Chapter 73

Photos

Sora, Mickey, Donald, and Goofy went around stocking up on items, armor, and accessories from the shops. They had already gone through most of the wares on previous visits and found better armaments, but Sora figured that he ought to give Riku and Kairi some more options, especially since Kairi had barely upgraded from the kneepads and armguard that she had picked up in Radiant Garden. And, of course, it was always good to support local businesses, especially when they could do well to make use of the vast amounts of Munny that they had accumulated through defeating Heartless.

They met up with Riku, Kairi, Hayner, Pence, and Olette at the train station. The Twilight Town trio looked sad. They knew what was going on.

"So, time to go, huh?" Hayner asked.

Sora nodded. "Yeah. We have work to do," he replied.

"But I'm sure we'll stop by again to say hello," Kairi assured them.

"Good luck!" Pence said.

Riku took out a small piece of paper and handed it to Hayner. "Take this," he said.

"What's this?" Hayner asked as he took the paper.

"A parting gift," Riku answered. "A bit of a reminder of what might have been, in another life."

Hayner, Pence and Olette examined the paper. On it was a printed copy of the Other Twilight Town's photo of them posing with Roxas in front of the old mansion.

"That's what you were doing on the computer?" Pence asked, understanding what he had been doing as they left the mansion that morning. "Printing this out?"

Riku nodded in confirmation. "Well, take care, you guys." He gave them a little wave as he took a few steps back.

Mickey shook hands with the three of them. "It was nice seeing you again," he told them.

"You too," Olette returned the favor.

"Let me know how Ansem's files work out," Pence made Mickey promise.

"Sure thing," Mickey replied.

Sora and Hayner raised their arms so that their forearms crossed in front of them. Hayner was not sure what had prompted him to do that with Sora, but Sora recalled the digital Hayner and Roxas doing that one time, and was thinking that Hayner's heart was sharing the feeling with his digital counterpart somehow and was reacting as the digital Hayner would have with Roxas.

"Stay cool," Hayner said.

"Keep your head on," Sora shot back.

Pence gave Kairi a pat on the shoulder, then Olette gave her a hug. "Be safe," Olette wished her. "Of course, if you're fighting with a key like Sora, you'll be fine, I suppose."

"It was good to see you again," Kairi said with a smile.

Donald and Goofy waved good-bye. With that, the six travelers went into the train station and used the Safe Point to beam up to the Gummi Ship.

Mickey held the flash drive up for the rest of the crew to see. They regarded it long enough that they could make out most of its details. The body was black with red lines down the middle. The cap was engraved on both sides with his ever-present head-shaped logo, and the indents were painted blue. A brand name was printed on one side, "Hackwrench".

"So, that's everything Ansem had on Xehanort?" Riku asked for clarification.

Mickey nodded. "That's what it looks like," he answered.

"You think Ansem figured out what Xehanort had planned for after we beat Xemnas?" Goofy wondered aloud.

"It's worth a try," Jiminy said from on top of Sora's shoulder. "Might help Leon and the others with their investigation."

"Well, then let's get this to them," Sora said with certainty.

Mickey nodded. "And we can update them on what we've found out about Maleficent's scheme," he added.

"Right. So, who's flying?" Donald asked.

On that cue, Jiminy hopped onto a button, which revealed a cupholder in which sat six ice cream sticks. "I wrote the jobs on three of these sticks," he explained. Now, you each take one, and if you get one with a role on it, that's what you do for the trip. Anyone with a blank stick gets to sit and relax."

Seeing no fault in that system, the six crew members each took a stick. When they saw what they took, Donald took the pilot's chair, Sora took the gunner seat, and Goofy took the copilot's chair. Mickey, Riku and Kairi were left to take their spots in the passenger seats.

A few moments after Donald started flying, Riku started to feel uncomfortable as he realized that he was sitting next to Mickey. The air between them had been tense since their argument after they left Castle of Dreams. As he had since had time to calm down and think about how he acted, he felt guilty for flipping out at him like that. He could tell how badly his outburst had hurt him, and he now understood that the mouse was haunted by his failure to keep his old friends safe.

Kairi nudged him with her elbow. He turned to see what she was trying to get his attention for. She cast her gaze to Mickey for a brief instant, then back to Riku. "Talk to him," she whispered.

Hesitantly, Riku nodded. He knew she was right. He had to resolve the issue.

"Mickey… I'm sorry… about before…" he said. "I wasn't even thinking about how the whole thing with Terra, Ventus and Aqua affected you. And I don't know what I would have done in your position, if I would have done what I said you should have done. I guess if I had been through the sort of trauma you had, I would have tried to find any sort of bright spot." He sighed. "I really am a hypocrite, huh? When I went through trauma, it was my own doing, and I kept blaming myself. I didn't want Sora and Kairi to see me. I was afraid to face my worries head-on. I guess we took two different approaches to our problems, neither of which was better." He paused for a moment, waiting to see if Mickey would respond, though the mouse did not move. "I'm sorry for yelling at you, and probably making you think I was blaming you for everything that happened with Ansem. And I'm sorry you had to go through all that on your own."

Riku was met with a somber moment of silence. He sighed and looked away. He was not sure if his speech would ease Mickey's mind, but he felt good to get it off his chest.

"It's not your fault," Riku heard Mickey say.

"Hm?" Riku grunted, wondering what Mickey meant.

"You had a pretty good reason to be upset," Mickey elaborated. "Out of everyone here, you were affected the most by Xehanort's machinations since my failure to stop him. There's no reason you shouldn't have been mad when you found out that I could have prevented it."

"But I shouldn't have taken it out on you," Riku countered. "You were hurt even more than me. You lost your friends, and you still haven't found out what happened to two of them." He did not notice Mickey shift about nervously when he said the last bit. "And yeah, maybe you should have checked, but after what you went through, can I really blame you for hoping that all that trauma wasn't in vain?"

After a moment, Mickey sighed. "Thanks, Riku," he said. "And I know you weren't blaming me for what happened with Ansem. It's just that I could never forgive myself for not being able to help my friends. The old wound opened up when Cinderella brought them up, and it just hurt more to think that I'd lost your faith and trust."

Riku shrugged. "Well, I haven't entirely lost my faith in you," he quipped.

He and Mickey started laughing, and Kairi joined it for a bit. She was glad to see that they were mending fences.

In the Disney Castle library, Queen Minnie Mouse perused the books on the shelves. She saw a spine labeled "Photo Album" and took it off of the shelf, deciding to take another look through it. She turned the pages, examining the pictures that her husband had taken during his quest to close the Door to Darkness.

After flipping past the last page she had turned during her first examination, Minnie stopped dead. She gasped at a sight that she could not explain.

She fully identified the acrylic and aluminum object as a star-shaped trinket with a symbol in the center, a shape she had seen a few times but of which she did not know the significance. It was being held in a white gloved hand that no doubt belonged to Mickey. Mickey was in the process of handing it back to its owner.

The figure who took up the majority of the image was a human woman with blue eyes and blue hair. Minnie was shocked at the sight, as she recognized this woman. She looked as though she had not aged much since they had met so many years ago.

The most surprising part was when she realized that this had to have been in the Realm of Darkness.

Is that… How was she there… And Mickey saw her?

Using a letter opener, Minnie removed the picture from the album. She took a piece of parchment and wrote a letter. She taped the photo to the bottom of the paper and stamped the top of the back side of the paper. She found a bottle and, rolling the parchment up and pinning it with a rubber band, slipped the letter into the bottle. She ran out to drop it into the lake, wishing for it to reach Mickey.

A/N: Uh-oh. Mickey has some 'splainin' to do! Though, I'm sure at least some of you saw this coming since chapter 2.

To be honest, I forgot about Kairi's armor for a while, so I haven't exactly been incorporating its existence into the fight scenes, particularly the armguard (which I based on the one from Yuffie's garb in FF7, by the way)