Chapter 7: Earth, Sweet Earth (Is in Danger!)

It didn't take very long, I would say four to five minutes, to reach the other side of the vortex. More familiar stars filled the vaccuum of space. And there it was... my home, beautiful Earth.

"So that's your world, Sly," Sora commented, looking very awed.

"Yeah. It looks great from a view."

"I can't wait to land so we can finally see what Earth looks like on the surface!" Sora said with a hint of excitement in his voice.

I couldn't blame him for being so excited to see my world. I was just as happy to finally be back home after I ended up in Sora's world. Of course, I couldn't celebrate right now, especially since all of us on the Gummi Ship, myself included, were well aware of what's going on down there.

"The world needs saving, so lets get to it!"

A thought struck me though.

"How will you three not attract attention?" I had to ask, looking at Sora, Riku and Kairi. "As I've told Sora, there are no humans on Earth. The word doesn't exist here."

"I think Sora mentioned something like that," Kairi commented.

"You leave that to me," Donald proclaimed, holding up his staff.

I looked at Donald in confusion. Sora appeared to have noticed my expression and gave me a smile.

"What Donald means is that he's going to give the three of us forms that'll help us fit in better when we get down to Earth," Sora explained.

"He can actually do that?" I asked in surprise.

"You bet he can. He's done this with himself, Goofy and I tons of times before, I've honestly lost count."

"Then let's do that. Anything to help save this world."

"But where do we start?" Goofy asked. I looked carefully at Earth and pointed towards the familiar tower.

"There. That's where my friends and I were before the Heartless attacked us."

"Then, that city it is!" Mickey announced.

"Here we go!" Donald began waving his wand and a light radiated. Once more, I found myself on concrete. A familiar sky, a familiar tower and feeling. I was home in Paris.

"I'm home," I said as I looked around Paris in bewilderment. Despite the fact that the Heartless may still be lurking around here, the city still looked exactly the way it was before I was sent to Sora's world.

"Woah, so this is what your world looks like, Sly! It looks cool!" I heard Sora's voice say.

"I'm glad you like it, So-" I began to say before I ended up stopping in surprise as soon as I turned around to look at the others. Mickey, Donald, and Goofy remained the same as they usually looked. However... Let's just say it was Sora, Riku and Kairi that really took me off guard.

"I didn't expect you to look like that, Sora."

"I... didn't either." The three were looking themselves over, still in the same clothes at least. Sora was a lion, thankfully not like Octavio. He was still on the young side with his spiky hair as his mane. Kairi, to my surprise, was a caracal with tanned peach fur and dark red tipped ears. I nearly jumped at the sight of Riku: he was a leopard.

Based on the expressions the three of them had on their faces, it was safe to say that they were just as surprised as I was. Even Riku didn't seem like he was expecting to look the way that he does right now.

"I'm not sure how long it will take for the feeling of surprise to wear off, but should we go look for my friends while we process this?"

"That would be a good idea," Riku said, calming down pretty quickly.

I guided everyone to where my gang was hiding out. But then, I realized something. I never told them that I was a thief. Oh god, I would be destroyed if I spilled a word about this. And what would they do when they meet my friends?

I heard static in my ears. I can't believe I forgot about the earpiece. Of course, being in a different world, there would be no signal.

"S-...! I'm-...! a signal...!" I noticed Sora seeing me slow down.

"What's the matter, Sly? You're kind of slowing down a little bit," Sora said. I knew it was pretty much inevitable that one of them was bound to notice me slowing down in my pace.

I have a communication device that keeps me in touch with my friends on my ear, and I think it just picked up a signal."

"SLY!" Bentley's voice screamed with a speech from the speaker.

"Ow!" I cringed, bringing a hand to my ear.

"Thank heavens! I finally found your signal! Are you okay?! What happened?! Where did you go?!"

"Bentley, Bentley! I'm alright. Calm down. I'm on my way and I'll tell you everything. And prepare some space for some guests."

"Guests?! What do you mean, 'guests'?!"

"Um, let's just say I made some new friends when I was gone," I said, giving a nervous chuckle afterwards.

"Sly, that doesn't exactly answer my question! Who are you bringing?!"

"I'll explain everything once we get there, Bentley. And trust me, it'll definitely be a pretty long story. Just hang tight."

"Alright. But if they pull a gun on us, don't blame me." Bentley cut the connection.

Who was that, Sly?" Sora asked.

"My friend Bentley, one of the smartest people I know, had trouble staying calm when Chaos Control activated. Hopefully he can stay calm when you come in, Sora."

"I guess."

I didn't want to waste any more time for my team. So we hurried until I saw the familiar house.

"What's that house over there, Sly?" Kairi asked out of curiousity.

"It's where my friends and I live around here," I explained. "They must be inside right now as we speak."

"Cool! I can't wait to meet your friends inside, Sly!" Sora said in excitement.

I was just as excited as Sora to see my friends again. Hopefully they've been doing well.

We approached the front door, me making sure that no one was around first, before we slipped inside. Shortly after entering, large, crushing arms grabbed me.

"Ah!" Gah-! Murray...!

"Sly! Buddy! You're alright!" he exclaimed, crushing me in his signature hugs.

"M-Murray, I'm happy to see you too, but- Gah-! Y-you're kind of crushing me right now!" I said, trying desperately to get some air from the tight bear hug Murray was giving me.

"Oh, right. Sorry, Sly," Murray said sheepishly, letting me go from his tight embrace.

"Do you know where Bentley is? We talked earlier, and I think he's expecting an explanation about where I've been. I made some new friends while I was gone."

Murray easily looked over me, seeing my new companions.

"Hi there!" he greeted cheerfully. "You must've helped Sly out! The Murray gives you his full gratitude!" Sora and Kairi nearly cracked up when he said, "The Murray."

"W-we're glad to help, Murray was it?" Sora thanked.

"Yep! A friend of Sly's is one of ours!"

"Ringtail, you better get in here this minute!" There went the wonderful voice of my Carmelita, coming from another room.

"Who was that?" Donald asked.

"My wife," I simply stated. They stared at me in surprise. Right, I didn't tell them I'm married.

"Wow, you're actually married, Sly?!" Sora asked in surprise. I couldn't help but give a bit of a sheepish chuckle in response.

"Yep. Her name's Carmelita. We've been married for at least a few years now," I said. "But this isn't exactly the right time to be talking about my love life right now."

"I think she's wondering where I was. But she's probably not the only person that wants an explanation. Are you ready to help explain what happened?"

All of them nodded.

"Everyone else is in the living room," Murray informed.

"Thanks, big guy." We all headed to the largest room - besides the lab downstairs - and there was the rest of the team. As soon as I entered the doorway, their attention was on me.

And before I knew it, all of them almost immediately ran over to me with the biggest smiles they could possibly give.

"Sly! You're actually back!" Penelope greeted me happily.

"Thanks! I was worried about how I would get home, but I'm back now, and I guess I have some explaining to do."

"We had no way of pinpointing where you were!" Bentley pointed out. "It was like you never existed! Even the DNA finder couldn't help!"

"You really had us worried ever since you vanished, Ringtail," Carmelita said. "But now that you're back here safely, I think I can officially sleep easily now."

I gave a bit of a chuckle. I was really happy to see Carmelita after so long. In fact, I was happy to see everyone I knew again. Although, it was safe to say that there were a ton of questions from them that were just waiting to be asked. And the first one asked by Bentley as soon as he saw the others was just the start of things.

"I'm assuming these six individuals are the 'guests' you informed me about before you got here?" Bentley asked.

"You are right about that. I had planned to tell you about the first person in this group that I met, Sora, but I couldn't because of the attack."

Sora waved.

"Wait. You met before?" Penelope asked, puzzled.

"You wouldn't believe me if I told you originally. Sora and I... met in my mind while I was unconscious."

"Sly, several different versions of yourself went into your mind once. You think we wouldn't believe this?" Oh. Right, that one incident.

"You make a point."

"Where did they come from?" Carmelita questioned with her firm tone.

"We're from another world," King Mickey stated.

"Another world?"

"Believe them, guys, I was there," I supported.

"Well, considering the fact that Sly seemingly did completely vanish with virtually no way of us finding out where he was here on Earth, the possibility of him ending up in a different world where these people live in does have a vague existance," Bentley pointed out.

"You do have a point about that," Penelope said before looking over at the others. "By the way, if you don't mind me asking, what exactly is this world that you're from called?"

"Sora, Riku, and Kairi are from the Destiny Islands, and the others are from the Disney Castle, but these people have been to many different worlds."

"We've lost count," Sora pointed out, though it was in a joking manner.

"Oh, and before I forget, I should probably be honest with you guys about something," I started before looking over at the others. "You see, these guys aren't exactly like us. You know, in their appearance."

Needless to say, the expressions of confusion my gang gave me was the only response I needed from them.

"Um, what exactly are you talking about, Sly?" Bentley asked.

"They were actually transformed into this by their friend, Donald, over there," I said, looking over at Donald. "Well, Sora, Riku and Kairi were transformed, anyway. In reality, they're beings that they call 'humans'."

"Could you change them back to human form, Donald?"

"Are you sure that's a good idea?" Goofy asked. I could see why this would make things more difficult.

"We've seen stranger things."

"Donald," King Mickey said. The king and magician made eye contact before Donald summonded his staff again.

It wasn't until long that Donald proceeded to wave his staff and the room soon became bathed in a bright light. It took a few seconds, but the light eventually dimmed down and standing right before us were Sora, Kairi and Riku in their original forms. Needless to say, my friends were absolutely speechless as soon as they saw them.

"Uh, you guys are seeing this too, right? Not just me?" Bentley asked with a perplexed tone in his voice as he adjusted his glasses a bit.

"Definitely not just you," Carmelita replied.

Sora smiled nervously while Kairi looked sheepish and Riku kept a calm face.

"Which leads me to a question first: what happened after I disappeared?"

"Those things just suddenly disappeared like they were following you," Murray spoke up. "A few did show up afterwards."

"So Bentley said to retreat," Carmelita added. That relieved me that they were okay.

"So what were those monsters?" Penelope questioned.

"I think it's best that these guys explain it you. Trust me, they've fought those things for a very long time. Longer than we have," I said.

"Very well then," Bentley said as he then looks over at Sora. "So, Sora, was it? Care to explain to us what those creatures unimaginable to mankind we fought were?"

"Well, for starters, they're known as 'Heartless' where we're from," Sora began.

If Sora said to me that he'd be as specific as possible when explaining his story, then we might be here a while.

It did take a few minutes for the group to get through their explanation of the Heartless, but my gang looked petrified either way.

"Oh my goodness," Penelope said in shock.

"So what you're saying is that unless we get rid of the Heartless, our world will get destroyed?!" Bentley asked.

"Basically, yeah," Sora simply said.

"But how are we supposed to fight back against them?! Before Sly vanished, my fists only went through them as if they were air!" Murray exclaimed.

"The same can be said when I used my shock pistol on them," Carmelita added.

"Easy," Kairi started. "We fight back against them using these."

At that moment, Sora, Riku and Kairi held out their hands and in a few seconds, their respective Keyblades then appeared in flashes of light.

"How did you do that?" Bentley asked, adjusting his glasses.

"That's complicated," Kairi replied. "King Mickey has one too."

"Wait! Sly had something like that for a moment!" Murray reminded.

"Right. For some reason, Sly's able to wield a Keyblade of his own," the king said.

"Uh, not meaning to change the subject, but you're a king?!" Penelope questioned, obviously a bit shaken. The rest of the gang looked a little stunned as well. Then, Bentley looked over to me and glared.

"Sly. You. Brought. A king. To our HIDEOUT?!" he shouted. Okay, now he was ticked.

I couldn't help but give a nervous chuckle. There was definitely no way I was going to hear the end of it from Bentley now that he knew that King Mickey was actually royalty.

"Yeeeeeeeah. I pretty much did," I said nervously.

"Hey." Donald looked at me in disapproval.

"That's not the point, Sly!" Bentley snapped. "He could have us arrested!"

"'Arrested'?" Kairi asked, a bit surprised. I went tense. I nearly lept out of my fur when Riku looked at me with that cold expression.

"Are you criminals?" he questioned.

"U-u-uh, we're... y-you could say..."

"I didn't see any intention from him to steal when he was at the castle," King Mickey said. "And he's only been polite so far. You're not the average, petty thief gang, are you?" The king got it? Somehow, that made me so relieved. Relieved enough to sigh in such manner.

"It's part of my lineage. The Cooper family only steals from the greedy and those who abuse power," I explained as calmly as I could under Riku's glare.

"The greedy and people who abuse their power for themselves? So, does mean you guys are essentially like the Robin Hoods of this world?" Sora asked out of curiousity.

"In a way, I guess you can call us that," I said.

That reaction could have been so much worse.

"Riku, you can drop the look now," Kairi pointed out. "It's obvious they have their morals." Riku finally looked away.

"Gawrsh, and Sly was looking forward to seeing all of you again," Goofy said to my team. "He was worried."

"How could I not? These guys are family to me."

"Yeah! The three of us grew up together!" Murray commented, pulling myself and Bentley close. Thankfully, it wasn't for another bone crushing hug.

"And the original three members," Bentley added.

"Together, we're known as the Cooper Gang," I then said.

"That's pretty interesting," Kairi said before looking over at Penelope and Carmelita. "And what about you two?"

"Well, to start off, I was a more recent member of the Cooper Gang after I joined them in Holland," Penelope began before her face then suddenly became glum in its expression. "Although... There was a time where did end up temporarily leaving them for specific reasons."

"'Specific reasons'? What do you mean?" Sora asked.

"I'd rather not talk about it. It's a little too personal for me, you see."

Honestly, I couldn't blame Penelope for not wanting to talk about her betrayal. That was a really tough and emotional time not just for her, but for all of us involved. So, I could understand that the topic made her pretty uncomfortable and it was definitely clear to Sora and the others.

"Sorry for asking. I guess I should've been more considerate," Sora said. "But, moving on now, what about you, Carmelita? What's your story with the Cooper Gang?"

"Oh, where do I even begin?" Carmelita said with an amused smile on her face. "Before I joined the Cooper Gang, I was originally a police officer working for Interpol. Unsurprisingly, my main goal ended up becoming trying to bust Ringtail and his friends. We ended up having quite a lot of run-ins with each other since the day I first encountered them. Emphasis on 'a lot'."

I said, "But now she's left Interpol to work with us."

"A cop that joined up with thieves?" Riku asked.

"Well, we did end up partnering up a lot despite the 'circumstances' between us."

"But the gang showed they were just and thorough, so I joined."

"That's understandable," Sora said.

"Okay. Back on to what happened when Sly disappeared," Bentley spoke up.

My new friends and I went into explanation of our encounter.

"I see. So you came to help eliminate the Heartless from our world, which may have come from your worlds," Bentley summarized.

"That's right, Bentley," the king confirmed. "All we need to do is locate the Keyhole of this world and lock it."

"That may be a problem," Carmelita commented. "Earth is huge with lots of monuments and areas. There's no way we'd able to search the whole planet and find a specific keyhole before the Heartless find it."

"Carmelita brings up a good point," Penelope stated.

"Locating a Keyhole is a struggle in itself," Riku informed. So now we're facing a new problem. How were we going to find the Keyhole? It made me really wish we'd had some way of guiding us to it.

"Uh, Sly, your cane," Murray pointed out with wide eyes. I looked down at my family heirloom that I had placed on the table. The end had a small light. So I picked it up and instantly, my Keyblade appeared. Without me focusing so hard to summon it.

To say that my gang was surprised would be an understatement. Either stunned or speechless would probably be more proper terms for the expressions they made.

"It's just like what happened when we fought those Heartless before Sly vanished," Carmelita said.

I said, "As far as I know, I'm not supposed to be able to use a Keyblade, but here it is."

"A Keyblade needs to be passed down from a previous wielder," King Mickey explained. "So it's a mystery why Sly has possession of one, if Keyblades don't exist in this world."

The light on the end continued to glow. Suddenly, it detatched and started flying around rapidly. A few of the others ducked to avoiding being in its way before it flew out the window.

"What the heck just happened there?!" Bentley shouted. Although, who could blame him for being shocked about what just happened.

"I have no idea," I said as then turned to the others. "I'm hoping you guys know exactly what was that just now?"

Sora said, "I don't remember that happening with my Keyblade."

The other wielders shook their heads. This kept getting even more confusing.

My Keyblade suddenly jerked on its own towards the window where the light flew off.

"Sly?" Carmelita called in surprise.

"I've seen this happen before!" Sora exclaimed. "When that happens out of the blue, it's towards the Keyhole!"

"Does... that mean Sly's Keyblade can locate the Keyhole?" Penelope asked.

"If Sly's Keyblade suddenly jerked like that, then that must be the case!" King Mickey exclaimed.

"And if it's pointing towards the window where that light flew out of, then that should be some sort of clue that the Keyhole we're looking for has to be close by," Kairi said.

"I suppose that saves us the trouble of having to travel all over Earth just to find it," Bentley commented.

"Then let's go follow it and see where it takes us."

"Oh. Before that." I could only smile sheepishly at the only humans in the room. If anyone else saw them, they would be calling Area 51 about hairless aliens. So Donald quickly used his magic to transform them again.

I felt determination flood my being as we headed out. My Keyblade was acting as if it was following that light to the Keyhole. Hopefully, that's where we would find it.

End Chapter