder and the girl up. The unversed did what they were told and Vanitas himself followed the group with the white-haired boy. He was a good fighter, a lot of unversed were slayed by his keyblade and he wasn't hit one time by them. This was a worthy opponent. Vanitas told the unversed to come back and they dissolved in a black smoke cloud that Vanitas absorbed with his hand. The boy looked confused until he saw Vanitas. His nerves were immediately on edge again and he took on his battle pose again.

"Who are you?" asked the white-haired boy.
"I'm your opponent."
"That's all I need to know."

Riku started charging and Vanitas couldn't help but feel excitement, why was that?
Vanitas blocked Riku's magic flames attack and disappeared in thin air before attacking Riku in his back. But Riku blocked his attack and used an ice magic attack at Vanitas who dodged it with an unhuman speed and threw two evenly large black orbs back. Riku started dodging by jumping upwards but he bumped into Vanitas' keyblade in the air with his own keyblade and black ropes came out of Vanitas' blade, surrounding Riku. But before Vanitas could crush Riku on the floor, Riku froze the ropes and broke them to get free. He escaped nearly in time. Vanitas turned around and hit Riku with a black flame before hitting Riku's arm with his keyblade. They both landed on the floor. Vanitas turned at Riku and looked at where he had hit. There was a small scratch in Riku's clothes and arm. Vanitas was more excited than before. This was a real fight!

"You're good, but not good enough."
Riku turned towards the masked boy in armour and said: "We'll see. This has only started."
"Thanks for the good fight, but it ends here. I can't waste any more time."

Vanitas summoned the darkness and it engulfed around the two of them like a bubble of dark, suffocating smoke. Riku started coughing, there was no oxygen in this cloud of darkness and it didn't help that he felt his powers leave his body. What was he supposed to do now?

"Well, I think it's over for you. Let's fight again some time."

Riku didn't want to give up, but his powers were being drained by this cloud of darkness.

"I -cough- won't lose -cough- to you!"

Then suddenly, a helmet appeared in front of him and a finger touched his head.

"How can you fight when your power is gone? It's over now."

Riku couldn't move anymore, his legs turned numb and he knew it was over. What was that boy? With that one finger, he made all Riku's strength disappear... Riku fell asleep and didn't see that the cloud of smoke was dissolving in a thousand little lights that flew up to the sky... But he could hear a voice... A female voice that said: "Riku! Hold on!"

It was Kairi.

So, that was the tenth chapter! Finally Vanitas and Kairi meet for the first time!