The Sapphire Sorceress

Disclaimer: The rights to Kingdom Hearts belong to Disney and Square Enix.

Act 61: Rowdy Rumble

"Really!? Oh, then you can count on me. Just get me outta here, and you can tell me what to do!"

Disney Castle: Hall of the Cornerstone ( Kairi's POV )

Running up to the nobody I had no time for fear or hesitation to keep my mind in these precious seconds, the enemy seemed more worried about fighting me than I was causing disbelief to enter my mind about Axel's determination. I also noticed that Axel's power was in stark contrast to that last nobody I've battled Demyx. The cold, shivering water was instead replaced by the scolding heat of these flames. Despite not being in the range of the heat to actually harm my body it still felt very room in this room.

"I think you should hit the bricks, your highness. Things are about to get pretty heated down here!" Axel was right about that if things were getting this intense, and she must have agreed her legs quickly ran up into the upper part of this room.

"You better not try anything with her or else!"

"What? You're not gonna beat me regardless of how strong you've gotten, so why should I resort to sneaking around by kidnapping that queen?" Why you arrogant, spikey-haired jerk! Hissing, my keyblade smacked onto those two circle weapons he must use for combat. What I wasn't ready for is when these two weapons to suddenly have fire come on them forcing me into retreat backward. Twirling those fire weapons in my direction my body had to move in order to avoid being hit and possibly burned.

"Run! Run! You don't wanna be well done!" Tch, you're the one who needs to get burned, Axel! Waiting for him I knew that a counterattack would need to be ice-based in order to capitalize on the element being used against me, and sure enough, he began to fling those burning tools my way giving me the opening I was looking for to strike back!

"Woah! You do know your basic elements after all!" He didn't seem impressed by the blast of ice magic I sent out with my keyblade, however, the intense heat being used made the water evaporate into nothing, his finger waving only made me angrier...

"Sorry, kiddo. I've been used to dealing with Demyx far too long for someone like you to beat me with a simple move like that." He sent out some fireballs that nearly came into contact with my body, a couple strands of hair that got caught in a blast got burned away from simply coming into contact with the fireball.

"Look, Kairi. We don't have to have a rumble like this. I know you're all rowdy to fight nobodies, looking to make us pay for what happened to your pal Sora. That doesn't mean I'm here to hurt you rather ask for your help."

"You?! Do you really need my help? Forgive me if I can't believe you're not trying to use me or my friend!" I found it hard to accept that a nobody wanted something beyond trying to manipulate a somebody.

"Man, the keyblade users these days are hard to deal with between Roxas, Xion, you and your pal," Refusing to let Axel taunt me in a pathetic pose of having a knee on the ground I got up off the ground while he continued with his attempt to win me over. "Still, you all have something in common and that is the willing desire to question the nature of a nobody. I only wish Aqua had been more like you instead of what she's become..."

My eyes grew wide at that comment, since the last time we met she was certainly acting differently from when we first reunited with each other.

"Something has changed...it is almost like with Xion and Roxas went any humanity she had left was destroyed in the process. I might have made things worse by accusing her of causing Roxas to end up absorbed inside of Xion, but in the end, it was no one's fault." Is that what happened, then it would seem that Roxas is truly gone if his conscious was pushed into Xion.

"That loss...it hurt us both; despite not having a heart losing those two crushed any good mood we had during the day, even if we both knew this outcome was likely in the making for a while we didn't want it to happen to either of them. After all of that...she just gave up on being Aqua." Gave up? You mean she still thought that her life resembled her old self despite not having a heart? He grimaced at that suddenly looking down.

"She began to seek out and hunt for any heartless that she could come across...with that old keyblade of hers." I-impossible! How...why does she have a keyblade now?! Suddenly, the heart inside of myself began to beat much faster realizing that she's only become much stronger if she has her old keyblade.

"I don't have much time left to explain, but you must know that she intends on beating you and your friend in a race. The goal she is rushing to complete is-" I saw bigger versions of nobodies suddenly come into the room with huge weapons being held in their hands.

"Damn! Looks like he knows that I'm here..." Before I could ask for more info he suddenly ran after me returning on the offensive push against me, his fireballs began to fire back my way once again. Without ice magic, at my disposal, I was at a loss for what I can do against a nobody opponent like this guy who looked ready to burn me up. Looking at the vines that covered the place, an idea popped into my head about how to get Axel off his balance.

"Hey, hothead! Why don't you try getting me now?!" Grinning, my body avoided another fireball to run over to the walls that were decorated with the evil vines growing around the room. Axel ran after me, which is exactly what I wanted him to do when I noticed the vines begin to charge after the both of us.

"Woah! Talk about your overgrown garden!" Rushing past him I cut down a few vines with my keyblade while Axel simply burned them all into ash with a few bursts of flame. I knew it was now or never to make a move, so despite the danger, I was putting myself in my legs ran as quickly as possible to charge him with my keyblade if only to actually make him back away from me. Blinking after swinging my weapon I saw that Axel was, in fact being wrapped up in the vines that were around the walls.

"Now then, the floor is yours to explain what you mean by needing my help."

"...I don't have anywhere else I need to be right now...alright but you can't go blabbing to Sora about this." He said with a sigh, his voice sounding a lot less confident with a bunch of vines crushing his body onto a wall.

"Aqua, no she calls herself Auxaq these days is looking to destroy as much heartless as possible. She considers it part of a race between herself and the only other keyblade wielders in the universe." Meaning Sora and myself, but why is she considering it a race exactly?

"The hearts that are ripped out of the heartless have to go somewhere, the place being Kingdom Hearts but not as you think it is."

"That place Ansem tried opening up with the other Princesses of Heart!" From what Sora told me it was a huge doorway that was stuck inside of a realm trapped within the pitch black darkness. If Aqua was after something like that it can't be good for anyone in the universe.

"Explain the full story. You're obviously hiding something..." His eyes darted back and forth like he knew whatever he wasn't saying had to be very important for someone like me not to know.

"Look I'm putting myself on the line just by telling you this stuff, and the higher-ups would turn me into a Dusk if they heard what I've been trying to tell you. You have to beat Auxaq in this race or else the Superior will get his way."

"Just tell me why I should believe you, Axel?!" Holding out my keyblade I looked him in the eye to see if his words were indeed the truth.

"You want to stop the crisis that involves my nobody buddies? Well, the first step would be finding that other keyblade user and trying to make her understand she can't keep reaping hearts. Your best chance would be to find new worlds," As I began to digest his words, his arms suddenly began to spin around resulting in a huge burst of fire to break him out of the vines that held his body. No...actually it seemed like he could have broken free a couple of minutes ago. "Heh! Fooled ya for a second didn't I?"

I knew he was not playing around with me anymore, so I tried casting a few more ice spells, but like before he easily melted them with his fire attacks.

"I've got you memorized, Kairi!" I couldn't stop him from knocking me on my back with those flaming weapons that connected with my chest with his boot now on my chest keeping me down.

"This wouldn't even be happening if you didn't try to prove yourself by fighting a losing battle against me. I don't have any intention of bothering you further since the message must be clear to you by this point." You're the one who decided to attack me in the first place jerk! My effort to strike him with my keyblade was met with the sharp end of those two circular weapons being pointed in my face.

"Unfortunately there is no more time that I can spare. Just stay out of the business of the organization or else..." His mood suddenly flipped with these nobodies walking closer to us.

"What is your problem, Axel?!" Why is he behaving so erratic now? Could it...be that he is under pressure to act like this against me or some other matter that I'm not aware of yet.

"Forget it. I'm not going to waste more time with a kid like you who will never be like Sora..." That is it! Pointing my keyblade at Axel to blast him with light, the reaction I got was a hot feeling on my arm as his hand began to actually burn my arm.

"You're not dealing with a bunch of punks working under that dark witch!" Screaming out I could see that he was hesitant about what he was doing, but I saw my arm was getting a severe burn to my skin that turned the part of my arm under his gloved hand darker. "Organization XIII. We are the nobodies left of people you're trying to stop...but you can't. I get no joy from hurting a girl...hell I can't find joy in anything I do these days."

Letting go of my arm Axel just waved his hand - the flaming prick finally left the room but not before leaving his mark literally on my arm. Minnie was shocked to find me in this state and helped me by applying some cold water on a towel to help me out with this injury.

"I'm sorry that I can't use a Cura spell to help you with this pain, such is the problem with my magical abilities only being capable of repelling creatures of darkness." My reassuring nature helped ease her worries once I told her that arm would be fine. True, the burning sensation won't go away but at least the coldness of this towel is helping relieve that pain in my arm.

"You shouldn't have needed to do all of that for my sake, keybearer." Nah; dealing with pain and punishment means I am a hero of the light even if I can't defeat those nobodies like Sora. It just means I would need to improve and become much stronger in the future, but that is what concerns me at this moment rather those words left behind from Axel.

"He didn't fill in all of the blanks about what he meant, but it sounds like those nobodies are trying to gather as many hearts as they can find."

"So, they desire to control this castle with those heartless like that witch." No. I fear their true goal is far grander than something like that Queen Minnie. Axel couldn't spill all of the beans, which means me and Sora would need to find Aqua as soon as possible. Of course, I became worried about those nobodies knowing that hearts could be released from the darkness - worse is the fact that I've freed Aqua's heart from a heartless didn't help her out with her lack of a soul.

'Kingdom Hearts...perhaps that heart is somewhere inside of that place?' It was a guess that had no confirmation on my end meaning I would need to get proof about this.

Eventually, the trio arrived with Merlin in tow but Sora was more worried about me when he looked at my arm.

"Kairi! What's happened to you?!" He clearly didn't expect this sight to greet him when he returned with the old wizard, his keyblade quickly cast a Cura spell while I began to explain what happened with Axel and what he told me before departing.

"Why are they continuing to mess with us?! We have to stop their plans, but you shouldn't keep getting hurt like this..." True however I was kinda used to this by now. At least I wasn't out of it like when fighting Demyx meaning that I had improved on some level despite Axel clearly not wanting to fight me. So, I told Sora about the "third" keyblade wielder running around the universe like we are now.

"Aqua? I don't know or remember who that person could be..." I'm not surprised to hear that considering I only recently began to remember her myself over the past few months. Still, if what Axel told me is correct we have a major problem on our hands dealing with someone like her - the full power of a Keyblade Master is nothing we can overcome by ourselves.

"Garsh. It seems kinda weird this Axel fella wants us to talk with this lady we've never met before."

"Actually that isn't true; you've seen here before it's just that memory is not present in your mind." Just like those other memories of Castle Oblivion, the truth about why he couldn't remember no matter how many times I told him or his friends would remain lost until he can remember on his own.

'Perhaps it has to do with the way Sora's been awakened from slumber.'

Focusing back on the objective at hand Merlin had managed to create a doorway into a different world, and with this pathway, we need to discover what is going on in this world to help stop these vines and heartless. Funny, the fact we would be heading into two worlds and not just one during a travel should be exciting to us, however, I felt nothing but concern about the trials ahead not to mention the warning Merlin gave us beforehand about traveling into this world.

'The temptation of doing something dark? I guess that only means we have to prove ourselves of bring those in the light.' With Sora and his pals with me, I knew that even with my defeat earlier I can easily get back on track by saving this world.

Timeless River: Cornerstone Hill

The worlds I've visited all had many different unique colors that made them stand out from each other, or the people living there had made each place special. This world, the colors were all black and white not to mention was the look Sora, Donald, Goofy and even myself had to ourselves. My body suddenly looked more...old-fashioned? It was like a cartoon version of my body that I was inside of right now, but I wasn't sure why this place had this look, seeing the surroundings around us it looked rather peaceful compared to Minnie's home.

Then, we had our next encounter...with, Pete? Just like us the look we had caught me off-guard.

"Pete?!" His more laid-back outfit certainly didn't match the look of Maleficent's henchmen.

"Bah! I don't have time to waste on punks like you. So, I guess I'll go easy on ya!" By that, he meant running away from us without even putting up a fight. Chances are he's up to no good here, and it will be up to us to stop him before things get worse back in the other world...or the real world I guess?

Catching up to Pete, his mind seemed more concerned about avoiding us rather than fighting but I knew that he likely was trying to help out that witch meaning we had to stop him even if he didn't want to fight.

"What's with you squirts? You got some kinda bone to pick with me?"

"More than one!"

"Them's fighting words!"

Our "fight" consisted of us tossing around the huge ball that was Pete in the air like a volleyball. The funny thing is, his beating should be more fulfilling to us but I didn't exactly feel happy when he fell to the ground in defeat like the whole battle was a waste of our time. My mind began to wonder if we really should be attacking Pete since he isn't acting like a jerk for once.

"Gawrsh, maybe we made a mistake."

"I'm starting to think the same thing. He hasn't even called any heartless." Perhaps we should make up for what we did, and the first thing we can do is apologize to poor old Pete. Laughing at Pete now getting swarmed by my friends in kindness rather than in hatred did make me laugh. Not that we've cleared this up the next thing to do would be to solve the issue that is the cause of those roots. Donald suggested we go look for a certain kind of door, but I wondered what is with this huge window that is floating in the air behind us.

"Are...we looking into the past?" We saw the heartless running into other windows, and then the first moments after coming through the doorway Merlin created. If those creatures are here, then it could mean they are the ones causing trouble in this world resulting in the vines growing in the castle.

"Let's get rid of those heartless!" That is just what I'm thinking as well, so we began our mission by heading into a window taking us into a weird, and empty city below. It wasn't until I noticed how far we were up from the ground that vertigo kicked in on me.

"WE NEED TO HURRY!" I yelled out with the fear of dropping from this height setting in, and that was before these hammer-looking heartless showed up. Now, we definitely had to hurry in defeating these heartless. From the way they were coming down it seemed like they were trying to make this board keeping us in the air come down on purpose.

"Don't worry...I'll make this quick!" Sora wait for a second! I know you want to use your new form to quickly handle these guys, but...if you change into that form again I'm not sure if you will be able to be stopped like last time. The nature of a heartless is pure instinct meaning Sora likely was driving on those basic natures in that heartless-like state.

"Yes we will Sora, but you don't have to use that form." Donald and Goofy agreed with me as we charged the enemy heartless trying to break down this board being held up by ropes. My keyblade was moving in rapid fashion as the rumble with these guys continued knocking these guys away. With a rowdy shout, our attacks were swift and decisive in exterminating these guys despite how strong their blows were on the scaffold. With the last of these guys gone I sighed a breath of relief until I felt a small black figure move past us.

'He...shaking Sora's hand?!' He suddenly ran away the second he appeared in front of us just to give thanks to Sora? Okay, this has to be the strangest world that I've been to so far. Looking at another window instead of seeing just a few moments in our past we actually saw...Maleficent?!

"You absolute idiot! You've managed to fail at everything! And what's more...you foolishly thought you could take my place while I was away." This was...Pete's memories.

"Well, as of now, you're finished. Mark my words, there'll be no place for you when the time comes!" Pete actually had to put up with that kind of abuse from that witch? Ugh, just seeing that gave me the shivers.

After looking at that we came into another odd place, which had the town below us shrunken down in size meaning we could accidentally destroy a build or house if we moved in the wrong spot. After inspecting a huge tower with toy cannons that mouse guy was waving at us like he wanted to say something.

"What's that weird sound?" Hearing it along with Sora I could see planes that were coming closer to us that had the emblem of the heartless! This must be our next mission then...with the problem being these flying heartless were more difficult to hit while in the air.

Thankfully, the huge tower filled with cannons in the center of this town could actually be used to aid us by firing at the flying heartless. We also had the aid of one of Sora's friends who managed to come from another world who was actually a walking, talking chicken with glasses. Seeing that image wasn't even strange thing I could observe after what I've seen and learned about during my travels. Again I was happy Sora took my words to heart about not relying on his different battle forms after last time.

Firing off some fire attacks with my magic along with Donald we knew these guys were trying to destroy the town rather than actually hurt us, so we needed to wipe them out quickly before they do any lasting damage here.

"Why are these heartless causing so much trouble here?!"

"I don't know for sure, but we gotta stop em!" Focusing my attacks on the rest of the flying air-bombers I knew the town was beginning to get several holes in the buildings resulting in more damage.

"We don't have much more time to spare!"

Sora's look told me that he needed to rely on his Drive Form...and I had to agree with him on that considering we had to save this place. Closing my eyes to plead for mercy on Sora...he wasn't in his blackened form rather his red attire complete with his second keyblade giving him the boost he needed to bring down the last of the heartless with me and his other pals taking care of any stragglers. With the enemy gone...that mouse again gave Sora a handshake and we got another vision into Pete or who I thought was Pete's thoughts.

"Hold on that door...it looks like the one we took in order to come here?!" Goofy also could tell that was the same kind of doorway, which made me feel nervous if that meant...that Pete could be here as well.

Our next duty was to put out a fire that was burning in a huge apartment building with several shadow heartless and a living car standing in our way now topping the list of most bizarre things I've had to fight with a keyblade. Unfortunately, this automobile was pretty hard to deal with in the speed it used to move around the place like a running train that can't be or rather refused to get stopped by us.

My efforts to burn out the rubber ties with some heat with a fireball didn't work out, such as when it began charging at me when I attempted firing off some more magic spells however when I moved out of the way it suddenly began to fall over like it was dizzy from buzzing around the area.

"Sora! We should strike it together!"

While we had the chance to hit it while it was immobile, his ice magic followed my strikes to the back of this car-themed heartless as we managed to bust it down after a lot of hard work put into hurting this guy. There was still the matter of dealing with the fireballs that were trying to burn down this building, so I cast more ice spells hoping to cool things down here with this problem. After that issue was solved that familiar mouse came up to shake Sora's hand once more, but the more important thing was the confirmation about Maleficent using the doorway to let Pete into this world along with the fact we were in the past!

This means we are back in time, which means the foundation of history is what Maleficent is trying to change.

"If we're in the past..."

"We can change the future!"

Yeah! We can undo her work and maybe even prevent Pete from even being seduced by her...

No! Wait Merlin tried to warn us about this. Goofy had also spoken up about that making me remember those words about resisting such a temptation. No matter how easy it would seem, the consequences of messing with events like that could be disastrous.

"So, what are we gonna do?"

Well, my guess would be to deal with the last of the heartless first then think about how to solve this problem with Pete. With the final window open we came into a strange house that looked kinda small. Hearing the buzzing of some flying heartless the last small duty here was clear as we had to protect this home from the invading darkness. Unlike the other places, the chaos here was almost impossible to deal with because of the limited space we could fight in not to mention we had another time limit to worry about here.

Rollings around to avoid the shadows I decided to take advantage of the area, using a carpet in order to trip up the shadows jumping around on this rug to help trap them in the carpet. Tossing around these guys into the flying heartless we easily handled the rest of these guys with no problems. I knew with this mess cleaned up we only had to find this second Pete now after the "King" gave Sora one more handshake of course.

"Hold on just a second! Where's the cornerstone?!" I couldn't help noticing that huge sphere of light is gone now. This could only mean Pete was the one who swiped the stone; the one we know from our world and not this past version of Pete who likely isn't as mean as he is in the present. Running over to a river, sure enough, we saw Pete with the stolen cornerstone on a ship being used to get away from here.

Running after Pete we had to fire back the projectiles being tossed our way in order to break down the ship since we couldn't afford to lose the cornerstone to the forces of evil! I'm so tired of dealing with these kinds of mission like this!

"Can you guys help me get on that boat? I will take it down if you toss me onboard!"

Taking the initiative I decided to board the ship by asking Goofy, Donald, and Sora to fling me onboard after enough damage was taken to the ship.

"Ahh! How did you get here?!"

"Easy I had some help unlike you!" I dodged Pete's punches before knocking him into the river with a simple hit from my keyblade while destroying the crane on this floating ship stopping it. Sighing after bringing the ship back to land with the cornerstone safe and sound we had stopped Pete from ruining history, but I knew we still had to catch up to him before he can use the doorway.

"We can worry about the stone later. Pete is going to use the door!" It just keeps getting more tedious with this guy, but what I wasn't expecting is the other Pete to show up when we caught up with him. Despite looking at his own future, his past self-was helping us battle him! Pete wasn't a push-over certainly with his defensive skills evident, but the numbers against him were too much for him to overcome however we suddenly began to get brought into the other places we've already visited in this world.

'I'm so tired of you!' My mind said what I was thinking about Pete dragging things out against us like this, so I took pleasure in knocking this guy out with each strike with my keyblade.

"Curse you brats! You're making me look like a fool!"

"Then, why are you working for a witch like Maleficent?!"

I wanted to know why he is fighting this hard for her sake when I saw how she treated him in his memories. Instead of some answer he just fought back with newly found aggression. Still, compared to the power of light...and Pete the servant of darkness was defeated for good this time retreated back to his Mistress of All Evil while Sora locked up another keyhole. Looking at Pete I wondered how someone like this could end up being the pawn of a witch like Maleficent.

"Riku also fell into temptation by her seduction as well..." I began to wonder if perhaps that is why Aqua has stepped into darkness. Not because of anything she did rather the seductive nature presented by the forces of evil present in the universe. Even here I almost considered messing with the laws of time to stop the present Pete rather than endure the hardships of fighting back. Truly the struggle to resist such an easy way out is difficult for many people even keyblade wielders.

"I can't wait to get back home. Kairi will be happy to meet her highness again plus my girlfriend!"

Donald? Donald actually has a girlfriend here? Apparently, the Duchess of Disney Castle was Daisy Duck who is a close friend of Queen Minnie and they were looking after the castle in the absence of King Mickey. I wondered how the King would feel about the fact we've helped save history along with this castle...perhaps we can run into him during our journey and I will be able to ask him myself or get a handshake of my own.

[ In advance I should warn you that I will be skipping a few worlds in this story like Atlantica and Pride Lands. Mainly because one I'm not sure how I can add Kairi into those plotlines without things getting to confusion, and the second being I need to get around to finishing up this story by this story at the earliest. Sorry if you were expecting this worlds in this fanfiction. I know you were expecting Wisdom or Limit form, but he can't do them yet in the storyline. Sorry if things seem a little boring this time I couldn't do much with this world in terms of the storyline. ]