Taking Back the Crown

by JCMorrigan

Mozenrath. Archibald Snatcher. Roman Torchwick. Mad Madam Mim. Yzma. The Huntsman. Wuya. Ayam Aghoul. Their mission: take over the multiverse, or look fabulous trying. Rated M for swearing, steamy implications and VERY bloody battles. Contains slash and het shipping.

92. Arrivederci

92. Arrivederci

A/N: Finished Kingdom Hearts III. Ohhhhhhh boy. There were things I liked and things that this fic is going out of its way to fix. That being said, you're still in spoiler-safe territory. No spoilers here. Just mentions of things that were general knowledge. I did, however, manage to sneak one line from the finale in here. It's not a spoiler unless you know exactly what you're looking for; let's see if the sharp-eyed can find it! In other news, I've adjusted Equestria's continuity further to my liking – S5 and onward still absolutely did not happen, but I liked the movie, as you'll see.

...

The boy had been whisper-quiet as he stole away from the inn, opening the garage door slowly enough that the door's usual creak was slowed to inaudibility. The small boats were lined up there, ready and waiting to see use. None would get all that far; they'd just been designed as shuttles to take a person as far as Crescentia and back. That was all the boy needed, he thought as he began to undo the ropes on one vehicle. He would get a bigger and better ship once he'd reached port. How, exactly, he meant to do that, he hadn't quite figured out, but he was confident he could make it work.

The vessel was freed. The boy slung his pack, filled with only the barest essentials for travel (and not even that; he hadn't accounted for many potential hypotheticals and therefore had about half the toiletries and changes of clothing one would need), into the boat as it began to leave the floor, rocking the whole vessel slightly. The boat's small sail unfurled, rippling with energy.

Perfect –

"Going somewhere, Mr. Hawkins?"

The boy jumped, startled. His eyes darted toward the door frame, where the tall, regal woman with feline features stood up straight as a flagpole, clad in a modest nightgown, regarding him with a smile that was sly by way of the lawful catching the stealthy in the act of doing something strictly forbidden – which was exactly what was happening.

"Come onnnnnn," the boy, one Jim Hawkins, aged seventeen, protested.

"And without even saying farewell, I might add," the woman stated.

"You know she doesn't want me to go," Jim groaned.

"And it never occurred to you that there's a good reason for that?"

Jim powered down the boat, hoisting up his pack. There was no escaping tonight. "How'd you even find me?" he asked.

The woman, one Amelia Smollet, former captain of the finest ships in the royal fleet, stepped back to let Jim exit the garage. "You aren't as quiet as you think," she informed Jim. "Not to mention I was already awake. Isaac was fussing."

So much for making off in the dead of night. Jim sighed heavily as Amelia walked him back to the Benbow Inn: a respectable building of average size for an inn. While Jim was a permanent resident of the building, his mother Sarah being the proprietor, Amelia was a guest, as were her husband Delbert Doppler (whose last name she had staunchly refused to take, love him though she did) and their children, still infants, all sisters except for Isaac. The Hawkins family and the Doppler-Smollets were close, the latter of whom were frequent visitors.

In retrospect, Jim should've known better than to try and attempt his mission when Amelia was on the premises. After all, he'd already tried to ask outright for permission, and been turned down, and Sarah, Amelia, and Doppler knew Jim well. He had an inkling she had been at least in part on the lookout for him, waiting for him to pull the stunt.

"Are you going to be the one to tell your mother," Amelia asked curtly, "or shall I?"

"Do we have to?" Jim groaned.

"You'd rather her learn what you've done by waking up to find you missing," Amelia stated.

"I left a note!" Jim protested.

"I'd think you of all people would know better than to let your mother find out a loved one had decided to leave her on short notice – "

"It isn't LIKE that!" Jim cried. "I'm gonna come back! None of you get it! I HAVE to go back and find it."

"No, you most certainly don't," Amelia insisted. "It's of little use to anyone now that Treasure Planet is shrapnel."

"You KNOW that's not why I want it."

Amelia quickly stepped out in front of Jim, blocking his path as she stared him down. It seemed that no matter how old Jim got, Amelia would always be taller, able to look down upon him with that gaze that reminded him of the wrongs he'd committed and break right through to his core. He averted his eyes from hers for that very reason.

"Mr. Hawkins," Amelia said sternly, "sentimentality is all well and good, but hardly when it comes to a man like him. That's if I can even call him a 'man' rather than a 'brutish, malevolent miscreant.'"

"That brutish, malevolent miscreant saved my LIFE," Jim reminded Amelia, finding the mettle to look her in the eye. "He's the reason we were able to fix up the inn. He changed my entire life. He's the reason I am what I am now! He's why I'm such a better person – "

"If you've become a better person," Amelia challenged him, "then act like it. Stop trying to defy your mother's wishes in pursuit of a trinket, and DO stop attempting to cross the entire Etherium with a pack that small and no plan."

"I HAVE a plan!"

"Then tell me, in excruciating detail, what that plan is."

Jim paused for a moment before admitting, "Get to Crescentia and wing it."

"He certainly has influenced you, all right," Amelia grunted. "Forget your mother's well-being; I'm saving you from certain death."

"Amelia – " Jim attempted.

"We've all heard it before," Amelia interrupted. "You haven't heard from him in two years, you've no idea if he's still alive at all, and that map is the only link you will ever have to him. After you finish spelling this out, then whichever one of us you're directing your plea toward will remind you that it simply is NOT worth the trouble for multiple reasons. At this point, we can expect that argument to fall on deaf ears. Let me simplify it for you: no matter how many times you make the attempt, you will be stopped. And if by some miracle you should slip away on your pilgrimage, I do hope you can live with the consequences. After all, what reason would your mother have to believe that you wouldn't come home safe based on a hastily written letter?"

Jim bit his lip. He truly didn't want to cause any grief for his mother, for Amelia, for Doppler, for anyone. But his heart cried out for the item that made up the last link between himself and the closest thing he had to a father. To the others, it was a hunk of metal, and John Silver a villainous rogue without whom the Etherium would be better off. So long as they didn't understand, Jim didn't see any other option as to what to do.

"Let's just go back," Jim sighed. "I'll deal with this in the morning."

"Realizing full well that you certainly won't be able to pull off a second attempt in the same night."

"I know, I know." He now felt an immense weight of regret settling within him.

He stormed around Amelia and marched back to the inn door. He mapped it out in his mind: if Amelia had been awake because of Isaac, then Doppler would be as well. She would tell him what Jim had done, and both of them would rise as early as Sarah. The gossip would be around before Jim had a chance to argue his piece.

Of course, as soon as Jim pushed the door open, the entire hypothetical fell to pieces. There were Sarah and Doppler sitting at one of the empty tables in the inn's dining area, Doppler cradling baby Isaac while Sarah held his sister Marie. Both adults regarded the appearance of Jim and Amelia with surprise; the infants, thankfully, had just been calmed to sleep.

"Jim?" Sarah hissed softly, so as not to disturb Marie. "What is going on?"

"Nothing," Jim answered quietly. "It's not a big deal."

Amelia stepped around him to correct him: "It seems Mr. Hawkins was making a break for the ruins of Treasure Planet."

"Jim!" Doppler hissed. "We've been through this!"

"Yeah," Jim said sullenly. "We have."

"Though to be honest, I didn't think you'd actually do it," Doppler admitted. "Why, that's the sort of thing your – well, I mean – it's not something I would've expected from you – "

"I get it," Jim grunted. By now, Jim and Amelia had moved indoors, and Amelia had shut the door behind them.

"Jim…" Sarah gaped at her son. "You seriously thought you could just leave – in the middle of the night – without even telling anyone – "

"There was a note," Jim grumbled. "You would've seen it when you went to the kitchen."

"I…seriously can't believe this," Sarah hissed. "How did you even think you were going to get back to Treasure Planet?"

"This is going to sound completely stupid," Jim sighed, "but my heart knows the way."

That earned him three blank looks from the adults present.

"I KNOW it sounds stupid!" Jim argued, his voice rising in intensity. "But it's the only part of him I'd have, and it's like…it's like I know he's part of me, and I'm part of him, and – "

His increased volume woke Marie, who began to squall.

"Shh-sh-sh-shhhhh," Sarah said softly to the child. "It's okay. It's okay." She then looked up at Jim. "But – I just – it's NOT okay – "

"I'm sorry," Jim protested. "I didn't think it through, okay? It was a dumb decision. I just couldn't forget about that map, and I – I messed up."

"Jim," Doppler said calmly, "it's not that we're against…whatever friendship you had with that crude, backstabbing – "

Jim shot Doppler a look that expressed his doubt that, given the use of such terminology, Doppler actually wasn't against his bond with Silver.

" – with Silver," Doppler corrected. "But you have to know where your priorities are. It isn't like getting that map back is a matter of the safety of the world!"

That was when the knock came at the door, and now Isaac was awake as well, making murmurs that threatened to become something louder.

"Amelia?" Sarah stood up. "Can you – "

"Of course." Amelia swept her daughter out of Sarah's arms, cooing at the infant as Doppler did the same with Isaac.

Sarah gave a sigh as she looked to Jim. "You know this makes it harder to trust you."

Jim's gut twisted. "I know."

"We'll talk about this later," Sarah vowed before placing her hand on the door handle. "For now, I need to figure out who needs a room at THIS time of night."

She pulled the door open to lay eyes on what wasn't the strangest array of six people she'd ever seen, but certainly a group that didn't look as though they matched.

"Uh…hi," Sora greeted. "This is the Benbow Inn, right?"

"Yes," Sarah replied. "How many rooms do you need?"

"Uhhh…we're not here for a room," Sora replied. "We're here about something else."

"May we come inside?" Jasmine asked.

"Of course!" Sarah stepped aside with a smile, letting Sora, Donald, Goofy, Jasmine, Aladdin, and Kazuichi enter.

Of the latter two, Aladdin hovered by Kazuichi's side, monitoring him after the rather lengthy Gummi flight to get to Montressor. "You doing okay?" he asked.

"Yeah!" Kazuichi replied. "I think I'm finally startin' to get used to – " His stomach lurched, and he clamped his hand over his mouth. "Talkingnotgoodnow."

Jim regarded the newcomers with interest; Doppler and Amelia gave the group a glance before returning to speaking to their children. Jim found himself curious about these people. While the sight of Donald and Goofy didn't faze him one bit – he saw all sorts from all planets come by – he did notice that nobody seemed to be dressed in accordance with the current fashions. Aladdin was the closest, but his lack of shirt didn't quite fit. Though he certainly was the sort of man who needed to flaunt what was beneath that vest, Jim decided.

"Sure is an empty place," Goofy observed. "Kinda strange for an inn."

"It's…the middle of the night," Sarah reminded him. "Everyone's asleep."

"I TOLD you we should've waited till morning!" Donald insisted with a stomp of his webbed foot. "Now we're keeping everybody up!"

"Oh, no, it's okay," Sarah told him. "We were already awake."

"Besides, this is IMPORTANT!" Sora insisted.

Sarah was completely baffled by now. Before she could ask, Jasmine approached her, holding out her right hand. "My name is Jasmine," she said with a jovial smile. "This is my husband, Aladdin, and our friends, Sora, Donald, Goofy, and Kazuichi."

The mentioned five made gestures of acknowledgement; smiles, waves, nods.

"What's your name?" Jasmine asked.

"Sarah," Sarah replied, bewildered as she took and shook Jasmine's hand. "Sarah Hawkins."

"Hawkins?" Goofy repeated. "Don't that name sound kinda…familiar?"

"Of COURSE it does, ya big palooka!" Donald squawked. "That's who we're lookin' for!"

"Well, this is the inn we were supposed to look for," Aladdin reminded them.

"Sarah," Sora asked, "are you related to anybody named Jim Hawkins?"

"Hey, wait," Jim broke in. "That's me. Why are you looking for me?" Two years ago, he would've immediately suspected the law chasing him down for trespassing – though he doubted they'd send a plainclothes officer who looked younger than he currently was. Now he wondered, hoping against hope, that these people had somehow been in contact with Silver and were bringing news of him.

"You're the guy who figured out how to get to Treasure Planet," Sora told Jim.

"Uh, yeah," Jim confirmed. "I know."

"And that's exactly where we need to go!" Sora proclaimed.

"You…do know it's not THERE anymore, right?" Jim asked.

"It's not the planet we're looking for," Aladdin clarified. "It's the map."

Kazuichi nodded affirmatively.

"Now YOU'RE looking for the map?" Doppler asked, befuddled. "That hardly seems to make sense. All it was good for was leading the way to Treasure Planet, and by the time you'd have found the map, you'd already be at Treasure Planet! Or what's left of it, anyhow."

"Trust us," Aladdin emphasized. "We have a good reason."

"Whoa, whoa, whoa," Jim broke in. "That map is WORTHLESS to you."

"Mr. Hawkins," Amelia snapped, "if they somehow DO have a good reason for wanting that map, it will be a good deal more important than sentimental value."

"Okay, it's like this," Kazuichi piped up, stomach finally settling. "There's this bad guy who's been goin' around doin' all this bad shit, like trying to take over the worlds, except he almost blew 'em up instead, and now he's tryin' to get that map!"

"We don't know exactly what Mozenrath will do once he has it," Jasmine asserted, "but it can't be good. Mozenrath is ambitious and destructive, and he's been able to figure out clever plans in the past involving things we didn't think would be useful to him. If that map falls into his hands, we'll all suffer the consequences."

"Wait, MOZENRATH?" Jim repeated. "Evil villain trying to take over the planets? Did I wake up in some kind of kids' book?"

"I kinda get this vibe that it plays out like a fanfiction," Kazuichi admitted. "No one would actually publish the shit that happens to us."

"You gotta believe us!" Sora insisted. "We need to get that map before he does!"

"An' Jim's the one person who can show us the way!" Goofy said cheerily. "He can be our guide!"

"So what you're saying," Jim reiterated, "is that you want me to take you to Treasure Planet to get Flint's map before this…Mozen-person can beat you to it."

"Which isn't happening," Sarah stated flatly. "You are NOT going off on some crazy adventure with a bunch of strangers who just turned up in the middle of the night!"

"THIS IS WHY WE SHOULD'VE WAITED FOR THE SUN TO COME UP!" Donald insisted.

"Hey!" Aladdin countered. "Mozenrath doesn't wait for the sun to come up, and we're trying to be faster than him!"

"That's the other thing," Sora went on. "We kind of have to leave…now."

"Jim," Doppler broke in, "you're not CONSIDERING joining this madcap chase, are you?"

"Look," Jim said in exasperation, "I've never been big on fate or destiny or whatever. But this is a HUGE coincidence, and, I dunno, maybe this is all happening for a reason!"

"Coincidence?" Jasmine repeated. "What about this is a coincidence?"

"I've been thinking about trying to get that map for myself," Jim explained. "It's the only thing left I could have to remind me of someone special who was in and out of my life." The disappointment set in fully; these people had no idea who John Silver was. "Tonight, I almost did something really stupid and tried to run off on my own to go get it."

"You know," Aladdin remarked, "you holding onto that map wouldn't be a bad idea. We'd know it was safe, at least."

"This works out perfect!" Sora cried. "You can get that map back for that person who was special to you, and then Mozenrath won't have it!"

"Now, I don't know," Goofy broke in. "Somethin' about this just don't seem quite right. An' I think it's that if we just let Jim have somethin' Mozenrath really wants and don't lock it up, then Mozenrath's just gonna come after Jim an' try to hurt him for it!"

"Oh, yeah," Sora realized. "That's right."

"We could never put you in danger over this," Jasmine asserted.

"Well, except for the part where we go get the map in the first place," Kazuichi corrected. "Kinda thinkin' that's gonna be dangerous."

"So I might not get to keep the map, is what you're saying," Jim stated, rather disgruntled.

"We can figure that part out later," Aladdin suggested.
As far as Jim was concerned, if a man who looked that good and acted with that much confidence hinted that something might go your way, you had every right to believe in that hope.

"So?" Sora stepped toward Jim, an enormous smile upon his face. "Whaddaya say? Wanna show us the way?"

"Are you KIDDING?" Jim replied. "I would LOVE – "

Sarah, Doppler, and Amelia all regarded him with a look that caused him to back down.

" – to help you," Jim concluded, "but…I don't think I can."

"Er, Amelia? Sarah?" Doppler addressed. "If I may?" He stepped back into the rear of the dining space, further away from the travelers and Jim, Isaac still cradled in his arms.

Sarah and Amelia followed him.

"They're going to be talking about us," Jim sighed.

"Right in FRONT of us?" Kazuichi groaned.

"And you SHOULDN'T LISTEN IN!" Donald asserted, hands on waist. He was, of course, planning his own course to eavesdrop when attention was diverted from him.

"So…what did you guys all say your names were again?" Jim asked.

"I'm Sora!" Sora proclaimed.

"Donald Duck!" Donald added.

"Name's Goofy!" Goofy chimed in.

"I'm Aladdin," Aladdin affirmed.

"And my name is Jasmine," Jasmine contributed.

"Kazuichi Soda!" Kazuichi concluded.

Jim nodded in response to each. "That's fair. It's just…" He turned to one of them in particular. "I have a hard time believing your name is actually GOOFY."

"Well, technically, it's m'nickname," Goofy clarified. "M'full name's Goofus George Dippy Dawg Goof, but I always thought that was kinda a mouthful."

With looks of pure astonishment, Sora, Aladdin, and Kazuichi all gaped at Goofy; "Your name is WHAT?"

Meanwhile, Doppler said in a hushed tone, "You know, it may not be so bad of an idea to let Jim go with them."

"Are you CRAZY?" Sarah hissed.

"Hear me out," Doppler continued. "Jim wants that map very badly. Now, while I think the three of us are in agreement that Silver is not the sort of person worth remembering, Jim obviously believes otherwise. And really, who are we to question whatever bond those two formed? None of us spent as much time with Silver as Jim did. Perhaps he was actually somewhat of a good mentor. The point is, Jim wants some token of remembrance of him so badly, he almost ran away from us in the middle of the night. And now, we're told there's a very good reason that he SHOULD find that map."

"Or so our visitors say," Amelia brought up. "Let's assume the map truly IS a weapon if it falls into the wrong hands. How are we to know those hands there aren't the wrong hands?" She nodded toward the crew of travelers.

"All the more reason for my proposition," Doppler went on.

"You're saying he should just go with them?" Sarah hissed. "All by himself?"

"What I'm saying is that this may not only avert some cosmic disaster," Doppler clarified, "but it will also give Jim closure and put the idea out of his head. Now, as a man of science, I am even less inclined to believe in 'fate' or 'destiny,' but this REALLY has lined up, hasn't it? But to settle your concerns, I am NOT suggesting he go alone." He looked to Amelia. "If you're thinking what I'm thinking…"

"…One of us would accompany him on his venture," Amelia said with a sly smile. "Suss out what our newcomers want with that map, exactly. Protect Mr. Hawkins from any and all harm. Step in before he does anything rash."

"Precisely!" Doppler concluded. "The question is, of course, which one of us would go with Jim and who would stay behind with the children."

"I wouldn't be averse to the concept," Amelia stated, "but I do know how badly you've been itching to traverse the Etherium again."

"I haven't been ITCHING," Doppler said defensively. "I have a stable life, I'm used to it, and I certainly don't need to go gallivanting off on any more adventures." He paused. "Even if I only ever have been on one." Another pause. "And it would be an absolutely fascinating experience to document." Pause. "But I'm not going."

"And why not?" Amelia asked. "We both know you're nothing short of starving for more to learn."

"Because I wouldn't know the first thing about what I was doing if we ran into any trouble," Doppler sighed. "You've always been the capable one. The strong one. The intelligent one."

"Delbert, dear, are you implying that you of all people aren't intelligent?"

"Well, no, but there's the kind of intelligence that benefits you in academic circles, and there's the kind of intelligence that benefits you in dangerous situations, and I only happen to be schooled in ONE of those fields, and it is the wrong one."

"Yes." Amelia gave a sniff. "Well. There is one particularly crucial component you're overlooking: an area in which you excel and I fail."

"FAIL?" Doppler said in astonishment. "Amelia, you have never FAILED at anything in your life."

"I would beg to differ," Amelia stated, "but that's for another discussion, not now. You and Mr. Hawkins have more of a history. You can connect with him. Were I to accompany him, I highly doubt I could get him to trust me with anything of importance. And after tonight, I daresay he sees me more as his warden than as any sort of quirky, friendly traveling companion. You, on the other hand, have a way with him."

"Amelia, I really must insist – "

"Delbert, I won't hear a word – "

"You can BOTH go!" Sarah burst out.

Amelia and Doppler both looked to Sarah in astonishment.

Sarah sighed. "As ridiculous as this is, it's starting to make sense. Maybe none of you believe in fate, but I do. I always used to tell myself that there were reasons for everything that happened in life. When Leland left, I told myself there was a good reason. And it didn't always work, but sometimes, that was all that kept me hanging on. That and Jim. Then that pirate showed up with the map two years ago, and I thought it was all crazy until Jim came back from Treasure Planet…and he was a whole new person. I mean, he was still Jim. He always will be. But he just…he seemed more like he knew what he was meant to do with himself, and what to make of his life. He was happier. This map business started making me wonder if all of that was just being flushed away, but now, it's happening again. Something lined up. It's like the universe is trying to tell me that if I want Jim to be happy…I have to let him go after that map." She gave another, lighter sigh. "Anyway, you both want to go, so you should just…go together."

"But the children!" Doppler argued.

"I'll watch the kids," Sarah said with a soft smile. "And before you ask, yes, I can manage watching kids and the inn. I managed with Jim, right?"

"Jim was only ONE child," Amelia reminded Sarah.

"I've babysat for the group before," Sarah reminded right back. "This will be like that, just…for a few more days."

"You know, Sarah," Doppler teased, "if I didn't know better, I'd think you were looking for an excuse to borrow our children."

Sarah always did love her babysitting shifts. Despite swearing off having any more children of her own, tending to the Doppler-Smollets in such ways as reading picture books to them, pretending their food was light ships coming in to dock at their mouths, and carrying them around the inn one by one while singing soft songs and tending to her customers' needs gave her quite a feeling of warmth. "I am a mom," she resigned. "Just promise me you WILL come back for them and you have a deal."

Doppler and Amelia each looked to the child in their arms, feeling a hesitance to part with their family. But as they looked back up to each other, they knew they were thinking the same thing.

"He is technically one of ours as well, isn't he?" Doppler voiced.

"I hadn't even realized when our number of children went from four to five," Amelia agreed. "Or perhaps it went from one to five, depending on how you view it."

"Then it's settled?" Doppler asked, looking mainly to Sarah.

"Yes," Sarah confirmed. "It's settled."

They broke their conference, turning back to the group assembled by the door.

" – No, you're thinking of a tankette," Kazuichi was telling a simultaneously fascinated and baffled Jim. "A cruiser tank has less armor and a less powerful gun to make it speedier, but it's not as small. It's used more of like a support kinda thing, y'know, for backup. I think Miss Sonia's military had a battalion of cruiser tanks. They might not be as good at blowing shit up as a heavy tank, but they're really helpful, and they're really pretty…kinda like Miss Sonia…huh. Miss Sonia really does have a lot in common with a cruiser tank…"

"That sounds fascinating," Doppler broke in, half-convincingly, "but we've come to a conclusion – "

"They're gonna let us go!" Donald stated for him. "We just gotta bring those two with us!" He pointed to Doppler and Amelia.

"DONALD!" Goofy gasped in shock. "You were listenin' in! An' you were the one who told US that was rude!"

"I never said it was rude!" Donald argued. "I just said YOU shouldn't do it!" This was followed by a rather mischievous, almost villainous-sounding quack-chuckle.

"Well, the cat's out of the bag," Doppler confirmed.

"You mean it?" Jim said, flabbergasted. "You're really cool with this?"

"Yes, so long as you have the proper supervision," Amelia stated. "After what went wrong with the last crew, I want everyone here aware that we will be keeping a SHARP eye on both Mr. Hawkins and his prized map." This was said with a glare at all of the newcomers.

"Whaddaya lookin' at me for?" Donald grumped. "I'm not suspicious!"

"You don't have anything to worry about," Jasmine told Amelia, "but I do understand why you are worried. The company will be fun, anyway."

Amelia said, "This isn't about fun – "

At the same time that Doppler proclaimed, "This WILL be fun, won't it?"

The pair looked to each other, their ideologies clashing on a metaphysical plane somewhere between their gazes, before they came to an agreement and smiled.

"I suppose all work and no play does make a dull crew," Amelia relented.

"But business is business," Doppler countered, "and we really can't delay."

"Gawrsh," Goofy commented, "you two're just made for each other!"

"JUST LIKE ME AND MISS SONIA!" Kazuichi cried.

"I was thinking more like Aladdin and Jasmine," Sora mused.

Donald muttered something derisive about "mushy-gushy stuff."

"If everything's taken care of, then we gotta head out," Aladdin urged. "Knowing Mozenrath, he's already two steps ahead…or, at least, he THINKS he is."

"Then let's go!" Jim barged out the door first.

"Okay, kid dropoff!" Sarah held out her arms. The now quieted and once-again-slumbering Isaac and Marie were placed in one arm each, and Sarah balanced them in her embrace. While she was looking forward to spending time with the quadruplets, she at least wished that Jim had thought to say –

As if commanded by Sarah's very thoughts, Jim raced back into the inn. "I forgot," he said sheepishly to his mother. "Take care of yourself, okay? I love you."

"I love you too," Sarah told her son. "Stay safe out there."

She couldn't really hug Jim with her arms full, but he gave a light embrace that circled her and both infants momentarily.

Once the traveling party of Sora, Donald, Goofy, Aladdin, Jasmine, Kazuichi, Jim, Doppler, and Amelia was out the door, Sarah took a seat, repositioning the children on her lap as she thought about the sudden turn of events that had just occurred.

There came a chirp; a plate on a nearby table stood up on edge, then collapsed into a gelatinous shape, revealing it had never been a plate but instead a very talented shape-shifting creature with a pair of bulbous, innocent-looking eyes.

Sarah gave the critter a mischievous smile. "It's you and me, Morph," she told him. "We've got a lot of work to do around here. Think you can give me a hand?"
Morph indicated his readiness to do the job by transforming into a literal hand.

Outside, Jim retrieved a contraption that appeared to be a surfboard with a miniature engine and a folded-up sail attached; it had been leaning on the wall. He'd obviously grabbed it right before remembering he hadn't said goodbye to Sarah.

"Are we REALLY going to need that, Jim?" Doppler asked skeptically.

"Hey!" Jim protested. "This thing saved our butts last time, remember?"

"You have a point," Doppler relented.

Amelia asked, "So which one of you is captain of your crew?"

Before Donald could claim he had the title, Goofy piped up, "That'd be Sora! It's always Sora!"

"I'm not gonna argue with that," Aladdin agreed.

"Captain Sora," Sora mused. "I like the sound of that."

Amelia regarded Sora with surprise. "The youngest of them all, and you're captain?"

"Hey!" Sora responded. "I'm not THAT young!"

"He looks about as old as I was when I picked up the map," Jim offered in Sora's favor.

"You were not captain," Amelia argued. "And what of your ship? Moored at Crescentia, I suppose?"

"It's parked around back," Kazuichi offered; the group pivoted to make way behind the inn.

"Around back?" Doppler repeated in confusion. "There's no way you've managed to dock a light ship at the Benbow Inn."

"It's…not exactly a light ship?" Sora volunteered.

When the Gummi ship came into view, Jim's jaw dropped. "Whoa," he said breathlessly. "That's your SHIP? It looks…DIFFERENT."

"Hey!" Donald snapped.

"Good different!" Jim said hastily. "I mean good different!"

"Well, CAPTAIN Sora," Amelia stated, suspicion growing, "I do think it's about time you came clean about your history. You're pursuing an interplanetary criminal none of us has heard of, you seem to have some use for a map that no longer functions, and your ship looks like that. Would you care to grace us with an explanation?"

"Yeah," Sora replied, "but it's a long story. We'll explain everything while we're taking off."

"So much for the world order," Donald grumbled, still rather angry that Sora, Riku, and Kairi had decided on their own to become so lax about preserving the secrecy of inter-world relations without consulting him. Yet he seemed to be the only person who truly minded. They'd tried their best to deal with Maleficent crossing the lines, but once Mozenrath had also become indifferent about mingling people from multiple worlds, the lawful, forced to get on the villains' level, could no longer be bothered to give a care.

As the group boarded the Gummi craft, Sora began, "So the thing is, it's kinda not just…the planets in this galaxy that Mozenrath's been messing with."

"There are several galaxies with confirmed life," Doppler recalled, "even if we have yet to make contact with many."

"Well…he's from even further away," Sora stated. "And so are we."

"How can you get further away than what Dr. Doppler said?" Jim asked. "Unless there's something outside the entire Etherium."

"Exactly," Sora responded.

The ship tore off into the night.

...

"I can't beliIIIIEEEEEVE IT!" Pinkie Pie cried as she bounded through the Everfree Forest. "An actual invite from Luna to meet her and Cadance at the old castle! This is soooo exciting! I can't WAIT to hear all about her adventures! You think she met any dragons? I bet she met dragons. Ooh, do you think she had a magic duel on the rim of a volcano? WHAT IF SHE HAD A MAGIC DUEL ON THE RIM OF A VOLCANO? THAT'S SO COOOOOL!"

Pinkie led the procession; Twilight, Rainbow Dash, Applejack, Fluttershy, and Rarity made their way behind her. Pinkie's excited leaping was enough to propel her over the tangle of Plunderseed vines that had erupted from the earth, but the others (save Rainbow Dash, who traveled by air) had to watch their hoofsteps to avoid being pricked. Every day, the growth got a little thicker, and they were still no closer to figuring out how to stem it.

"I'm sure Luna has a lot to talk about," Twilight answered. "And so will Cadance."

"So long as they've come up with a riddance for these ghastly Plunderseeds," Rarity sighed. "I don't see how we can put up with this much longer!"

"I still think it's about time they let us in on the whole thing!" Applejack huffed. "We've done all we can 'round these here parts. It's time for us to go get involved in the big ol'…whatever-it-is out there!"

"I agree," Twilight stated, "but what's concerning me more right now is why…all of THIS. Why we were summoned to the old castle instead of Canterlot or the Crystal Empire, or why Luna and Cadance didn't just come to Ponyville. I've thought of a lot of possibilities as to why we're meeting somewhere all the way out in the middle of the Everfree Forest, and I have to say about half of them…aren't good."

"You don't think this is some kind of trick, do you?" Fluttershy worried. "What if it's Queen Chrysalis trying to lead us into a trap and feed off our love for our friends and families before having her Changeling army turn into duplicates of us and bring down Ponyville from the inside?"
"Fluttershy, dear, kindly STOP," Rarity asserted. "You're giving me all sorts of unnecessary fears I do NOT need to manage right now!"

"But what if she's RIGHT?" Twilight asked. "Should we even be going?"

"I dunno about Chrysalis," Rainbow Dash ventured. "I think this might be Twilight's weird boyfriend turning up again."

"STOP CALLING HIM MY BOYFRIEND!" Twilight barked. "So I found a stallion attractive, and he turned out to be an evil thief with a penchant for Dark magic! IT! HAPPENS!"

"See, this is why I don't even bother with stallions," Rainbow Dash said smugly as she glided past Twilight. "When you're into mares, you don't get problems like this."

"Need I remind you," Twilight growled, "that the pony who tricked the Cutie Mark Crusaders into unleashing the Elements WAS A MARE?"

"Stallions, mares, who cares?" Applejack snapped. "We done got tricked, an' that's the beginnin' and the end of it!"

"It certainly wasn't your fault, dear," Rarity reassured Twilight. "Mozenrath was quite the debonair unicorn, and I daresay you two seemed to have quite a bit in common."

"Well, this feels like my fault," Twilight sighed. "Anything I thought about him aside…I'm a princess of Equestria. And I just let this happen right under my nose."

"Villains happen, Twilight!" Rarity attempted to reassure. "We did just have all that business with the Storm King, after all. You handled THAT well!"

"And we've got Cadance and Luna on the job!" Rainbow Dash added. "If those two can't handle it, nopony can!"

"They did manage to rescue the Crystal Heart," Fluttershy recalled. "That solved half of our problem."

"But I was supposed to figure out how to solve the rest while they were gone," Twilight mourned. "I was supposed to make their job easier. I have this whole new giant library to live in and NOTHING in it about how to stop Plunderseeds. But I keep thinking that maybe I just haven't read the right book yet. That maybe I missed a page, or that there's another room full of encyclopedias I didn't find, or – "

"You're not responsible for everything, you know," Rarity volunteered.

"Some stuff is just…out of our control," Applejack suggested.

"Out of our control?" Twilight repeated. "OUT OF OUR CONTROL? I MADE this mess! There HAS to be a way I can fix it!"

"Don't worry, Twilight!" Pinkie reassured. "We're almost there! Look!"

Across the ravine, the old, crumbling castle that had once belonged to Celestia and Luna a millennium ago was in full view.

The six stopped before the bridge, Fluttershy visibly trembling. "W-we still aren't sure this isn't a trap," she reminded the group.

"Last chance to turn back," Applejack offered.

"No way!" Rainbow Dash urged. "If Mozenface is in there, I wanna go give him a good clobbering for what he did to Equestria!"

Without another word, she sped toward the ruin, leaving a bright rainbow in her wake.

"RAINBOW DASH!" Twilight yelled, almost scolding, but there was no bringing the pegasus back now.

"We gotta go after her!" Pinkie cried. "She could be in trouble all alone! CHAAAARGE!" She now hopped twice as fast to get across the bridge.

"Somehow I doubt Rainbow Dash wouldn't be able to take care a'herself," Applejack remarked with a smile, "but we'd best check in on her all the same."

"All right, girls," Twilight declared. "Let's go."

Luna and Cadance awaited the six they'd sent the message to by standing in the audience chamber that also served as the castle's atrium. Luna stood beneath her own banner; Cadance, beside her, had unwittingly taken her place beneath the other.

"It suits you," Luna stated.

"Huh?" Cadance tilted her head at Luna, confused. "What suits me?"

Luna nodded her head up toward the golden banner with the insignia of the sun. "You stand beneath Celestia's crest. As if you were the princess of the sun yourself. I am no longer such a fool as to doubt my sister's place in this world, but seeing you beneath such a symbol makes me realize just how capable you are of one day becoming something just as great as she or I."

"I don't think I could manage the whole sun," Cadance said meekly. "The Crystal Empire is enough for me."

"Whatever destiny brings you," Luna told her, "I know you can rise to the occasion."

"What do you think about Twilight?" Cadance asked. "I may have been a princess longer than her, but by your standards, we're both still new at this."

"Twilight still has much to learn," Luna admitted. "There is potential for both great Light and great Darkness within her, and she has yet to foster either to its full potential. The clash against Tirek was only the beginning."

"The beginning of what?" Cadance asked.

"That, I do not know," Luna admitted. "I can sense the presence of power, and I can tell when turning points in history have occurred. However, I do not know the future."

"We COULD always ask Merlin," Cadance realized.

"Due to the ever-changing flow of time, you know whatever answer he could give us would be an approximation at best," Luna reminded her. "But more importantly, he is wise enough not to even give us a hint toward the answer to a question of that importance."

That was when the blue blur buzzed right up to them, emitting a familiar voice that cried, "OKAY, MOZENDORK! YOU THINK YOU CAN PULL ANOTHER ONE OVER ON US? WELL, I'M READY FOR YA!"

Cadance actually found herself laughing. "It's us, Rainbow Dash!" she clarified.

Rainbow Dash's hooves clattered on the floor as she landed. "Oh," she said as she looked over Cadance and Luna. Then: "Oh, I see. So it WAS you trying to pull the Changeling gambit! Well, you're not gonna fool me!"

"We are not Changelings," Luna stated plainly.

"Oh, yeah?" Rainbow Dash challenged as the other five finally made it in, Twilight having decided to make it easy and transport them en masse into the audience chamber via magic. "Then tell me something only the REAL Luna would know!"

"Your nightmares often concern the world around you becoming too 'cute' and 'childish,'" Luna stated, matter-of-fact, "and you seem rather proud of this in keeping with your personality. But what you won't tell anypony is that in the very worst of your dreams, the Olden Pony stalks the night when you are alone in the forest."

"Seriously?" Pinkie asked. "Our Rainbow Dash is still scared of Olden Pony stories?" This was followed up with a light "Teeheehee…"

"It's the real Luna, all right," Rainbow Dash growled.

"Don't worry, Rainbow Dash," Fluttershy reassured. "I won't make fun of you for your nightmares. And you shouldn't either," she said with a harsh edge toward Pinkie.

"It's good to be back home," Cadance said with a warm smile. "How have things been since we were away?"

"You're never gonna BELIEEEEEVE the adventures we had while you were gone!" Pinkie cried. "So this big scary guy called the Storm King showed up and decided that because the Plunderseeds had weakened Equestria, he was gonna petrify all the princesses and use the opportunity to take over the world, but he could only find Celestia and Twilight, so he sent his general Tempest, except her name isn't really Tempest, it's Fiz – NO, WAIT, SPOILERS! You never heard me say anything! She doesn't have another name! It's just Tempest! He sent Tempest to turn both of them into stone, AND IT ACTUALLY WORKED ON CELESTIA, but Twilight got away, and the last thing we heard Celestia say was to find the queen of the hippos, and we thought that actually meant the queen of the hippos, so we went on this long journey, and there was this really tall cat in a really fancy coat named Capper – oh, silly me, I mean the cat was named Capper! Not the coat! I don't know WHAT his coat was named. Should've asked. Anyway, Capper said he was our friend, but then he turned out to be a bad guy, but then he turned out to be our friend again, and he helped us get away from other bad guys, but then it turned out what Celestia really meant was to find the queen of the hippoGRIFFS, but all the hippogriffs turned into sea ponies, so we turned into sea ponies too, and we went underwater and there was all this drama about whether or not they'd help, and we kiiiinda soooooorta ruined diplomatic relationships with the hippogriffs forever and ever, EXCEPT with Princess Skystar, who is ALSO our friend now, and then Twilight got captured by FizzzzzIMEANTEMPEST! So we all got together to go to Canterlot and rescue her, and Tempest ended up turning on the Storm King because the only reason she was helping him was so he'd fix her broken horn, but he DIDN'T because he was a BIG! FAT! LIAR! So then we beat him in a fight, and we saved the world, and it turned out the whole time, Tempest's real name was FIZZLEPOP BERRYTWIST, and now SHE'S our friend too! It was AMAAAAA-ZIIIING! Oh, and also, we helped a crew of pirates go back to being pirates and having fun again." At the conclusion of this tale, Pinkie zipped right up to Luna's face, bouncing up and down as she asked, "WHAT WAS THE VOLCANO LIKE?"

"Volcano?" Luna asked.

"She means to ask about the adventures you've been on," Rarity clarified. "I think we're all curious as to what happened to you. I'm certain you already knew such things as hippogriffs and pirates were around Equestria and waiting for us to run into them, but we've simply no clue as to what you've experienced out there!"

"That's part of why we're meeting out here," Cadance admitted. "There's…something we kind of wanted to introduce to Equestria slowly instead of just walking right into town."

"Before we tell any of our tale," Luna broke in, "we must first ask what progress you have made toward stemming the Plunderseeds."

Fluttershy, Applejack, Pinkie, Rarity, and especially Twilight shuffled their hooves sheepishly, looking to the floor. It was Rainbow Dash who blurted, "We haven't figured out ANYTHING about those stupid seeds!"

"Ya'd think after travelin' halfway 'round the world," Applejack muttered, "we'd've found somethin'. But nothin'. All we did was make the hippogriffs even more convinced they shouldn't come back up topside never again."

"The vines are everywhere!" Rarity moaned. "Truly everywhere!"

"Ponies are trying their best to just…get around them," Fluttershy explained. "But I'm worried that some…really bad things might've happened where the vines got out of control."

"It's all my fault," Twilight sighed. "I've spent day after day researching the vines – when we weren't looking for hippogriffs to stop the Storm King, I mean. But nopony in all of Equestrian history seems to know how to get them to just stop. It would be easy to stop the blame there, but I've studied magic my whole life. I should've figured out some way to engineer the spells of the past to make something new and stop the vines. I finished an unfinished Starswirl the Bearded spell! But I can't figure out how to save the world I love, and I'm supposed to be one of its princesses! All I can do is just…retry what everypony else has already tried, and fail at it!"

"Do not blame yourself, Twilight," Luna told her. "There are those who say that a real leader knows that destiny is beyond her control, and accepts that. Perhaps this is a situation in which you simply could not prevail without the Elements of Harmony."

"Did you get them back?" Pinkie asked excitedly. "You got them back, didn't you? That's why you're here! YOU GOT THE ELEMENTS BACK!"

"We did indeed," Luna confirmed. "And we have brought something else as well. Or, rather, we have brought someone."

"You have to promise not to freak out," Cadance stated. "We've made a lot of new friends…but they're nothing like anypony you've seen in Equestria. Two of them came along with us."

"We do believe we must eventually reconcile their presence with Equestria in order to fulfill a dilemma they have presented," Luna went on. "We believe this world may be the key to finding other friends who have been lost."

"But we thought it might be best to start small," Cadance said sheepishly. "We'd introduce them to you first and see how it went from there."

"Whaddaya mean…nothin' like anypony we've seen here in Equestria?" Applejack asked with suspicion.

"Whoever and WHATever they are," Pinkie declared, "I bet they're awesooooome! You wouldn't bring home bad friends!"

"Let's see 'em!" Rainbow Dash urged.

Cadance and Luna exchanged a glance.

"Any friend of yours is a friend of ours," Twilight consoled. "It doesn't matter if they're different. Everypony has things that make them different."

Cadance nodded to Luna, and Luna returned the gesture. They then both angled their heads toward a side door in the wings of the audience chamber. "You may come out," Luna declared.

Riku and Sonia stepped into the room proper, the former holding a small decorative chest in his arms.

Twilight, Fluttershy, Pinkie, Rainbow Dash, Rarity, and Applejack simultaneously gasped.

"Uh…hi," Riku greeted, feeling as though he had a spotlight turned on him. He thought he'd been prepared for being one of the only two humans on a world filled with creatures in almost every variety but human, but he wasn't quite ready for the gawking, nor for the reminder that this also meant he was going to be so much taller than everypony.

Sonia gave a formal curtsy.

"What…ARE you?" Rainbow Dash blurted.

"RAINBOW DASH!" Applejack scolded. "That was just plumb rude!"

"Sorry," Fluttershy said in a tone almost too soft to make out. "We don't mean to stare. It's just…"

"No humans on this world," Riku clarified with a soft smile. "We get it."

He'd talked with Luna about going back to Yen Sid's tower and having his clothing modified so it would change his appearance to something more akin to the denizens of Equestria. They had seriously considered it, but then came upon the point that in the current climate, it might do well for Equestria to be exposed to the concept of other worlds, and what beings resided on them, because if they didn't start bringing the worlds together, their opponents surely would. But that brought back a question of keeping the world order. It was Sonia who finally broke in and stated that in her time as princess of the Novoselic Kingdom, she had seen far more benefit come from alliance and exchange than isolation. So human she stayed, as did Riku.

"My name is Pr – " Sonia halted. No longer was she royalty; she had fallen far. "My name is Sonia."

"And I'm Riku," Riku introduced.

"What kinda names are 'Sonia' and 'Riku'?" Rainbow Dash said roughly.

"RAINBOW! DASH!" Applejack scolded.

"Really, Rainbow Dash," Rarity sighed, "if you can't say anything polite…"

"Okay, okay, I'm sorry!" Rainbow Dash huffed.

"This is FASCINATING," Twilight said with a glimmer in her eye as she approached the pair of humans. "You must know so much we don't! Equestria has so much to learn from you! I want you to tell us everything!"

"I don't know if we have time to tell you everything," Riku admitted, "but we can talk about some things. We should probably learn your names first."

"I'm Twilight Sparkle," Twilight said with a nod.

"PINKIE PIE!" Pinkie bounced right in between Twilight and Riku, bounding up and down right in front of Riku's face at a proximity that caused him to cry out and stumble back a step. "I'm Pinkie Pie!"

"Pinkie, you are scaring our guest!" Rarity hissed, and that got Pinkie to deflate (somewhat literally; her curly mane and tail flattened out a bit) and step aside. "I am Rarity," the unicorn declared, "and I must say, Riku, you are quite the fashion-forward creature." She then realized what she hadn't said was more obvious than what she had. "Erm…which isn't to say…"

"I know I have not had a proper change of clothing in a while," Sonia admitted.

"Well, darling, we'll just have to fix that!" Rarity declared. "True, I've never designed clothing for anyone who looks like you do before…but I'm certain I can work out the proper dimensions with some time to evaluate measurements. I see I'll have to account for more height than usual…two legs instead of four…the skirt pattern would have to be more even to account for that. I assume you would prefer a skirt, seeing as you're wearing one now."

"That would be lovely!" Sonia asserted.

"Gettin' back to the meet-an'-greet," Applejack broke in, "name's Applejack. Pleased to meet ya."

"And I'm the one and only Rainbow Dash!" Rainbow Dash proclaimed. "Pretty much the coolest pony you're ever gonna meet."

"And, um…" Fluttershy's voice grew even softer. "I'm…Flutter…shy…" The last syllable was all but inaudible.

Riku looked back and forth between all six. Then he began to laugh softly.

"Somethin' about us funny to ya?" Applejack asked defensively.

"Well, I mean, we probably look nothing like anypony he's ever seen," Twilight brought up. "If there are no humans on our world, there wouldn't be ponies on theirs. I bet we probably look a little silly to them."

"Oh, no, that is not true!" Sonia interjected. "I know of ponies. But the ones I am used to do not talk. They also do not have such bright colors, or those marks. You seem more like characters drawn for an American cartoon, and that is wonderful! I have always wanted to visit such an idyllic world!"

"And I'm not laughing at you," Riku clarified. "It's just…seeing you all together. You're so different, but I know from what Luna and Cadance have said that you're all best friends. It just…reminds me of someone who's really special to me. He's always making friends wherever he goes, and they're all different. Friendship is the most important thing in the world to him, and he thinks of it almost like it's magic."

"Believe me," Twilight confirmed, "it's magic. We know."

"We've helped each other out of TONS of jams," Rainbow Dash affirmed.

"Not to mention supported each other when it mattered most," Rarity stated.

"Plus, we just have FUN together!" Pinkie squealed.

"But darling," Rarity said coyly, "I simply must know. When you say this person is 'special' to you, are you referring to a friend, or somepony SPECIAL?" This was delivered with a wink.

"That second one," Riku confirmed happily.

"My, my!" Rarity cooed. "How fortunate!"

"Uggghhh, not this mushy stuff," Rainbow Dash groaned.

"Not to rain on anypony's parade, but we ain't got time to dwell on that," Applejack broke in.

"That's right," Twilight realized. "I'm sorry, Sonia, but this world is far from idyllic. It's not the…'cartoon' you think it is, whatever that means. An infestation of evil plants is choking the life out of everything not in the sky or under the sea! And we have no idea how to beat it without the Elements of Harmony!"

"Oh!" Riku realized; he'd very nearly forgotten about the reason he was carrying the sizeable chest in his arms. "That's right! Here!"

He pried the chest open, and there, sitting on a light blue satin cushion, were each of the gems of the Elements.

The six former wielders of the gems gasped audibly. "You FOUND them!" Twilight cried.

"I KNEW it!" Pinkie proclaimed. "IknewitIknewitIknewit!"

"We have to get these to the Tree of Harmony right away!" Fluttershy gasped.

"Well, what are we waiting around HERE for?" Rainbow Dash groaned. "Let's GO already!"

She was off like a shot bullet.

"There is not a moment more to waste!" Sonia agreed. "Please, lead the way to this tree!"

"CHAAAARGE! AGAAAAAAIN!" Pinkie proclaimed, and she, Fluttershy, Rarity, Applejack, and Sonia were quick to follow.

Twilight, Riku, Cadance, and Luna lingered. Cadance and Twilight approached each other, grinning. They crouched, and began to stamp softly on the floor, voices at a whisper that only each other could hear: "Sunshine, sunshine…" They covered their eyes with their forelegs, then opened them in unison: "Ladybugs awake!"

From there, it didn't seem like the time or place to do the rest of the rhyme, and they both agreed on that nonverbally, straightening back up. "I missed you," Twilight told her sister-in-law.

"I missed you too," Cadance replied.

They both couldn't help but wonder what would happen after the Elements had been returned and Riku's friends rescued. Would they split up yet again? Or would they be together this time?

"We have a lot to talk about, don't we?" Twilight asked, making way for the castle entry.

"You first?" Cadance asked.

"No, you first," Twilight told her. "Now that I've seen two of your new friends, I wanna know about the rest of them."

"It's a pretty big team at this point. And they're all such colorful personalities, I hardly know who to start with."

"Anyone who's super intelligent, has studied magic, and appreciates the value of a good book?" Twilight teased.

As Cadance thought about it, she realized, "Actually, there is one who's like that…"

They headed out the door.

Riku made to follow, shutting the chest in his arms to protect the precious cargo within. As he crossed the audience chamber, he noticed that Luna wasn't following. He turned back to regard her; she was looking about, taking in the sight of the castle.

For the first time, Riku noted the castle's state of disrepair. He had been told it was a vacant building, but it seemed more than just untouched. It was wrecked. The stone had been seemingly ripped apart in some areas, as though some sort of natural disaster had hit the building – or an unnatural one.

"You okay?" Riku asked Luna.

That snapped her out of her reverie. "I am all right," she answered.

"Anything you wanna talk about?" Riku offered.

She approached him, head held high. "No need," she stated. "You of course have places that remind you of the depths of your Darkness."

"Yeah."

"This is one of mine," Luna told him.

He sensed she did not want to elaborate, but out of no sense of defensiveness. He had been told how she had accepted the Tantabus into herself during Maleficent's living nightmare, and he supposed she was at peace now, giving this place a final farewell glance before putting the past firmly in the past. And now that Riku had a vague idea of the significance, he felt apprehension at asking any further questions. After all, the wounds in the walls were the sort that could have been inflicted by Luna's own great power.

"Come on!" Twilight called back at Riku and Luna, sticking her head through the door. "We can't do this without the Elements!"

"Right!" Riku answered, taking off at as best of a run as he could manage with the box in arm. Luna followed.

Stories were briefly traded during the hike through the Everfree Forest. Riku and Sonia could see what the ponies meant now, having to watch where they tread to avoid getting tangled up in the black vines that writhed slowly like snakes coming out of hibernation. Riku, Luna, and Cadance tried to give a brief version of events since Mozenrath had taken the Elements, which wasn't easy. Twilight, Pinkie, Fluttershy, Applejack, Rainbow Dash, and Rarity contributed more details about this Storm King debacle. Sonia had to admit that her part in this story was quite small, and she had only just entered the stage.

The Tree of Harmony was located in a cavern at the very heart of the forest, so deep within that Riku and Sonia weren't sure how someone could even find their way to and from this place without becoming hopelessly lost. The stunning pearly glow of the Tree itself surprised them both, though Sonia was far less used to sights like this.

"It really is like something out of a cartoon!" she proclaimed.

"Are you ever gonna tell us what that word means?" Rainbow Dash asked.

"Hmm." Sonia thought it over. "Do you have television?"

"What's a television?" Applejack replied.

The thought of this was appalling to Sonia; how did anyone entertain themselves without a steady supply of J-dramas? She changed tactics: "What about theater?"

"Plenty of that," Rarity confirmed.

They had theater, and Twilight had confirmed that books were commonly owned items here. "Think of an illustration in a book," Sonia described, "but it moves and has sound, like a play. It tells stories. In a lot of countries on my world, an animated drawing is called a 'cartoon,' and it is generally very lighthearted and entertaining. But in Japan, where I attended school, it looks different, and we call it 'anime.' That can get more serious in tone." To think that none of these ponies had any idea what anime was!

"This is EXACTLY the kind of thing I'd LOVE to study," Twilight gushed. "Cartoons and anime must be thought of as really high forms of literature!"

"Not…exactly," Sonia replied.

"We got a job to focus on here," Applejack reminded the crew. "Riku, you got the box. Wanna do the honors?"

"All right." Riku nodded, stepping toward the tree. He could see that five of its branches had growths almost resembling faceted stones, and he supposed five of the gems belonged there somehow. The sixth, he wasn't sure on. Prying the lid of the chest open, Riku expected to need to replace the gems by hand.

Nature took over. The six crystals rose up out of the box of their own accord, floating toward the tree. Five of them arranged themselves to the corresponding growths Riku had noted, assimilating into the branches. The sixth, the light pink crystal in color, absorbed into the tree's very trunk.

A radiant wave of white light emanated from the tree the moment all six gems were in place. It was as if an enormous weight had been lifted, and all present could feel it rising off their shoulders.

All over the world, the black, slithering vines dissolved into a luminous glow that crumbled into mere sparkles, soaking into the ground and powering the world's heart with Light itself. The foliage of the forests was no longer choked; the inhabitants from the Crystal Empire to Klugetown and beyond were no longer terrorized by the thorny plants sneaking into their homes and threatening to strangle those who stood still too long.

"WE DID IIIIIIT!" Pinkie Pie cried, bounding up and down. "We saved the world!"

"YOU saved the world," Twilight told Riku.

"Hey, this was a team effort from the start," Riku replied.

"I'm glad that's over," Cadance sighed. "Now we don't have to worry about THAT anymore."

"And we can progress to finding Riku's missing friends," Luna stated.

"But we just saved the world!" Pinkie protested. "Doesn't that call for a party? One with streamers, balloons, and a delicious cake?"

"Don't reckon we got time for – " Applejack began.

Pinkie was mixing a bowl of cake batter with her front hooves. Three balloons were tied to her tail, and a handful of streamers had already been fastened to the cavern wall.

"…When'd you do that?" Applejack asked in confusion.

"At this point, I just don't question it anymore," Twilight stated.

"But first, we MUST find some new garments for Sonia," Rarity argued. "Now that I can see just how tattered that skirt is…we have a LOT of work to do. Would you prefer something in yellow to match your traveling companion? Or would you rather stick with your current palette?"

"I usually wear whatever my staff demands," Sonia admitted. Or, she added to herself, what Junko Enoshima thinks I would look most imposing in. But never again. "But now, it is time for me to make my own choices, is it not? And I say I would like something blue! With my gratitude for your offer, of course."

"We still have to figure out how we're going to tell everyone else in Ponyville about the existence of humans," Fluttershy pointed out timidly.

"A matter I have given thought," Luna replied. "If you will allow me to take the lead, I can handle the introduction."

"We have to figure out how to start looking for Lianna and Mal," Cadance stated.

Before the conversation could progress, a masculine voice, the sort that was usually lilting but currently carried a heavy dose of frustration, echoed throughout the cavern: "That's IT? You're simply going to CLOSE this chapter and move on to the next adventure? Didn't anything about this whole incident seem OFF to you? This is supposed to be the part where one of you says, 'But one thing still bothers me! How did the WHAM ARMY even know where to look for the Elements of Harmony?'. And yet NOTHING from ANY of you? And just when I thought things couldn't get any LESS SATISFYING."

"WHAT?" Riku cried, suddenly on the alert.

"WHO'S THERE?" Sonia cried out.

They expected their companions to be similarly flabbergasted and frightened, but instead, all eight ponies simply looked strangely annoyed. "I don't know what you're talking about, Discord," Twilight sighed, "but just show yourself and let's get this over with."

The draconequus materialized before them in a pop of glitter, standing tall. His asymmetrical arms were folded to offset the disgruntled expression upon his face.

Riku, upon instinct, drew his Keyblade, aiming it at Discord. Sonia cast her gaze about before noting a nearby heavy rock; she hoisted it up into her arms, prepared to bludgeon if necessary. It wouldn't be the messiest way she'd ever killed anyone.

"NO!" Fluttershy shrieked, turning around to stand before Discord and looking back to the pair of armed humans with a frightened gaze. "Please, don't! He's our friend!"

Upon seeing the Keyblade, Discord took on a lighter expression. "Oh? And what is this?" He slithered through the air around Fluttershy, winding up hovering over Riku's shoulder. "So they've sent a Keybearer to Equestria. This would be quite the plot twist if it weren't so predictable. You Keybearers end up everywhere nowadays." He ran a claw over the metal of Riku's weapon.

"HEY!" Riku yelled at him. "Don't touch that!"

"Ooh, and such a dark and edgy design for a dark and edgy warrior!" Discord remarked. Before Riku could respond that he wasn't any such thing at all, Discord continued, "Aesthetically, it is gorgeous, but wouldn't it be more fun if…"

He tapped the Keyblade, and all of a sudden, it no longer appeared to have its bat-wing design, but now resembled an oversized car key with a thick, double-edged blade.

"What – " Riku stumbled. "What did you just do to my Keyblade?"

"I improved it!" Discord said with a big, bright smile. That faded, and he sighed, "Oh, I'm just kidding. I made it worse." The smile returned in the form of a smirk. "It beeps like a car alarm when you summon it now. That's an extra little bonus I threw in that you wouldn't have gotten if you'd ended up with this the traditional way."

"Change it back!" Riku demanded.

"Hmm…" Discord pretended to consider it. "No."

"What do you want, Discord?" Twilight snapped.

"I'm sorry, did I not make myself clear?" Discord replied, turning to face her. "I'm waiting for one of you to ask how, exactly, the WHAM ARMY knew to remove the Elements of Harmony. Go on. ONE of you must be curious."

"Mozenrath was smart," Cadance replied. "He knew where to find exactly what he wanted on every world."

"It's no big mystery!" Pinkie laughed. "But now that Riku put the Elements back, we can all go back to Ponyville for the party! There'll be caaaaake!"

"NO!" Discord growled, his red eyes now glowing like embers. "I don't WANT any cake! I don't WANT to be invited to your parties! Haven't ANY of you put it together yet?"

"Is something wrong?" Fluttershy asked Discord. "You seem really upset. Maybe we should talk it out – "

"He sabotaged your Elements," Sonia said loudly and plainly.

She was immediately showered in confetti; a quartet of trumpets appeared from nowhere, two on either side of her, to play a fanfare. "And our winner is Sonia Nevermind!" Discord declared. "Though, really, I expected YOU to have me figured out within a moment's notice, MISS Sonia. Never mind that you sat six class trials picking out killers who worked so hard to cover their tracks. You've studied killers your whole life. I may not be as murder-oriented as your usual favorite sort of villain, but my psychology would be an open book to you. Sparkling Justice vibes, anyone?" He then looked to the others. "First me, and now her. You REALLY have to start getting better at judging character."

Sonia trembled, the rock in her hands nearly slipping to damage her feet below.

"WHAT are you TALKING about?" Twilight cried. "YOU told the WHAM ARMY about the Elements of Harmony?"

"And what're ya implyin' about Sonia?" Applejack asked. "You sayin' she's some sorta villain?"

"We'll save that reveal for another day," Discord stated. "The longer you hang around her, her true colors will eventually have to come out in the wash."

Sonia tossed the rock aside to avoid actually losing grip on it. Discord was laying out her past on the table, inviting the others to pry the lid up off it, making her wonder if she could end up on the same slippery slope as before.

"But less talk about her and more talk about ME," Discord went on. "Yes. It was me! I was the dastardly villain who organized the entire theft of the Elements!" In a snap, he was donning a long black coat, a tall black top hat, and an obviously fake black mustache that he twirled in his paw. "Now, I know what you're thinking. That just doesn't make sense! After all, Discord was the one who sent Aladdin to STOP that spell from being cast!"

"That was YOU?" Riku cried.

"I don't know how we didn't put that together," Cadance said, flushing. "But if that is true, then you're a hero – "

"UGGGHHH, NO!" Discord groaned. "WRONG! That's EXACTLY the sort of thinking that got us INTO this entire mess!"

"Back to the point, Discord," Twilight said through gritted teeth. "You gave Mozenrath ammunition to destroy the worlds, and then you stopped him. And that DOESN'T make sense."

"Well, for one," Discord reminded her, "I never thought he'd actually get as far as he did." He gave a dramatic shrug. "It's MOZENRATH. If Aladdin were here right now, he'd agree with me. But on the other hand, you should know my mode of operation by now, Twilight. All of you should remember it. It's what I always say: what fun is there in making sense?" The villainous getup was now replaced with a clown suit and a rainbow wig to emphasize just how humorous he thought his randomness was.

"Are you saying…you set Mozenrath up to unleash the Plunderseeds?" Pinkie realized, eyes watering. "But…that's not fun one little bit!"

"Ponies coulda gotten HURT!" Applejack insisted.

"Pretty sure ponies DID get hurt," Rainbow Dash added.

"And this is my problem how?" Discord asked, deadpan, the clown getup vanishing.

"If you aren't careful," Riku warned, "YOU'RE going to be the one getting hurt." The new Keyblade might have been unwieldy, but still Riku drew it back, poised to strike now that the true villain had been revealed.

"And what are you going to do to me?" Discord challenged. "Dismember me? KILL me? Of course not. I know how you work. I know all about your little promise to never kill anything that isn't a Heartless or a Grimm. I know Little Red Riding Hood still regrets scarring Cinder Fall at the Forbidden World. Please. There's nothing you could do to me that I couldn't overcome EASILY."

An enormous force threw Riku against the wall of the cavern to prove Discord's point.

"PLEASE STOP!" Sonia yelled.

"Now, you." Discord looked Sonia directly in the eye. "YOU might actually have the guts to do me in! It's too bad you're just a nonmagical human. If you had Riku's power, I might actually be worried!" This was followed up with a deep, hearty laugh.

"No one's going to do you in!" Cadance protested. "We just want to know WHY you're doing any of this!"

"Discord…I don't understand," Fluttershy said as she approached him, her eyes now misty. "We're friends!"

For the first time, Discord's expression softened, betraying something other than hard confidence. "We are, aren't we?" he said softly. Then, a little louder, "That's the only thing that makes this so difficult. For you see, now I'm attached to you, and that isn't easily undone. That's why from now on, you, Twilight, Pinkie, Rainbow Dash, Rarity, and Applejack are all going to be physically safe from me and only me."

"PHYSICALLY safe?" Rarity repeated.

"An important adjective to remember for the future," Discord emphasized. "And that courtesy only extends to the six names I mentioned and no other present company."

Angered, Riku charged Discord, knowing he had no justification to strike but still driven to make some sort of move, even if only to subdue him, try to bring him into custody. He leapt, a Dark aura propelling him toward the draconequus. He passed right through Discord as though the latter wasn't even there, crashing to the ground before the Tree of Harmony. Discord flickered like a hologram before fading entirely. He then uncurled from the ceiling as though manifesting anew, giving a dramatic stretch as he perched there, upside-down. "Oh, I'm up now, am I?" he said cheekily. "Where were we…oh, yes. That's really what started this whole mess. Friendship."

"Don't tell me ya've changed yer tune and are about ta lecture us on how friendship is overrated," Applejack grunted.

"How cliché," Discord replied. "It's the opposite, really. Do you know what's been keeping me in line ever since Celestia ordered me freed from petrification? Which, I might add, could be considered a fate worse than death to anyone less able to entertain himself with only his imagination. Shame on all of you, really. But to get back to the point: it's friendship."

He slipped off the cavern roof to land back on the ground, fixing his gaze upon most of the crowd. Behind him, Riku rose, unsure what move to make. "Fluttershy, you gave me a chance at knowing what true friendship was like," Discord admitted. "For once, somepony actually cared about me, and I actually cared about somepony. And I LIKED it. So I reined myself in. But it felt as though…well, I simply wasn't ME anymore. In order to become friends with anypony, I had to become somepony completely new. Somepony who wasn't DISCORD as we all know the concept. No more tricks, no more schemes for power, and DEFINITELY no more worldwide makeovers. Do you have any idea what it's like to feel like you aren't even living in your own skin because you've changed so much? You're lucky I didn't simply start fading away. That's what happens to draconequui when they become stifled out of their own selves, you know. Luckily, I was still able to cast chaos and maintain a stable enough level of mischief that I didn't LITERALLY lose myself. And I thought it was worth it. Everypony finally liked me! Even when I did terrible, horrible things that no truly GOOD friend should ever do. It fascinates me just how much I was able to get away with so long as I offered up a decent apology afterward. But I was in it for friendship as much as any of the rest of you.

"And then Tirek came along. Finally, it seemed I could have the best of both worlds. He offered me a chance to pursue my old ambitions again, but simultaneously be my FRIEND. At least, that's what I thought he wanted, even if he didn't use those exact words. And if I'm being perfectly honest, I was rather hoping he ACTUALLY wanted to be my – well, no, let's not get into that. If this turns into too much of a Discord pity party, you'll just get tunnel vision for the tragedy and stop taking me seriously. As has happened to many a good villain. My partnership with Tirek was one of the most fulfilling times of my entire life! But then, of course, he was just using me to make himself stronger, and he turned on me and ate all of my magic. That's when I gave up. The things I considered 'fun' and friendship were mutually exclusive qualities. No one like Tirek could ever want to truly be my friend without some sort of ulterior motive. No, if I wanted friends, I had to turn over a new leaf and hang up my evil schemes for good. Pun intended."

"You were the one who gave us the keys to STOP Tirek!" Twilight reminded him.

"A necessary failsafe," Discord answered. "Which it seems is a recurring pattern I have to adhere to in order to keep from being utterly destroyed. Anyway, at the point you needed to use the keys, you wanted Tirek gone as much as I did. The enemy of my enemy is my friend, after all. But that's not REALLY how it works, is it? Ask Riku. Xehanort and Maleficent can't stand each other, so which one of them is more accurately Riku's friend?"

"SHUT UP!" Riku yelled.

"Though, like I said, I am still ATTACHED," Discord sighed. "For all your aggravating qualities, you are strangely endearing. Ergo the sparing. But your idea of fun and my idea of fun are two COMPLETELY different things. YOUR idea of fun is what I like to call 'boring.' MY idea of fun is what you like to call 'villainy.'

"And so I went back and forth, toying with how I could relive any of the reckless abandon I'd had in the old days while still having companions to talk to and take tea with. All the while, I kept an eye out for any interesting news in the greater cosmos. When suddenly, the strangest thing happened! See, everypony who had any knowledge that there are, indeed, other worlds beyond this one had seen Maleficent put her team together from day one, but nopony had ever seemed to make the connection as to what that meant. Then Mozenrath decided to throw his gauntlet into the ring with a group of legitimate friends, and be so obnoxious about it, no one could miss the point this time! He gathered people who came from incredibly different backgrounds, yet shared a common lust for power and what I call TRUE entertainment! And that's when it hit me: villains could, in fact, MAKE FRIENDS! I don't have to turn into something I'm not just to be liked and have company! I could've been myself all along!

"So I gave them a little test run. I may have been a little misleading about my motivations to them. What are a few lies between potential friends, after all? And from the moment they left this world with the Elements in their clutches, they've only proven more and more that they're where I SHOULD be. It's the funniest thing! Mozenrath started out as an introvert who locked himself away studying magic and reading books, and he thought he couldn't possibly have any need for friendship, but then, after the craziest people dropped into his life, he couldn't imagine going on without them! Now, doesn't that just sound like somepony ELSE we all know and love?" Discord winked at Twilight. "You and he have a lot more in common than you'd like to think."

"Great," Twilight groaned. "So now I have to deal with YOU acting like Mozenrath and I are a couple."

"A couple?" Discord repeated, recoiling. "Gag! I was merely trying to make you uncomfortable by pointing out your similarities to a villain everyone hates and implying that perhaps you could fall to the same Darkness he did! Believe me, I've had enough ROMANCE for one centuries-spanning lifetime. Eurgh."

Riku, remembering something Discord had said earlier, put two and two together. "Wait. You were in love with – "

A large piece of duct tape slapped itself over Riku's mouth before that sentence could be finished.

"Are you saying you're giving up on us so you can join a bunch of horrible villains who are trying to hurt everypony?" Fluttershy squeaked in disbelief. "All because you were…bored?"

"Well, I wouldn't say – " Discord stopped to think it over. "No, that's pretty much it, actually."

"But we could've done so many things together that really were fun, and didn't involve you having to do any harm to anypony!" Fluttershy protested.

"Oh, please," Discord scoffed. "What could YOU have suggested for fun that I wouldn't have absolutely needed to spice up with a trick or two that would make you all incredibly peeved?"

"We could've gone to the Grand Galloping Gala!" Fluttershy suggested.

"You would have wanted to hang out with other friends," Discord scoffed, "and if you couldn't pay attention to me all night, I would've condemned whoever stole your attention to the sock puppet dimension."

"We could've invited you over to Sweet Apple Acres for a party, just the seven of us!" Fluttershy protested.

"Seven?" Discord repeated. "It would be FAR more entertaining if I intentionally made a scheduling conflict so one of you couldn't come, then became the life of the party, spawned SEVERAL in-jokes that only made sense to the six of us in attendance, and then used that to make the seventh frustrated. Next."

"Board games?" Fluttershy suggested meekly.

"Board games?" Discord replied harshly. "BOARD GAMES? The only one that REMOTELY interests me is Ogres and Oubliettes, and if you're not going to let me stack my character with every stat from the get-go and transform the board into a real-life landscape filled with actual life-threatening peril, then what's the point?"

"You could help us save the world again!" Fluttershy said desperately. "Queen Chrysalis is still out there, and if she strikes, you could help us!"

Discord stared at her in disbelief before groaning, "You haven't been listening to a WORD I've been saying, have you? You could go so far as to invite me to step in and help you run, oh, I don't know, some kind of 'friendship school' where you teach little foals about kindness and manners, which, honestly, seems like something you'd do at this point – "

"That's a little heavy-hooved, even for us," Twilight rebutted.

" – and all I'd REALLY want to do is cause as much mayhem as physically possible in the halls," Discord concluded. "I don't care even if you would forgive me for everything I do that should be unforgivable. I want to go somewhere my work is APPRECIATED! I want to go somewhere I can be regarded as an ARTISTE!"

Riku had by that time ripped the duct tape off his mouth. "And you think the WHAM ARMY is just gonna let you in," he challenged.

"There's no reason why they shouldn't," Discord said with a shrug, back still turned on Riku. "And if they don't? Hm, how shall I put this…" He directed a sly smile toward Fluttershy. "They're…going…to LOVE ME."

"You certainly are acting in line with how Mozenrath thinks," Luna snapped.

"You are TERRIBLE!" Sonia accused.

"Finally, somepony who gets it," Discord droned. "But for all intents and purposes, you've won. You saved the world. The Elements of Harmony are back where they belong, and I'm not about to try and sabotage the Tree AGAIN. That plan's just gotten boring. I just wanted full disclosure before we parted ways. For one, the looks on your faces are just PRICELESS!"

"You're SICK!" Rainbow Dash countered.

Discord sighed. "And for another, I guess I owed an explanation to you in some form, given our history. But as of now, it's over and done. Reformed Discord can't come to the telephone right now! Why? Because he's dead! And now that you and I have all come to an understanding, it's time I bid you, for the FINAL time, ARRIIIIIIIIIIVEDERCI!"

His body popped like a balloon, though the sound of the explosion was magnified several times, startling everyone present.

After Discord had left, a silence settled in. It was broken when the sound of Fluttershy sniffling and weeping pierced the atmosphere.

...

The Asgardian castle was every bit as glamorous as promised. It towered over the rest of the already ornate city, a collection of spires rising higher and higher until they reached the pinnacle at the fortress' heart.

Harley Quinn looked every bit the tourist, gazing up at the castle in gobsmacked wonder. "I can't even believe it!" she gushed. "It don't even look real! Not even Maleficent's place was anythin' like this!"

"Well, as we have established, Maleficent sucks," Roman asserted.

His team – Harley, Garfield, Peter, Aghoul, Xayide, Vexen, Neo, Snatcher, and Roman himself – was assembled just outside the castle grounds. The plan was to get inside en masse, blend in to the crowd of courtiers, and find the Tesseract through an effort of stealth. If all went well, they could avoid battling the superhuman Asgardians altogether. If all did not go well, that was why Aghoul, Xayide, and Vexen were there.

"We've got to see to the matter of infiltration," Snatcher announced. "At the moment, we all stand out here rather like – "

"A rotted, black gangrenous thumb," Aghoul volunteered.

"A far more colorful image than I had in mind," Snatcher commented, "yet effective."

"So how're we gonna blend in?" Harley asked. "We gotta go shoppin' for disguises? ShopLIFTIN'?"

Neo clapped her hands suddenly, bringing all eyes to her. Once she had everyone's attention, her illusion took effect, starting at the top and rippling down. A lacy vanilla-cream-colored bodice faded into pink over the length of the wide sleeves of the gown being created. A full, chocolate-colored skirt ruffled out beneath, cascading all the way to the ground; an overlay panel the same strawberry pink as the sleeves rested atop it. Neo pinned her hair up physically using a few barrettes retrieved from an unseen pocket, and once it was in place, a gold band with a pink gem inset, not unlike a tiara, shimmered into place atop her head.

Harley was beside herself with awe. "THAT'S AMAZIN'!" she cried. "NEO, YOU LOOK SO GORGEOUS!"

Neo smiled, faking sheepishness. In truth, she knew she was gorgeous, and there was no need for anyone to remind her, but the lack of need did not translate to an adversity to wanting the praise.

"Yeah, well, we can't all change our outfits at will," Roman reminded the group.

"However," Xayide broke in, "there are those of us who can change the clothing of all present at will…provided you say 'please.'"

"Miss Xayide," Snatcher replied with a bow in her direction, "would you PLEASE kindly outfit us all for the occasion?"

"Most certainly," Xayide said with a nod.

Her own deep purple gown did not need adjustment to blend in, though she figured it didn't hurt to place a silver band in her hair. She transformed Vexen's clothing into a long white robe trimmed with the softest of blues. Roman was given a white tunic over simple black pants, a black cape edged in red trailing from his shoulders and sweeping the ground as his bowler hat disappeared entirely. Snatcher wore a similar ensemble, though his tunic was red and his trousers deep gray to reflect his usual attire; his cape was a crimson a shade deeper than the tunic's fabric and trimmed in pristine white fur. He, too, lacked a hat. Aghoul was given black robes with lavender panels. Garfield found himself clad in a black tunic and leggings that matched exactly, a brilliant yellow cape edged in black fur setting off the darkness in conjunction with the lightest of golden armor on his arms and legs. Peter was completely denied his usual shade of brown, given a tunic and leggings of green, a cape of deep gray, and light silver armor accents – Xayide had admittedly chosen this palette out of spite toward the Ragdoll palette, which, to her mind, was hideous, and Peter was completely on to her game. Finally, Harley was given a jet-black gown with red overlays and a red shell draped about her shoulders, her blonde hair done up with a circlet of black iron featuring a ruby-red gem.

"I look like a PRINCESS!" Harley cried, spinning round and round to make her skirt balloon. "A REAL PRINCESS!"

"I wouldn't think 'princess,'" Xayide corrected. "You are garbed as a queen, as are Neo and I."

"I do hope you don't mean that literally," Vexen sighed. "If we are overdressed beyond what Odin himself would wear, then we've gone too far toward the other extreme, and will certainly be noticed!"

"There is nothing to fear," Xayide told him. "It was a mere figure of speech. This clothing will keep suspicion away from us."

"You could say we're – " Aghoul began.

"DON'T SAY IT," Roman and Snatcher growled at him in unison.

That only prompted Aghoul to smirk all the more broadly as he concluded: " – dressed to kill."

Snatcher blinked in surprise. "Rather thought you were going for 'drop-dead gorgeous.'"

"That too!" Aghoul confirmed.

"Hey, yeah, this ain't gonna work," Garfield complained as he picked at his new garments. "My whole gimmick depends on me blasting stuff outta my battle gear. You want Firefly on the team, you're gonna have to let me wear it."

"YOUR armor will draw the most suspicion of all!" Vexen snapped.

"He does, however, have a point," Roman asserted, with Neo nodding to back him up.

"Hmm," Xayide muttered. "Perhaps…"

She waved a hand; Garfield was now clad in his Firefly armor, fuel tank and all.

"Neo," Xayide requested, "if you would…"

Neo realized what Xayide was asking and nodded furiously. She skipped over to Garfield and playfully tapped him on the shoulder; his battle suit rippled out of sight as an illusion of Garfield wearing the ensemble Xayide had conjured earlier took its place.

"Now you may use your heat," Xayide reassured him, "and none will be the wiser."

"One catch," Roman broke in. "You kinda gotta stay close to Neo now. She has to be next to the illusion for it not to break. I think it's about a fifteen-foot radius? Twenty? Point is, if you two get separated, everyone's gonna see the giant gas tank on your back."

"Or he could simply stay out of sight," Snatcher suggested.

"Also viable," Roman admitted. "By the way, Boat Lights, if you had his suit the whole time, that means you have my hat, too, right?"

"Rest assured," Xayide said as she flicked her hand, Roman's hat appearing in it momentarily before she bent it out of existence again.

"If I may also lodge a complaint?" Peter broke in, undoing his cape and letting it drop to the ground behind him. "The armor is most regal, and certainly convincing, but it isn't exactly conducive to contorting, now, is it?" To prove his point, he turned his back to the others, wrenching both arms down over his shoulders and attempting to intertwine them only for the silver plates of metal to clank against each other.

Xayide dismissed the armor accents, leaving Peter only cloth to work with. His arms, clad as they were in bright green, looked all but the spitting image of the tendrils of creeper vines, wrapping around each other in such a way that Snatcher had a hard time believing the man's elbows were still in their sockets.

"MUCH better," Peter said with a dramatically contented sigh.

"Erm…Miss Xayide," Snatcher ventured. "While we are making wardrobe adjustments, I also had rather a…suggestion."

"Yes?" Xayide replied.

"Well, it's clear you were going for quite a stalwart man's look," Snatcher began. "Quite formal. Quite regal. Makes a statement, it does. For an incognito mission, however, I was rather hoping for something a little more…GLAMOROUS. Only a suggestion, of course. Not a demand. Not an order. But between friends, of course, it should hardly be a bother, wouldn't you think?"

Xayide knew what he wanted. "Say no more."

In a shimmer, his tunic, pants, and fur-trimmed cape were gone. Now he wore a gown of striking vermilion, its multilayered skirt billowing diaphanously, black lace at every edge. His hair was bound beneath a wig of the same fiery red with a single lock of raven black worked in, set up in an impressive mountain of curls.

Harley gasped deeply. "Mr. Snatcher!" she cried. "You look – well, you look just gorgeous!"

Unlike Neo, Snatcher did in fact need this reminder, though he played it off casually. "Please, please, my dear Mademoiselle Quinn," he said, slipping naturally into the voice that accompanied this particular presentation. "Whilst I am under this guise, do refer to me as Madame Frou Frou."

"Sure thing, Madame Frou Frou!" Harley said with a thumbs-up.

"Should any others of you wish to switch from trousers or robes to gowns, or vice versa," Xayide offered, "this is the last chance to ask."

No one spoke up. Garfield took that opportunity to say, "I think we're good…"

"Are we certain, every last one of us?" Snatcher teased. "I do maintain as ever, Monsieur Vexen, you would make a truly stunning woman…"

"I will have to decline," Vexen snapped.

"Oh, do you not believe me?" Snatcher went on, eyes sparkling mischievously. "It is more than obvious. That slender waist, those stunning cheekbones…" His hands pantomimed forming an hourglass shape in midair.

"I am sure you are objectively correct," Vexen huffed, "but I REFUSE to partake."

"Come on," Roman cajoled, "it's a serious good time. And you would make a sexy woman."

"This fixation is never going to cease, is it?" Vexen grumbled.

"All right," Harley suggested, "let's not bug 'im no more."

All eyes turned to her as though she'd just announced that the disco they'd all been dancing at would be closing three hours early.

"Even if he would look real pretty," Harley admitted. "But if he don't wanna wear the dress, then he don't wanna wear the dress. Ain't no way you can change his mind."

"THANK you," Vexen told her.

"That almost sounded like a challenge!" Roman realized. "Didn't that sound like a challenge to you, angel cakes?"

No one knew to whom Roman was referring.

Looking Snatcher in the eye, he sighed, "I CAN'T go around calling you 'Archie' in public when you're trying not to be Archie! So you get to be angel cakes. Which is not just me throwing words around, by the way."

Snatcher played this off coyly, reaching out a hand to stroke down the side of Roman's face; "Such a flatterer, Monseiur Torchwick…you must've broken so many hearts with your way with words."

"Okay, I know you're just playing with me and probably think 'angel cakes' is the least dignified thing I could call you," Roman replied, "but I'm gonna take the compliment anyway. Roman Torchwick: resident heartbreaker!" He reached up to grasp the hand Snatcher had at the side of his face within his own hand. "Second, of course, to the mistress of malicious seduction herself…" He planted a gentle kiss to the back of Snatcher's hand. "My lady. Actually, how's that one do ya? 'My lady' or 'angel cakes'? Got a preference?"

"Oh, Monseiur Torchwick," Snatcher teased, "I truly don't care what you call me…so long as you call me often."

"Oh. Oh, that was smooth as FUCK."

They'd been inching closer and closer all the while, and now it was not Snatcher's hand but his lips that Roman's own lips met, his tongue running briefly over and through crooked teeth whose unique pattern he'd come to memorize. When they parted, Roman whispered right into Snatcher's ear, but loudly enough so everyone else could hear, "I'm going with 'angel cakes,' then."

"Ain't you two just the sweetest?" Harley cooed. "You're just perfect! I bet you're the kinda couple that wears matchin' outfits and everythin'!"

Both Snatcher and Roman turned to face her at once. Snatcher informed her with a grin, "Mademoiselle Quinn, that is truly a touching thought, but we are not so frivolously sentimental."

At the same time, however, Roman had begun to say, "You know, that actually sounds like something we should – "

When he realized where Snatcher was taking the reply, he clammed up. Now all eyes were on him; he was transparent. " – NOT do," he attempted. "Because we're not a pair of saps."

Snatcher knew better. Roman knew Snatcher knew better, and Snatcher knew Roman knew, and so on. Already, Snatcher's mind was whirring, brewing up the proper response to this situation: one that couldn't be properly executed at the moment but would have to wait until the mission had ended.

"So, uh," Roman scrambled to change the topic, "did we all just forget about giving Iceman a dragsona, or – "

"WILL YOU CEASE?" Vexen snapped. "IT IS NEVER GOING TO HAPPEN!"

"C'mon, Roman," Harley urged, "stop buggin' 'im already."

"You know what's dangerous?" Roman said coyly, giving Vexen a smirk. "Saying the word 'never' around a betting man. Fifty lien says you end up wearing the dress before the year's out."

"And what makes you think I am going to accept your bet?" Vexen countered.

"Because if you don't, you're going to look like a coward who suspects he'll lose," Roman challenged.

"Or, perhaps," Vexen suggested, "I will look like a man thoroughly disinterested in gambling, in keeping with the fact that I am, as you might put it, a 'killjoy.'"

"I – " Roman gaped. "Okay. That's fair."

"I'LL take the bet!" Harley cried.

Roman whirled on her. "Well, didn't expect THAT. You want in on this, jester?"

"Yeah, I do!" Harley insisted. "And I say you're gonna go a whole year without gettin' 'im to wear the dress!"

"He gets a dragsona come hell or high water by the end of the year," Roman countered, pointing at Harley enthusiastically, "or you're forkin' over fifty lien!"

"DONE!"

"YOU DO NOT GET TO PLACE BETS ON MY LIFE!" Vexen insisted.

Aghoul reached up to sympathetically pat his upper arm. "There, there. You can't escape the inevitable end, after all. And this time, the inevitable end is having Roman Torchwick take out a bet on your life."

"Do not touch me," Vexen hissed as he recoiled.

"YOU need to stop being such a stiff," Aghoul countered as he placed his hands on his hips and glared up at Vexen.

That pun drew a collective groan from the crowd.

"We have wasted enough time," Vexen declared, his tone now more even. "We must begin our assault."

"Do lead the way, Monsieur Torchwick," Snatcher cooed, running a hand seductively over Roman's forearm from behind. "Wherever you go, I shall be certain to follow."

Roman turned to flash him a smile; "Now, how can I back down after a vote of confidence like that?" He then faced forward, beginning his path toward the castle. "All right, company, move out!"

As they approached the castle, those who had the most stake in this mission had a distinct sense of "So far, so good."

So far, so good, Roman thought; Jester seems to trust me, and Gar and Mister Twister haven't spat on my name and stomped on my hat yet. Let's just see if this keeps up.

So far, so good, Garfield thought; Roman and Harley sure seem to be getting along despite everything that happened. If the Phosphorus incident hadn't made that much more of a pessimist out of me, I might actually think we solved our problem.

So far, so good, Peter thought; those who place bets on easily-irked comrades are certain to be fast friends. I have every confidence we're going to come out of this woven tightly together.

So far, so good, Harley thought; Roman actually seems like a nice guy, and this way, my friends don't need to pick between him and me. So why do I have this terrible feeling like something's gonna go wrong?

Once inside the building, Vexen calmly reminded the group, "Remember, stealth is of the essence. We must make every attempt to blend in, stay unseen, and not draw attention."

"Duly noted," Roman said with a nod.

Within fifteen minutes, Vexen's rage could barely be contained as Snatcher demanded the Asgardians who populated the hallways "STEP ASIDE! STEP ASIDE! VERY IMPORTANT PEOPLE ARE COMING THROUGH!" and Roman punctuated this with "Move it or lose it! We're walking here!".

...

Additional A/N: The joke about Riku's KHIII Keyblade beeping like a car alarm comes from destiny-islanders/DaPandaBanda, who makes really cute and funny KH comics. It was just SUCH a Discord move that I had to write it in – I actually forgot for a minute where I got that idea, but I must give credit where it's due!