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.

110. Let's Get DanganRonpa!

A/N: The Disney Duckverse will come into play here, but it will be strictly the 80s/90s material…with admittedly one notable exception, but I'm getting ahead of myself. Also, the DanganRonpa cutoff has been increased to include DanganRonpa V3 as of this chapter! Its introduction also includes a fair bit of canon-typical DanganRonpa violence, so stay safe!

...

It was easy to see why Sora had been so excited about Starshine Beach Galaxy. It was a decently sized pool of salt water, ringed with soft white sand that also comprised islets in between. The waters were shallow in some places and deeper in others. Two simple towers, one round and one square, were constructed in the deeper end of the water. The natives of this world, the rotund Piantas, milled about with their day-to-day routine, which, this particular day, largely consisted of relaxing.

"See?" Sora said excitedly. "It's just like home!"

"It really is," Riku replied, a warm smile overtaking him. "Well…maybe a little different."

"Come on!" Sora grabbed his hand, ran out into the waters –

And was held back when Riku stood stone-still, not following.

"Riku?" Sora asked. "Is…everything okay?"

"Yeah," Riku said with a nervous laugh. "It's just…I haven't been back to our beach in such a long time. The last time I've been to the beach is out at Radiant Garden, with everyone else. It kinda feels…awkward. I don't even really know what to do anymore."

"Do you…not wanna be here?" Sora asked in concern. "There are plenty more galaxies – "

"No, I want to!" Riku insisted. "I guess what I'm saying is…I think with all the growing up we had to do, I forgot what we used to do here just for fun, without some quest in the way."

"Oh!" Sora realized. "That's easy! I remember all sorts of stuff we used to do here when we were kids! That is…if you're okay acting like a kid again."

"I think that's something I need to do more often, to be honest," Riku laughed. "Okay. So what did we do?"

"Follow me!"

Now Riku let Sora lead him eagerly into the waters until they were waist-deep. "Remember that game we used to play way back when we were little?" Sora reminded him. "Me, Kairi, Selphie, Tidus, and Wakka would all pretend to be fish, and you would be the big, bad shark?"

"And everyone was SURPRISED when I turned to the dark side?" Riku chuckled. "That game's gonna be awkward with just two people, though."

"Oh, is it?" Sora asked coyly.

"…You know what?" Riku replied mischievously. "Let's give it a try. I'll give you a count of three head start. One…two…"

Sora paddled away from Riku as quickly as he could before Riku yelled "THREE!" and dove beneath the surface to pursue Sora swiftly.

Sora gave him a good chase, zigzagging all over the pool and pulling tricks like diving down deeper to go right under Riku back the way he'd come. Finally, the two of them had run into the shallows, and Riku gave a flying leap, tackling Sora down into the water and sand. They rolled over each other there, laughing.

When they came to a stop, Riku was above Sora, looking down on him, face framed by the sun in a golden halo. "You got me!" Sora said with a wide smile.

Riku didn't even need to be told what should happen next. He leaned down, pressing his lips to Sora's, and Sora eagerly let his tongue inside.

When they'd had enough of that, Riku sat back in the shallow water. "So what next?" he asked.

"Hmm." Sora looked around. "See that tower?"

Riku's attention turned to the rounded tower. "Yeah."

"It's over really deep water. I bet if we could get to the top of it, we could dive right in."

"All right. Sounds fun."

It took them a few minutes to realize how to reach the tower's zenith; as it turned out, the entrance was underwater, and getting there was half the fun, diving down deep to resurface inside the tower. Then they clambered out onto the roof, high up beneath the baking sun.

Sora was ready to run and jump straightaway, but Riku put a gentle hand on his chest. "Wait," he said, taking out his GummiPhone.

"Good idea!" Sora agreed, taking out his own phone.

They took pictures of the view from on high, of each other against the view, of themselves squished together in the camera frame. Then they completed their mission, diving off the top of the tower to feel the absolute rush of adrenaline as they freefell into the waters below and plunged back into the depths once they hit.

"Maybe we should dry off for a bit," Riku suggested once their heads resurfaced.

"Sand castle?" Sora offered.

So then they found themselves collaborating on a complex sculpture of wet sand on the beach, constructing tall towers and decorating their work with pebbles, until…

"Wait. Aren't we building the Radiant Garden castle? Because your half doesn't look like that."

"Oh. I was building Disney Castle."

They then burst into laughter before getting several pictures of the rather silly-looking hybrid of Disney Castle and Radiant Garden, square on one half and rotund on the other.

Sora tossed a small seashell up and down in his hand. "Remember when we used to go around collecting these?" he asked.

"It was never our idea," Riku reminded him with a smile. "Kairi always started it. She was the one who wanted to pick up seashells."

"Maybe we should find one to bring back for her!" Sora suggested.

"If there's one that looks like a thalassa shell," Riku mused, "we should definitely bring it for her."

Thus began their quest to find a shell for Kairi, which was rather easily completed when an oblong blue shell made itself known. Sora stored it away in his magical pocket space, then said, "You know…maybe Kairi's not the only person we should bring a shell back for."

"Are you going to suggest we find shells for EVERYONE back home?" Riku chuckled.

"Maaaaaybe…?"

"Well, let's get looking!"

They split up, calling to each other from across the islets:
"This white one reminds me of Roxas!"

"Jasmine's gonna love this fancy-looking one!"

"What do you think of this blue one for Katara?"
"This one's HUGE! Better save it for Yen Sid."

"Didn't Moana say she used a conch like this back in her village?"

"This one's all swirly and pointy. I dunno, I kinda think Nora'd like it."

They found they didn't mind spending the time. It allowed them to catch their breath from the more watery games.

When a suitable number of shells was collected at last, Riku asked, "What next?"

He knew Sora would have an answer. "Remember when we used to do this?" the brunette asked, stooping down to pick up a flat-looking stone.

"Now I do," Riku chuckled. "You never could skip them. They'd just hit the water and sink."

"Hey, I grew up since then! I got better hand-eye coordination!"

"So prove it."

Sora managed to get the rock to skip thrice while Riku filmed on his GummiPhone. Riku then passed the phone to Sora, picking up his own rock, which he managed to get ten skips out. They went a few more rounds, Riku the clear victor in every circumstance and making a record-breaking sixteen skips.

"You two look like you're having fun," one of the Piantas said as he approached.

"We are!" Sora said with a beam. "It must be great to live here all the time."

"It is," the Pianta confirmed. "Not to mention it's a great place for business."

"Business?" Riku repeated.

"I rent leaf rafts," the Pianta explained. "I had a feeling that two such fun-loving people as yourselves might want a ride. It's one munny for one raft for an hour."

"That's a pretty obvious sales pitch," Sora told him. "I'll take it anyway!"

"We should each get one," Riku suggested.

"Why?"

"You'll see."

After paying up, the two boys stepped out onto large lily-pad-like leaves, testing the waters; the leaves would float wherever they shifted their weight.

"What's your plan?" Riku asked Sora, already feeling the mischief radiating from him.

"Maybe I win the race this time," Sora replied. "Whaddaya say? Around the two towers, then back to the rental dock?"

"You're on!"

Leaf rafts were perhaps not the fastest vehicles for racing, but that made it all the more of a novelty to do so. Sora did win this time, adding it to the victory count.

"You still have them for the rest of the hour," the Pianta reminded them. "Also, if you haven't tried out some of the fruit that grows here, you should. Most everything is edible."

"Well, now, we gotta!" Sora insisted.

They floated the rafts around until they came to an islet sporting a bush with round, pink fruit. Riku was the first to pluck one, taking a bite. "It's sweet," he observed.

Sora bit eagerly into a fruit of his own, pink juice spraying. "WHOA!"

Next, they came across a plant bearing large red peppers. "I dunno about those," Riku commented.

"I'm gonna try one!" Sora emphasized. "They can't be that bad!"

"Sora – "

Before Riku could finish his warning, Sora had taken a great bite off the red pepper. He then dropped the rest into the ocean, fanning at his mouth; "IT'S HOT!"

Riku chuckled. "Saw that one coming."

"OW OW OW OW OW!"

"Is it really THAT bad?" Riku teased.

"Yeah," Sora told him meekly.

"Can I try for myself?"

When Sora offered a second pepper over to Riku, Riku shook his head; "No. Not like that."

"Wha…oh!"

Catching on, Sora veered his raft closer to Riku's, letting their mouths meet again. Riku used this method to taste the spiciness still present in Sora's mouth, which was truly that potent.

"You weren't kidding," he said after the kiss. "Maybe more of the pink ones will rinse that out."

They steered back to the round pink fruits, indulging in their sweetness again to mask the pepper.

Then they decided to simply sit on the beach awhile, looking out over the water. Pictures were snapped, then phones put aside.

"Is it weird that I like that this both is like home and isn't home?" Sora asked. "I mean, like…I like how it reminds me of our Islands. But I also like that it's different from the same thing."

"I know what you mean," Riku replied. "Remember how sick I was of home, and how bad I wanted to get away? But now that I'm here, I love how much like home it feels. Maybe that means I'd appreciate home that much more if I went back."

"You mean WHEN we go back," Sora told him. "Stuff's gotta calm down sometime! And we can always visit!"

"I guess that's true."

"You know…wanting to leave wasn't a bad thing." Sora stretched a foot into the water, lazily waving it. "I know it kind of started some bad stuff for you. But it wasn't bad. Sometimes it's weird, when I think about it. I was way less excited to get out there than you…when it turned out that visiting new places and meeting new people was just what I needed in my life. I'm glad we can both do that now."

"Me too," Riku agreed. "And…thank you."

"Anytime! What are boyfriends for?"

"Apparently for eating hot peppers and making you taste them too."

"Hey, you asked!"

They remained there for much longer than in any other galaxy they'd visited.

...

In the midst of a cheerful-looking park, all green lawns and trees, there was erected a statue of an anthropomorphic duck, holding up a cornucopia filled with vegetables. Around this statue, three rather interesting characters by this world's standard had gathered. Though, really, this world had seen so much bizarre that none of them faced any interrogation by the parkgoers.

"Hmm…let me see about this stone sculpted savant." Hämsterviel walked right up to the plaque on the base of the statue, which was exactly his eye height. "This is Old Cornelius Coot – hmm, fitting name – who turned his corn crop into loot, and founded the Disney Town faire, to him, we dedicate this square."

"How sentimental," Mozenrath spat, leaning back against the statue. "I had my reservations about coming this close to Disney Town in the first place. These Duckburg thugs of yours had better be worth it, Hämsterviel."

"It seems rather a lackluster town for breeding villainy," the Huntsman observed. "I would have expected a metropolis at the very least."

"No, no!" Hämsterviel protested. "You must believe me! If you are to be wanting of raw muscle and sheer numbers to carry out orders without question, you are to be wanting of the Beagle Boys!"

A shrill, piercing voice suddenly filled the park, making all three men flinch: "WHAAAAAAAT?"

Without warning, Mim popped into existence before them, murder in her eyes. "DID I HEAR YOU SAY YOU WERE CONSIDERING TAKING ON THE BEAGLE BOYS?" she seethed.

"Why were you LISTENING to us?" Mozenrath snapped back.

"Oh, that doesn't matter!" Mim waved her hand.

"I believe it does," the Huntsman told her.

"Well, after tiring Hannibal out for three hours in the bedroom, I needed some sort of follow-up activity for a change of pace," Mim explained.

"That raises more questions than it answers," the Huntsman told her.

"Particularly the kind of question WE DON'T WANT ANSWERS TO IN THE FIRST PLACE," Mozenrath growled.

"The point is you can't have the Beagle Boys!" Mim shook her fist in Mozenrath's face. "You hear me?"

"What," Mozenrath sighed, "did you have some kind of falling-out?"

"You'd best believe!" Mim told him. "Oh, the Beagle Boys and I, we used to have all sorts of adventures, robbing banks, stealing rocket ships, impersonating princesses…and then there was the whole sphinx incident. There was just something nice about teaming up with lesser thugs with no magical talent but a taste for destruction."

"I am beginning to understand your fascination with…many of the WHAM ARMY," the Huntsman admitted.

"And yet," Mim went on, "the link between us all was…HER. The most foul woman I ever laid eyes on, and not in the good way! The traitor who I will never, ever, EVER forgive, so long as I live – which is going to be forever, you know!"

"Tell me we're not about to suddenly learn some part of Mim's backstory that throws our entire mission out of alignment," Mozenrath sighed.

"You mock me," Mim told him, "but did you really think the WHAM ARMY was the FIRST set of friends I'd had?"

"I wasn't really sure how you could have made any before," Mozenrath told her. "In fact, I'm still a bit confused about how you keep making friends NOW."

"Once, I had a very best friend," Mim said wistfully. "A fellow sorceress who understood me. Who shared my love of wanton destruction, though she was a little more goal-oriented. Oh, she had the most wonderful sense of avarice. Together, we were the right combination of order and chaos. Until she stabbed me in the back! Now, her name no longer deserves to be spoken, and I will never name her again!"

"Then we don't have to harp on her?" Mozenrath said in a vain hope.

"MAGICA DE SPELL," Mim seethed.

"You JUST SAID you weren't going to say her name!" the Huntsman pointed out.

"You're worse than Snatcher," Mozenrath teased. In the intentionally worst impression of a Cockney accent he could muster, he gave the example: "The unspeakable has happened! We must speak of it immediately!"

The Huntsman let out a sound that he hoped no one realized was a laugh.

"Well, I realized it was far more rewarding to drag her reputation through the mud than erase the memory of her existence," Mim decided. "She and I were the thickest of thieves, partners in crime, until the day she betrayed me in a way that could NEVER be forgiven! NEVER, EVER, EVER, EVER! AND THE BEAGLE BOYS TOOK HER SIDE!"

"So you are concerned that they will turn on you if brought under our roof," the Huntsman supposed.

"Them turn on me?" Mim repeated. "I'M going to turn on THEM! Show me a single solitary Beagle Boy, and I'll have him DESTROYED!"

"I don't even know why I'm asking this," Mozenrath sighed. "We all know that whatever the answer is, I'm not going to be happy with it. But what exactly DID Magica De Spell do to you that turned you against her for all eternity?"

"If only so that we do not make the same mistake," Hämsterviel said with trepidation.

"Oooooh, you had better not!" Mim seethed. "Magica and I vied over the same thing, the thing that mattered most to me, and she TOOK IT AWAY FROM ME!"

Mozenrath smacked his forehead with his palm. "YOU FELL OUT OVER A MAN?"

"WHAT?" Mim shrieked. "NEVER! We fell out over something REALLY important! You remember the Cornerstone of Light, don't you?"

"Is this a trick question?" Mozenrath asked. "It was one of our first missions. It was aboard the warship for months."

"Well, ask yourself this question," Mim posed. "Did you ever stop to think about where all the Darkness that opposed it was?"

...

Before the WHAM ARMY, in those deceivingly halcyon days of which Mim spoke, a sizeable expedition was launched over a barren wasteland, through groves of thorns as big as a person, over rivers of acid, and through caverns so dark, one nearly went mad simply by entering.

At the center of the bleakest of the valleys in this miasma, the stone walls purple-black beneath a churning stormy sky, the expedition came to a halt. At its head, a woman Mim's height: an anthropomorphic duck, her feathers bright white but sporting a head of long, sleek hair dark as ebony. She was clothed in a simple black dress. Behind her walked the throng of Beagle Boys, dog-men of all shapes and sizes who favored crimson shirts and blue pants.

"I dunno about this, Magica," Bagarre the Beagle Boy said nervously. "If word gets back to Mim that we got this far without her – "

"Word will not be getting back!" Magica snapped in a thick Eastern European accent. "Mission was kept absolutely secret! Is no way Mim will realize what I am to be doing!"

"Yeah, but – "

"Silence!" Magica snapped. "Or are you wanting me to be leaving you on next barren outcropping of waste? Or shoving off precipice?"

"N-no, Magica…"

"Good! Then follow and keep defending from Heartless, and I will give you small yet substantial percentage of reaping! Is more than MIM would let you have."

"She's right, you know," Badinage pointed out. "Mim wouldn't let us have a cut at all!"

As Magica was distracted, Barmkin muttered, "I ain't so sure Magica's about to let us have a cut, either. Maybe we should wait 'till she's distracted, then…"

"That's playing with fire," Barratry snipped. "Keep talking like that and I'll rat you out! Then I'll get a bigger cut than the rest of you!"

"Shut yer trap, Barmkin!" Battledore hissed. "Nobody wants Barratry to end up the most powerful of us!"

The trek through the valley seemed straightforward at first sight, but it was teeming with Heartless; the Beagles dispatched the creatures of Darkness with fist, gun, and blade. Magica flicked a spell at the creatures every so often, but why, really, should she exert the energy when her minions would do it for her? Besides, she didn't want to get too much of a bad rap in the Heartless' book.

At last, after many sharp rocks and unseen pitfalls, the company arrived at their destination. Just when some of the Beagles had begun to even doubt the existence of such a thing, it did not so much shine as do the opposite of that, a void created that still stood out against the ordinary light. The immense sphere, jet-black with a sparking purple core, perched upon a wrought pedestal of onyx in the midst of the treacherous valley.

"Is what I think it is?" Magica's eyes widened, and she rushed the last few steps toward the sphere, putting her hands on its surface. "It is, IT IS! KNEW SUCH A THING EXISTED!"

"Wow," Barmkin said in awe. "It is real. The Cornerstone of Darkness."

"Is ultimate Dark power in all of world!" Magica cried, applauding as she leapt up and down giddily. "And is mine, all MINE! …Oh, and tiny percent is yours for the work."

"So how're we gonna keep this a secret from Mim?" Battledore asked.

"Is simple," Magica explained. "First, are going to – "

"I'LL TELL YOU HOW YOU'RE GOING TO KEEP IT A SECRET FROM ME: YOU'RE NOT!"

The shrill voice echoing off the cliff faces threw a chill into the Beagle Boys' very bones. They started up a chatter:

"Oh no!"

"She's here!"

"She's found us out!"

"We're in for it now!"

Only Magica seemed unperturbed, turning away from the Cornerstone of Darkness to lean against it, arms folded. "What is disturbance now?"

With an almost earsplitting "pop" sound, Mim appeared directly in front of her. "YOUUUUU!" she shrieked. "AFTER ALL THOSE THINGS YOU SAID ABOUT US FINDING THE CORNERSTONE OF DARKNESS TOGETHER AND SPLITTING ITS ABSOLUTE DESTRUCTIVE POWER, I FIND YOU DOING THIS BEHIND MY BACK?"

"Cornerstone was not MEANT for you!" Magica spat. "You would not know how to use! And you hardly NEED! I am one who has needed Cornerstone! I am only one deserving of so much POWER!"

"NEED?" Mim repeated. "And what do you NEED it for? THIS HAD BETTER BE BAD!"

"Oh, is time for demonstration!" Magica chuckled. "Old friend Mim, have never told you how jealous I was of shapeshifting powers. But now, with Cornerstone of Darkness, can finally use them for what you REFUSE to do!"

She placed a single hand on the Cornerstone, letting its foul magic seep into her body. And before Mim's eyes, that body changed, lengthening, thinning out. No longer was Magica the squat duck who could look Mim in the eye; she was nearly twice as tall, thin as a rail in the middle with more chest and hip to speak of than before. Her limbs were long and graceful, her beak flatter and wider. Even her plain black dress changed to a more extravagant garment: a flowing gown fastened by a purple brooch, lacking sleeves but offset by long fingerless gloves of a matching black shade and a cape of black on the exterior and lavender on the interior.

"Finally!" Magica cried. "Am worthy of wearing such beautiful clothing! Oh, and while I am at it, should fix voice as well. Something more…something more…"

More Darkness flowed into her. Her feathers began to take on the slightest tint of green. Her eyes glittered with gold flecks. "Elegant," she concluded, her voice now nothing like it had been before, bearing a lilting English accent. "Ah, yes, this will do nicely. I'm giving myself proper grammar mastery while I'm at it."

"WHAT DO YOU THINK YOU'RE DOING!" Mim cried in horror.

"Oh, don't be daft," Magica told Mim, now sounding far more uppity than she ever had. "You had the power to be beautiful and graceful all this time, and yet you wasted it on being…well, that? You know there are villains in this world that could actually use that power for what it's supposed to be used for, you know."

Mim gasped. "Magica! You've managed to make me being ugly sound like…NOT A COMPLIMENT!" Her brow furrowed. "So this is what you wanted, all this time? You never DID agree with me that ugly was beautiful, did you? That unrefined was the new classy? You…you WEREN'T PROUD OF BEING REPULSIVE!"

"Never," Magica hissed. "Frankly, I don't see how you could stand it."

"YOU WEREN'T PROUD OF BEING YOU!" Mim went on. "OF BEING US!"

"You're never going to get anywhere in this world on that face, you know," Magica told her casually. "Or that voice. Now, power, you've got, but the thing is, I have more."

"WE WERE SUPPOSED TO SHARE THAT POWER, MAGICA!"

"As if you ever intended to uphold your end of the agreement."

"For YOU, I was considering it!" Mim confessed. "You should know how much that means! Besides, you knew I was a traitor and a horrible friend when you agreed to this partnership! But YOU? You were the definition of honor among thieves!"

She rounded on the Beagle Boys next; "AND ALL OF YOU! Taking HER side! Going behind my back to give the Cornerstone to HER! AFTER ALL WE'D BEEN THROUGH! DID THE SPHINX MEAN NOTHING TO YOU?"

"Sh-she promised!" Badinage stammered. "And like you said, she has honor!"

"Face it, Mim," Magica scoffed. "When push comes to shove, I'm the sort they'll choose, now that I've got all the necessary assets. You only use your power to be crude and petty. What do you offer them, really? Fun? Is fun what makes the world go round? Any of those worlds you've been to?"

Mim slowly turned to face Magica again, her eyes icy with anger. "I…won't…STAND FOR THIS!"

She rolled up her sleeve, fingers sparking.

Magica was faster.

Mim was thrown across the field like a rag doll by a burst of too-bright purple magic, landing unceremoniously sprawled on the stone. The Beagle Boys thought at first she was dead, which, given the circumstances, was a little bit of a relief. But Mim was back up on her feet and literally swinging in an instant.

With a restrained laugh of evil dignity (one so repressed from utter madness that it made Mim all the more angry to see how far Magica had deviated from their ideals), Magica surrounded herself in the purple energy, a translucent sphere that protected her from any and all attacks Mim was about to launch – and Mim opened fire with nuclear force. Tidal waves of magic were redirected away from Magica by her shield, nearly collapsing the entire valley in an avalanche of debris.

"I'm starting to think I should've betrayed you years ago!" Magica cried as she rose up into the air, cape billowing. "This sort of emotionally charged rivalry is what every good villain lives for, you know!"

"NOW YOU'VE GONE AND MADE ME MAD, MAGICA!"

"I haven't even tried the best trick!" Magica informed Mim from on high. "Why would I need your approval when I have hundreds, no, THOUSANDS of new friends at my disposal? Why would I need ANYONE – "

The Beagle Boys cleared their throats in chorus.

" – exceptfortheBeagleBoys when I have THEM?" Magica posed.

"WHEN YOU HAVE WHO?" Mim yelled.

"…Probably should have summoned them first," Magica realized. "Oh, well. Better late than never."

She clapped, and the very shadows of the valley answered her call.

Shadow Heartless, a thousandfold, wriggled up out of the dark corners, forging themselves into a Demon Tower, then a Demon Tide, then something even greater behind Magica and the Cornerstone. What resulted, Mim could only think of as a Demon Tornado: an immense cyclone, filling the whole valley, made up entirely of the Shadows.

"Hmph." Mim folded her arms. "It's only SHADOWS. That's not impressive. At least throw an Orcus in there or SOMETHING!"

"Oh, I of all people know not to underestimate SHADOWS!" Magica cried. "New friends? PULVERIZE THE OLD FRIEND!"

She pointed downward at Mim, and the Shadows obeyed, breaking out of their Demon Tornado to whirl toward Mim in a deadly wave.

Mim was instantly engulfed.

"She never stood a chance," Barratry said as he placed his cap over his heart.

A slight rumble. Then the Heartless wave bursting open, the individual Shadows flung to the far corners. As a rotund dragon, Mim rose up, becoming tall enough to meet the flying Magica's height.

"YOU WANT TO PLAY DIRTY?" Mim challenged. "WELL, I PLAY ABSOLUTELY FILTHY!"

"Bring it on, pig-face," Magica replied.

Mim rose up into the air on wings that shouldn't have been able to physically carry her, jaws snapping at Magica. The duck sorceress evaded, her purple sphere flitting about the battlefield expertly as its pilot launched violet projectiles back at Mim.

These blasts sizzled against Mim's scaly skin, leaving burn marks she chose to outright ignore. She angled herself above Magica, breathing a magically charged fire with a specially chosen enchantment.

Magica decided it would be fun to play the game, only moving her sphere at the last minute. She waited for the stream of fire to get closer to her.

It never did. Instead, it collided with the Cornerstone down below, which seemed to be unaffected when the flames cleared.

"YOU MISSED!" Magica jeered.

"OH, DID I?" Mim countered.

She spun then, using her thick tail to bat Magica out of the sky. The duck sorceress plummeted, spherical shield and all, directly down to the Cornerstone.

When the two spheres made contact, Magica's shield shattered. The duck sorceress stood atop the Cornerstone, willing all the more Darkness to flow into her through her feet. Her eyes flashed a bright yellow as she became one with Darkness, her feathers darkening still greener.

But before she could make the next move, she gave a cry, for she realized what was happening, what Mim had done to the Cornerstone.

Magica was sinking. The Cornerstone's crystal exterior was now viscous, dragging her down in like she was standing in a tar pit. Magica tried in vain to free herself from the absorbing, but her struggles only sank her faster, waist-deep.

"Help me!" she cried, putting out a hand.

Mim returned to human form, standing cockily before the Cornerstone. "And what makes you think I would help you now?"

"Not YOU!" Magica hissed. "THEM!"

The Heartless were hurrying toward their mistress at top speed.

"NO YOU DON'T!" Mim sent a burst of fireworks up toward them that interrupted their chain of rescuers, blowing several of them back to the Darkness.

Now neck deep, Magica screamed, "I'LL GET YOU FOR THIS, MAD MADAM MIM! YOU HAVEN'T SEEN THE LAST OF ME! WHEN I GET OUT OF HERE, I SWEAR I'LL – "

She choked on the liquid crystal, sputtering sickly.

"Really? In the midst of my vow of vengeance?"

Those were her last words before she was absorbed completely.

"You know what, Magica?" Mim said to the Cornerstone. "I've made a decision. Now that you took the Cornerstone away from me the first time, I don't even want to play with it anymore! You can't have it, and you didn't want me to have it, so guess what?" Her hands charged with sparkling combustion. "NO ONE CAN HAVE IT!"

She released her attack.

The crystal of the Cornerstone shattered completely, shards falling in a heap around the onyx base. The Darkness within shot straight up into the air, dissipating and spreading itself thin around the world, as Darkness should do. A few stray shadows were seen crawling away from the base, flat and impotent.

With their master gone, the Heartless scattered, disbanding their cyclone and going back into hiding. The Beagle Boys watched it all with awe, horror, and, in the end, grief.

"She was our pal," Bagarre mourned, tearing up. "A real pal."

Barratry, however, saw the truth of the situation, and what amends needed to be made – quickly. He prostrated himself before Mim. "We're sorry!" he cried. "We'll never betray you again, Mim! Now we know better!"

"Do you?" Mim asked, still seething. "Hmm…I think I ought to teach you a lesson. No, wait, I don't care about teaching you anything! I'm just MAD, and I don't want any of you to leave here alive!"

What happened next was an utter bloodbath. Mim cycled through the most predatory of her forms, each Beagle Boy succumbing to fangs or claws or venom. Such was the reason that the names of Badinage, Barratry, or Bagarre were never heard from again in Disney Town or any of its surrounding cities.

Only one Beagle Boy was left, a short man who cowered on his back, awaiting his death blow. But it never came. Mim stood over him as a human, asking him, "And what's YOUR name?"

"B…Big Time…"

"You're a little scrawny to be a 'Big Time,' aren't you?" Mim taunted. "Now, you listen here, and you listen good!"

She leaned down, seizing Big Time forcefully by one ear. "There's only one reason you get to live," she informed him, "and that's to go back and tell all the rest of your family, right up to Ma Beagle herself, that our partnership is THROUGH! The next time you cross Mad Madam Mim will be your LAST! DO YOU HEAR ME?"

"L-loud and clear, Mim!"

"Now get out of my sight!"

Big Time scurried away faster than he knew he could even run.

Among the rubble, the carnage, and the shattered crystal, Mim finally felt as though her anger had burned out. "That'll be the last time I trust anyone to partner up with me," she seethed.

...

"Until I decided on a whim to partner up with all of you," Mim told Mozenrath, the Huntsman, and Hämsterviel in a perfectly cheery tone, "and it's worked out much better than I expected!"

The Huntsman was struck silent. Hämsterviel needed a moment to gather his thoughts before crying out, "Woman, are you INSANE – "

"No, no." Mozenrath held up a hand casually. "Honestly, Magica had it coming. I would've done the same thing."

"…Come to think of it, so would I," the Huntsman realized. It rather smacked of how Rose (Thorn) had used the Crystal Skulls to orchestrate his murder; had he been able to turn the tables on her, he wouldn't have held back. "It does seem to be an unspoken agreement among us not to usurp each other's magical resources. And I am not opposed to bringing that agreement out into the open."

"For EVERYONE'S sake," Mozenrath clarified. "Not in the sense that we're afraid of you. In the sense that I don't want Wuya deciding she can snipe my Heart of Atlantis because she feels like it."

"You are CRAZY!" Hämsterviel was sputtering. "You are a LUNATIC! You are…you are…"

"Mad?" Mim suggested.

"I don't see how you didn't see this coming," Mozenrath told the small extraterrestrial. "Anyway, no one's going to be taking the next Cornerstone from you. Or, more accurately, no one's going to be taking the Heart of Atlantis from me. What matters now is that if we don't have the raw numbers of the Beagle Boys, we're going to be lacking in power when it comes time for the grand invasion."

"Hmm…" Mim appeared pensive.

"You're going to try and come up with some kind of replacement on the spot," Mozenrath grunted. "Please tell me it's not this town's second-rate scraps in the criminal underworld."

"No, there's nothing worth anything in THIS town," Mim said with a sly grin. "But one city over, there's something that might interest you."

"I'm listening," Mozenrath told her. "Against my better judgment."

"None of the 'raw numbers' you were talking about," Mim told him. "No, the group I'm thinking of numbers only five."

"Waiting for the upside, Mim," Mozenrath grumbled.

"Oh, but they are truly FEARSOME," Mim advertised. "They have POWERS! Mastery over the elements, scientific and magical! Well, except two of them, but those two are violent and creative, collectors of weaponry! Anyone can rope a Beagle Boy into doing anything, but you'll have to send ten of them to get it done! Any single ONE of these supervillains can get the job done, and with twice the character!"

"And you never allied with them because…?" Mozenrath asked.

"Two reasons," Mim told him. "One was that I never needed to. I had my allies here, and they had theirs. I THOUGHT I could TRUST my circle, and didn't see the need to bring anyone else into it. But more importantly, and this works in our favor, their leader isn't such a fan of Magica De Spell."

"That does seem advantageous, given the schism," the Huntsman decided. "All right. Where are we to find such valuable allies?"

"Not around here, that's for sure," Mim scoffed. "We're going to a REAL hive of villainy: St. Canard!"

...

In the woodlands outside the civilization of Terra Wallop, Roxas and Lea waited at the tree line, observing the Wallops that walked into the edge of town. The Wallops were a tall, broad people, skin tones ranging from golden to deep brown, with very rhinoceros-like qualities, including a sharp little horn over the nose.

"We definitely don't fit in here," Lea said softly. "If they're as weird about outsiders as the others said, then we're probably in trouble."

"We just have to not get spotted," Roxas replied, knowing exactly what Lea was leading up to. "But that's old hat for us, right?"

"You know it."

They slid into town, keeping to the shadows and around the corners. It was almost exactly as if working one of the Organization's old missions again: staying invisible, eyes and ears open, gathering clues.

From where they crouched behind a fruit stall in the marketplace, they could hear a pair of Wallops conversing:

"You coming to the meeting? It's soon."

"Yeah, yeah. The usual place?"

"The usual place."

"The usual place?" Roxas whispered.

Lea shrugged. "Let's keep moving. See if we can hear more."

Lea crossed a street, looked both directions for observers, then waved Roxas across to follow him. One block over, they heard what they were listening for:

" – but don't let Thragg find out, or you'll be banished from Wallop. Got it?"
"Yeah. So where's the place?"
"Dilly's."

"The ladies' und – "

"Yes! And there's a code word. You have to say – "

The sound of more Wallops walking down the same street became audible.

"…Let's go somewhere else we can't be heard."

"Rats!" Roxas hissed once their targets were out of their earshot.

"Just gotta find 'em again," Lea told him, "or find someone else headed to Dilly's. Wherever that is."

"I think I saw a little shop with that name on it a few blocks back," Roxas recalled.

"Good eye!" Lea ruffled Roxas' hair playfully. "Someone went on too many recon missions with Vexen."

"Just the one, and that was one too many!"

The houses in the village weren't quite set close enough together for rooftop travel to be easy, but both Roxas and Lea were athletic, and they leapt over the gaps in the roofs without too much trouble. From here, they crept up above, watching the passerby below and stopping where they saw a small gathering.

"Goin' to Dilly's?"

"Yeah. Just gotta pick up some…stuff for the wife."

"Cool. Same order as last time?"
"No. This time, you have to order – "

After the Wallop explained what sounded to Roxas' ear like a very silly set of words, the boy looked to Lea meaningfully. "If the first guy was doing the shopping," he said, "then the only reason he would tell the second guy to pick up what he wanted – "

"Is if that's not a shopping list," Lea concluded, "but the code word."

After some more investigation, they slunk over to the small shop known as Dilly's Frillies. Here, they both walked through the door without any attempt to hide, certain they knew what they were after.

The cashier flinched when he saw them enter. "Outsiders!"

"Don't mind us," Lea said with a casual wave of the hand. "Just stoppin' by to pick up some essentials."

Roxas cast his gaze around the shop. It was all underwear, all sized for Wallops, and all styled for women. Either the cashier knew what they were really here for or was incredibly nonjudgmental.

The cashier, starting to suspect, leaned forward; "What brand were you looking for?"

Lea nudged Roxas playfully, wanting to get the boy to say the words. Roxas reluctantly said "Bumpy…Rumpies?"

"I see," the cashier replied. "We have plenty of sizes in that brand. What were you looking for?"

Roxas nodded, naming a size no person could truly buy: "Extra Medium."

The cashier nodded. "Follow me."

He led Roxas and Lea into the back stockroom, then opened a trap door in the floor, descending a narrow stairway. The two humans followed with some trepidation.

The deep voice of another Wallop sounded from the subterranean room: " – keeps coming back to the fact that Thragg won't follow anyone but the strongest! And if Cyclonis is the strongest – "

The meeting came into view. Around twenty Wallops stood in the dimly-lit room. Before them, the Wallop who spoke stood on a stool to elevate himself – which he needed, since he was just a touch shorter than average Wallops his age. And beyond that, he wasn't a fully mature Wallop, only an adolescent.

Roxas and Lea knew immediately who he was.

The Wallop stopped speaking once he saw the newcomers. "Huh?"

"Outsiders," the cashier responded, gesturing to them. "They knew the code. You passed it on to outsiders?"

"Uh…not that I can remember." The young Wallop scratched the back of his head.

The cashier whirled on Lea and Roxas; "SPIES?"

"Kinda?" Lea replied. "It's complicated."

"You're Junko, right?" Roxas asked. "Chief Thragg kicked you out of Wallop. Don't worry. We're not gonna tell him you're here. We're on your side."

"Who ARE you?" Junko asked in confusion. "And why'd you come looking for me? You're not Wallops. No offense, but I'm not sure why outsiders would be worried about Terra Wallop."

"Got a little message for ya," Lea told him. "Hear us out before you throw us out."

All of the Wallops in the room who weren't Junko looked as though they wanted to skip to that latter step without doing the prerequisite. However, Junko just shrugged and said, "Okay."

Lea and Roxas looked to each other, then back at Junko. In perfect unison, they said the words, "Cyclonia. Help. Bad news."

Junko knew those words from only one other place. A wrestling tournament. A hypnosis session. The words needed to break his trance. Only a certain group of people would have any reason to remember those words. His expression softened into one of awe; "…You guys are with the Storm Hawks?"

A gasp went up throughout the crowd.

"Figured you wouldn't believe us if we told ya that first thing," Lea explained.

"Sorry about crashing the meeting," Roxas added sheepishly. "We kinda…did spy around to get in. But we're NOT here to sell you out."

"So they're alive?" Junko asked with mounting excitement. "They're all okay?"

"Yeah!" Roxas replied. "We have Stork and Aerrow and Radarr and Finn – "

"Well, mostly okay," Lea broke in. "About the girl, Piper…turns out we do have some bad news that involves Cyclonia and needing help."

"Cyclonis came back," Junko realized. "She's got Piper."

"Yeah," Roxas affirmed. "But we're gonna find a way to get her out. You with us?"

"Well, gee, I'd love to," Junko told them, "but…the resistance needs me. Terra Wallop is divided between Wallops who are ready to pledge allegiance back to Cyclonis and Wallops who wanna break away from Cyclonia permanently. I gotta help 'em figure it out. It's real complicated. Well…okay, maybe not that complicated, but there's no good way to solve it."

"What's the problem?" Lea asked. "Maybe we 'outsiders' can offer a different perspective."

"Should we tell them?" one Wallop asked.

"They are with the Storm Hawks," another figured. "We can trust the Storm Hawks."

"The problem is Chief Thragg," Junko stated. "He's the sole ruler of Terra Wallop, so really, you can divide the Wallops into the ones who agree with him and the ones who don't. Chief Thragg believes that strength is the most important thing to all Wallops, and that Cyclonis is the strongest person in the world. That's why he says we need to obey her. But I think it's more that he's afraid of her, and he thinks if he stands up to her, she'll hurt him and all the rest of us. The easy way to solve everything would be if he could just change his mind about Cyclonis, and then everyone would agree. But I dunno how we can get him to do that, especially since I'm not even supposed to be here."

"Can't you just pull a coup d'etat?" Lea asked. "Get the big guy off the throne and put somebody better in place? Believe me, if I'd done that earlier on, I woulda been saved a major headache."

"There's only one way to transfer the title of chief on Terra Wallop," Junko told Lea, "and I can't do it. The person who wants to be chief has gotta challenge the current chief to a fight…and it's gotta finish to the end."

"Oh," Lea realized. "The icky way, huh?"

"Maybe it doesn't have to be like that," Roxas realized. "You said your chief would bow to Cyclonis so long as she was stronger than him, right?"

"Yeah, pretty much," Junko confirmed.

"What if we could prove that Cyclonis wasn't that strong?" Roxas asked. "What if we could beat her in a fight?"

"That already happened, remember?" Lea sighed. "That's not gonna work again."

"No," Junko corrected, "that's not what happened. Cyclonis ran away before we could beat her. It was the Dark Ace we beat. That's why Thragg still thinks he has a reason to be afraid of her."

"Then we'll do it," Roxas determined. "We gotta face her to get Piper back anyway. If we can beat her…if YOU can beat her…then Thragg will have no choice."

"Hey, yeah!" Junko realized. "That's a great idea! Okay. I'll do it. I'm coming with you!"

"Good luck, Junko," one of the Wallops in the crowd said, and the others struck up a chorus:

"Good luck, Junko!"

"Good luck!"

When it had died down, Junko stepped down off the stool to approach Roxas and Lea. "I never got your names," he realized.

"Oh," Roxas replied. "I'm Roxas."

"And I'm either Lea or Axel, whichever you prefer," Lea added.

Roxas grinned as he chimed in with Lea on a synchronized "Got it memorized?"

"Hey!" Lea lightly shoved Roxas.

"What?" Roxas replied. "It's too easy!"

"Nice to meet you guys!" Junko replied.

Before he could say anything more, an almost deafening growl resonated throughout the room – the young Wallop's own stomach.

"Man, organizing resistance meetings sure works up an appetite," Junko remarked. "We should pick up some food on the way back. I'm feeling breakfast for dinner. How about you? Do you like waffles?"

"NO!" Roxas yelled sharply; Junko flinched.

"Not this again…" Lea rolled his eyes. "Roxas hates waffles. Same with pancakes."

"What about French toast?" Junko asked, almost mournfully.

"I hate French toast SO MUCH," Roxas seethed. "They're all just dough! It doesn't taste like anything!"

"That's why you put syrup on it!" Lea argued. "I keep telling you!"

"If you have to drown it in syrup for it to taste good," Roxas asked, "then why not get something else that already tastes like maple? Food isn't good because of the stuff you dump on it! It's like putting more icing on a cupcake than there is cupcake!"

"ROXAS, IF YOU START THE CUPCAKE DISCOURSE HERE AGAIN, I SWEAR I'M GOING TO LEAVE YOU BEHIND ON THIS TERRA."

"MUFFINS! ARE! BETTER!"

"Maybe we just get you a muffin, then," Junko resolved. "Oh! Wait! I know! There's a place on the edge of the Terra that does all-day breakfast, and they have this double-decker omelette sandwich with a biscuit for a bun, and then the inside is egg baked with cheese and ham and spinach and mushrooms and…" His gaze had disconnected from focus, and he licked his lips.

"Sounds like you're more hungry for one of those than I am," Roxas observed. "I'll give it a shot. Let's go."

When Lea, Roxas, and Junko returned to the outcropping where the small Glockenchime ship was parked, they brought with them enough takeout breakfast food for everyone. (Lea had ordered plenty of waffles just to rile up Roxas.) Here, Ruby and Aerrow were sparring, Ruby dancing around the Lightning Claw and Aerrow ducking beneath Crescent Rose, each to commend the other on their good reflexes every now and again.

Nearby, Finn sat on a large rock and listened to Rainbow Dash finish a long tale: "And THAT'S how I saved Daring Do from Ahuizotl!"

"All right, yeah, that was pretty cool," Finn admitted. "But wait until you hear about how I formed the Ultra Dudes."

Stork was curled up against the hull of the ship, listening to Rapunzel tell him some stories of her own. She regretted that she didn't have much of the dark, nightmarish sort of material he usually liked to discuss, but he had admitted he wasn't in the mood for that anyway, so Rapunzel had decided to share some of the little things she liked about the forest surrounding Corona.

"There's an amazing dandelion field," she explained. "It's almost as big as a house! When it's all gone to white seeds, and the wind blows it up, it's AMAZING. The dandelion seeds in the air look almost exactly like the floating lanterns…if a little less glowy. You feel like you're inside of a cloud!"

Stork had to admit to himself that he liked envisioning the cheerful things Rapunzel described. A dandelion seed storm sure would be a more welcome sight to him right then than more villains.

"Yo!" Lea greeted as he and his companions entered the area. "We brought back dinner! Oh, and also, something else you might want."

"JUNKO?" Aerrow halted in place, Ruby accidentally hacking one small lock of red hair off his head due to the sudden stop.

"JUNKO!" Finn leapt up, charging toward the Wallop. "DUUUUUUDE!"

Junko quickly dropped his takeout bags so that he could catch Finn in a hug, spinning him around as they laughed in harmony. Aerrow and a chattering Radarr walked up to them, gently joining in the group embrace as well.

"Hey," Junko realized, "I thought Stork was here, too."

"Um…about that," Aerrow told him. "Stork's kinda – "

"Uh, guys?" Rapunzel called over. "I think he might've entered the paralysis stage."

Sure enough, Stork was now unmoving, his limbs having twisted instinctively before freezing up.

"Sky Shock?" Junko asked.

"Did they tell you about Piper?" Aerrow asked.

"Oh, yeah," Junko realized.

"They have the Condor, too," Finn added.

"We really gotta kick those guys' butts," Lea sighed.

"I still gotta go say hi," Junko insisted, and Finn, Aerrow, and Radarr parted to let him move closer to Stork. As he approached, he put up a hand and waved gently. "It's, uh…it's good to have you back, even if you are frozen with panic. I'm super glad you're alive!"

He then looked to Rapunzel; "I'm also glad you're helping take care of him."

"Stork is really important to me," Rapunzel asserted.

"Did you meet him on the Far Side of Atmos?" Junko asked.

"Not exactly," Rapunzel stated.

"You are not gonna BELIEVE this story," Finn hyped up.

Before anyone else could elaborate, a bird with long, flowing white plumage flapped through the air, stopping to hover before Finn, a scroll clutched in its claws. "Huh?" Finn reacted, flinching.

The bird dropped the scroll to his feet, then vanished completely, dissipating into a wisp that quickly faded.

"Must be from Terra Vapos," Finn figured, kneeling to pick up the scroll. "I'm guessing they need their Domo!"

"Um…don't we have to find Cyclonis first?" Ruby asked.

"It's not like we really know where to look," Aerrow admitted. "We still don't have any clue where to even find her. And it's not like the answer's gonna drop into our laps."

"DUDES!" Finn shrieked as he read over the scroll. "I KNOW WHERE CYCLONIS IS!"

In explanation, he turned to point at the scroll, showing it to the others. "Okay," he clarified, "so I'm the Domo of Terra Vapos, which is like this Chosen One hero thing; it's a pretty big deal. And whenever Terra Vapos needs help, they call me. Hold your applause. But this time, they sent me this message 'cause Cyclonis and a buncha new thugs took over Vapos! They've got this one guy, he almost broke the Serpigris and wiped Terra Vapos out, and King Aggar's risking his life to even write this message! Or he did risk his life to write this message. Obviously he did it, because I got it. But he said they're holding Piper there! And they've got the Condor!"

"Then we know what we have to do," Ruby declared.

"For Terra Wallop," Junko declared, "for all of Atmos, and especially for Piper! …And the Condor, too!"

...

St. Canard was a bustling metropolis: the sort that attracted supervillains like a popsicle left in the heat attracts ants. Its most notorious crime syndicate (locally, anyway; F.O.W.L. was headquartered elsewhere and did not count) had adopted a series of increasingly more bizarre lairs as they'd committed various heists, from warehouses to tennis courts to the trailers of parcel delivery trucks.

Today, however, they had menaced the staff of the city's second most prestigious accounting firm out of their cubicles, taking over the thirty-third floor of the skyscraper to count their loot.

This was not regarded as the best aesthetic choice they'd ever made.

"Eurgh." A rat dressed all in yellow, an enormous battery strapped to his back and an electrical outlet on his chest, surveyed his surroundings. "I hate this place. Gives me the creeps. I get these flashes forward like somebody's gonna make me work in one of these if I ever have to stop being a supervillain, and I'd sooner surge and short out than have to do THAT."

"This is booooooring!" a duck dressed in red-and-purple jester's clothes agreed, lying on one of the desks and spinning a top idly. "Couldn't we go somewhere more fun or colorful?"

"Now, now!" This enthusiastic chiding came from a unique being: shaped like an anthropomorphic dog, yet composed completely out of water. "By investing in a budget lair, we can maximize our profits for other endeavors!"

"I'm of two m-minds," the fourth in their group stammered. He, too, cut an interesting figure: he was a duck, in theory, but his flesh was plant matter, deep green throughout, with purple petals gracing the crown of his head and clawed roots for feet. "On one hand, I feel a little out of m-my element so far off the ground. B-b-but on the other, if we're this high up, we should be a lot sssss-safer."

The final member of their alliance gave a low, guttural growl; "You idiots are forgetting the most important thing."

"What's that?" the first four chimed in unison.

Their leader turned to face them. For all intents and purposes, he looked the least strange there: a duck of average height and build, dressed in a yellow jacket. Perhaps the things that stood out the most about his appearance were the black cape and mask he wore. However, he set himself apart from the others not in costume, but by radiating absolute menace in his every word and action. "I picked out this lair," he seethed, "and you're all going to like it or SHUT UP ABOUT IT!"

"Yes, Negaduck," the other four chorused nervously.

"Good," Negaduck purred. "Now, get back to counting my loot."

The jester-duck looked from the pile of cash they'd accumulated in the corner of their cubicle to his boss and back. "Why does it always gotta be youuuuurs?" he whined. "I think we're each entitled to twenty percent. That's just fair play!"

"Equal pay for equal workers!" the water-dog chirped.

"Coming from you?" Negaduck focused on the jester-duck. "That's rich. You're the most useless one here. You practically did nothing. I had to pull your weight. Do I look happy that I had to pull your weight?"

"Hey, I – "

"Sometimes, I don't even know why I keep you around," Negaduck grunted. "You're nowhere near evil enough to follow in my footsteps. At least the others have a kill count."

"Whaddaya mean, not evil?" The jester-duck retrieved a plush banana toy from within his pocket and waved it in Negaduck's face. "You tryin'a say I'm an antihero, Zero?"
"I'm TRYING to say you're lucky I even let you in on the schemes AT ALL, let alone have any of the money!" Negaduck snapped.

"HEY!" the rat broke in. "Don't you talk to him like that!"

"Or what?" Negaduck asked slyly. "You gonna fry me like an egg? You wanna TRY IT?" Though he held no weapon, his glare reminded his subordinate of how quickly that could change.

"N…no…" The rat sweated, swallowing hard. "Just…forget I said anything…"

The jester-duck fired him an almost heartbroken look.

"C-come on, guys!" the plant-duck said nervously. "L-let's not fight! We ran a r-really great heist! Who cares that we d-don't all get a cut? It was f-fun, right?"

"Yeah, I guess," the jester-duck said halfheartedly. He would've agreed with the other half of his heart if this statement had been issued before his skill at villainy was called into question.

"It was a good time!" the rat agreed.

"YOU NITWITS!" Negaduck practically shrieked, leaping up and down. "THIS ISN'T ABOUT FUN! NOW KEEP COUNTING! I WANT A TOTAL IN THE NEXT FIVE MINUTES!"

"Act fast," the water-dog said hurriedly, "and we'll throw in this one-time bonus of NOT GETTING BEATEN TO A PULP!"

The four who weren't Negaduck, because of course Negaduck was above tallying his own spoils, returned to counting:

"One…two…three…"

"Five…six…thirty-two…sixty-seven…eighty-three…seventy-four…"

"URRRGH! STOP SAYING NUMBERS WHILE I'M TRYING TO COUNT! I'LL LOSE MY PLACE! Okay. One…two…three…"

"S-s-s-six…s-s-s-seven…ooh, darn it, I dropped it. Now I gotta start over!"

"Eleven, plus a twenty percent bonus to make – "

"Four…five…twenty…WHAT DID I SAY ABOUT SAYING NUMBERS?"

Negaduck groaned. "Idiots."

From directly to his left, a lilting voice commented, "It is just SO hard to find good villainous help these days, isn't it?"

Instantly, Negaduck turned, drawing a pair of what was either large guns or small missile launchers depending on your classification and aiming both barrels at the speaker. Mozenrath simply gave him a condescending look in return; from behind him, the Huntsman, Hämsterviel, and Mim echoed it.

"You have five seconds to explain who you are, why you're here, and why I shouldn't blow your head off," Negaduck growled.

"Fellow villain," Mozenrath replied dryly. "Business proposition." He then pointed toward Mim. "Talk to her."

"Hello, boys!" Mim waved enthusiastically.

"Wait a minute!" the rat cried. "Is that HER?"

"I think it is!" the jester-duck said with a grin.

"The one!" the dog proclaimed. "The only!"

"M-M-M-M-M – " the plant-duck attempted.

Negaduck finished for him, though instead of saying the name that was the target, he chose instead to go for "MAGICA'S STOOGE."

"EXCUUUUUSE ME?" Mim yelled, almost literal fire in her eyes. "I never took ORDERS from Magica, and I'm never going to! And here I thought you'd be happy to see me, now that she's good and dead, thanks to me! Isn't the enemy of your enemy your friend?"

Negaduck gaped. "You…killed…?"

"So thaaaaat's why we haven't seen her around in a while," the jester-duck said casually.

"I d-don't like this," the plant-duck said in a quivering tone. "If she k-killed her own b-best friend…then what's ssss-stopping her from k-killing us?"

"MAGICA DE SPELL WASN'T MY FRIEND!" Mim insisted. "WE MAY HAVE THOUGHT SHE WAS, BUT SHE WAS A TRAITOR AND A LIAR! I'm on the market for NEW friends! BETTER friends! Friends who want to celebrate being ugly and gruesome and NOT TAKE WHAT'S MINE AWAY FROM ME!"

"Well, I mean, I am pretty ugly," the rat mused. "This could work."

"Awwww, no you're nooooot!" the jester-duck teased. "But we ARE gruesome!"

"I d-d-dunno about that," the plant-duck muttered.

"Strangling those who mock you is hardly false advertising!" the dog proclaimed. "And out of fear for our lives, you have our one hundred percent lifetime guarantee that we will NOT take what's yours!"

He then stretched over to Mozenrath, putting a hand to hide his mouth as he muttered, "The guarantee may become void in the case of violent schism or necessary mutiny."

"…That's a given," Mozenrath told him. "All the same, don't. Just don't."

"So you bumped off the witch," Negaduck said in a relaxed tone as he holstered his weapons. "She took somethin' you wanted, and you weren't happy."

"Whoa," the rat said in awe, "how'd he know that?"

"It was implied," Negaduck seethed. "Idiot."

"Mim, I already don't like this," Mozenrath sighed, looking back at the rat. "That one does NOT look like our brand."

"Oh, hush," Mim told him flippantly. "We're doing this my way. You don't get to complain."

"Actually, by rights, I do," Mozenrath groaned, "but you're still not going to let me, even if I pull rank on you, so I'll ride this ride for a few more cubits."

"Then you came knockin' down the door of the Fearsome Five," Negaduck went on. "Forgive me if I assume you don't have the best of intentions. After all, I never do, and you and me, we're the same kind of people."

"Ohhh, I like this one," Hämsterviel said with glee.

"We want to assimilate YOUR criminal empire into OUR criminal empire," Mim told him confidently.

"I'd call it something a little more spectacular than just a criminal empire," Mozenrath huffed. "More accurately, it's a multi-goal villainous enterprise based around conquest."

"Now that's a sales pitch!" the dog cried.

"Explain to me what makes your people the top dogs," Negaduck said as he folded his arms. "Why should I take orders from you?"

"You've heard of the WHAM ARMY?" Mim posed.

"Nope," Negaduck told her. "Stupid name, if you ask me."

"It's an acronym," the Huntsman and Mozenrath said reflexively.

"Well, let me try this, then," Mim told him with a gleeful smile. "You've heard of the people who stole the Cornerstone of Light up in Disney Town and locked the king out of his own castle?"

"Now, that's startin' to ring some bells," Negaduck told her. "Proceed."

"YOU REALLY DID THAT?" The rat surged forward, practically shoving Negaduck aside, and the very air seemed to spark and pop around him with his enthusiasm. "I'VE ALWAYS WANTED TO MEET THE PEOPLE WHO PULLED THAT OFF! THAT WAS THE GREATEST ROBBERY OF ALL TIME! That poseur thinks it's a lightbulb…it's a FAKE! It doesn't run on traditional electricity! How DARE it assume a high-ranking position in the hierarchy of light-giving devices? You gave it what was coming to it!"

"Mim," Mozenrath reiterated, "I really, really, REALLY have doubts about THAT ONE."

"HE'S MINE, YOU HEAR!" Mim snapped at Mozenrath. She then turned back to Negaduck; "That's just one of our many, many misdeeds committed across hundreds of worlds."

"More accurately, around twenty," the Huntsman muttered.

"But now we're in the midst of a recruitment drive!" Mim went on. "We're after our biggest heist yet: an entire empire! And for that, we're going to need funds! We're going to need manpower, womanpower, duckpower! We're going to need sinister minds backed up by skills and drive! And we're going to need a force that's BETTER THAN THE BEAGLE BOYS!"

"Y'know, with your track record, I just might buy this," Negaduck told her. "What're your terms?"

Mozenrath broke in here: "We want a demonstration of what you can do. Commit a heist with our supervision. Show us your worst. At the end, we split the profits eighty-twenty."

"Eighty-twenty," Negaduck countered, "but the eighty belongs to ME."

"I don't really think you're in a position to bargain here," Mozenrath told him. "This is Mad Madam Mim we're talking about. And she murdered Magica De Spell at the height of her power. That's not even getting into what the Huntsman or I can do."

"EH-HEM," Hämsterviel coughed loudly.

"You're strategy and motivation, and you know it," Mozenrath retorted.

"All right," Negaduck replied, "so you have me outgunned. Good place to start."

"I figured it would be speaking your language," Mim told him.

"B-b-but it's not OUR language!" the plant-duck protested. "Do we just have to work with the threat of you hurting us hanging over our heads?"

"Shuuuuuuut uuuuuuup!" Negaduck groaned at him. "You go where I say you go!"

"Now, now." Mozenrath put up his hands. "Let's everyone just calm down. Violence isn't the only way we solve things. I promise, unfortunately, that back at our base, you'll find people who fit right in with your…less threatening approach. All I ask is that you don't have a squeamish stomach when it comes to murder, and you're willing to pledge loyalty in exchange for big returns."

"Well, I m-mean, I d-d-didn't mind when I…you know…" the plant-duck brought up.

"Need expedient drowning services?" the dog asked. "Not sure where to go for your assassin needs? Find all of these features more right here, in one convenient package!"

"Yeah, I killed a guy once," the rat mused. "…I think. Or maybe I just put him in a coma. …Was it a guy? Can't remember now."

"Don't even ask about him." Negaduck inclined his head toward the jester-duck. "He doesn't have what it takes."

"HEY!" The jester-duck stood up on the desk where he'd been laying, hopping up and down on it angrily. "I DO SO! DO SO, DO SO, DO SO!"

"Mim," Mozenrath whispered, "I only like one of these people."

"Not my problem," Mim whispered back.

So Mozenrath tried a different approach; "George, I only like one of these people."

"They're Mim's prospects," the Huntsman whispered back. "We grin and bear it. Don't think I'm glad she's decided to bring such…MONSTROSITIES on board."

Mim pointed to the jester-duck; "I think I'LL make the call on whether you have what it takes or not!"

That got him to calm down enough to sit back down atop the desk, kicking his legs over the edge. "I'll prove it to you!" he insisted in frustration.

"So!" Mim turned to Negaduck, putting out a hand. "Do we have a deal?"

"Eh…why not?" Negaduck shook the hand firmly. "Been lookin' for some excitement anyway. This old town's startin' to get too small for us."

In the vain hope that he would actually find something redeemable about any one of Negaduck's minions, Mozenrath brought up, "Before we commit, I'd like to see a little demonstration. Who are all of you, and what do you bring to the table?"

"OOH! OOOOOOH!" The rat put up his hand and waggled his fingers. "ME FIRST! ME FIRST!"

"Literally anyone else but him wanna go?" Mozenrath pleaded.

"Let him speak," the Huntsman advised. "You can get it over with."

"Fine," Mozenrath growled. "Who are you?"

"I'm St. Canard's public enemy number three!" the rat boasted, a finger held high in the air. "Liberator of lightbulbs! Master of technology! A literal conductor of electricity! And also, I make a pretty mean strawberry rhubarb pie! I am…MEGAVOLT!"

"All right, Megavolt," Mozenrath replied, still unimpressed. "Show me what you can do."

"Gladly," Megavolt said mischievously. "Let's see…where to start, where to start…oh, I know!"

He extended a finger out to point at the computer on the desk – a model that the Huntsman recognized as being about a decade behind those on his world. A bolt of pure electricity extended from Megavolt's hand to the monitor, powering it immediately and turning the screen to full brightness. It cycled through every file in the database.

"But that's not all!" Megavolt went on. "Watch and be amazed!"

He next pointed both hands at the ceiling, firing twin bolts that hit the covering of the lights overhead and bounced right back down to shock him.

After a good session of twitching and gibbering, Megavolt muttered, "Darn fluorescents…", then hopped up onto the desk beside his jester friend to pry the covering loose. "NOW!" he proclaimed. "WATCH! AND BE AMAZED!"

His strike collided with the bulbs directly, making them shine all the brighter. One had been dead previously, but his power revitalized it.

"But for more heinous applications," Megavolt said casually, "it also works as an offensive attack."

He jumped down off the desk, throwing open a nearby filing cabinet. He threw the files up into the air, then blasted the fluttering papers, burning them up into ashy confetti.

"And it doesn't stop there!" Megavolt went on. "I can control vehicles to do my bidding! Suck the electrical energy out of a living being and use it to power appliances! Design weaponry the likes of which you've never seen, unless you live here and have read the newspaper articles with me on a regular basis, in which case, you've seen them about fifty times!"

"All right…" Mozenrath nodded. "That's slightly more impressive than I was expecting. So, basically, a lightning-based mage with technopathy."

"What?" Megavolt replied. "Nonononono, it's not magic! It's science!"

"It looks like magic to me," Mozenrath told him, "and believe me, I know magic like I know my own right hand."

"But it's not!" Megavolt argued. "See, I got these powers in a freak accident involving a treadmill and an insanely powerful bulb – it was supposed to be a science project – and I was infused with electric charges on a molecular level!"

"A proximity to your affiliation imbued your aura with lightning-based magic," Mozenrath corrected.

"Rrrrgh…" Megavolt clenched his teeth. "ALL MAGIC IS JUST SCIENCE THAT HASN'T BEEN EXPLAINED YET, YOU KNOW!"

Mozenrath flicked his wrist, and Megavolt sailed out of the cubicle to collide softly with the nearest wall ("Ow…I'm okay!").

"Don't ever say those words to me again," Mozenrath seethed. "Ever."

"W-whatever you say, b-boss!" the plant-duck piped up. When Negaduck glared at him, he corrected, "I mean, uh, higher-ranking villain who's n-not the b-boss!"

This was perhaps the first thing Mozenrath didn't really appreciate about Negaduck, but he let it slide. "What's your story?" he asked. "You look like a fairly magical creature."

"Oh, me?" the plant-duck replied. "O-of course! L-loads and l-loads of…m-magic, sure! M-my name is Dr. Reginald B-Bushroot. You can, uh, just call me Bushroot for short. I turned myself into a plant-duck back in m-my old l-lab, and n-now, I have plant powers! W-watch!"

He rushed out of the cubicle, tripping over the downed Megavolt and spilling onto the carpet.

Mozenrath rolled his eyes.

Megavolt and Bushroot disentangled from each other and stood; then Bushroot approached his target, a large potted plant in the corner. He whispered into the plant's leaves, and Mozenrath desperately hoped this was leading somewhere good.

"Marcus?" Bushroot said softly. "Okay." He nodded. Turning back to the others, he said, "Everyone, this is Marcus the Ficus! Say hi, Marcus!"

Before Mozenrath could make any sort of sarcastic complaint, the ficus extended a branch and waved hello.

"…Is that normal on this world?" Mozenrath whispered to Mim.

"Not in this city, at least," Mim replied.

"Marcus," Bushroot asked politely, "could you please take a few steps forward to our guests?"

The ficus hopped, his pot thudding against the carpet, until he stood before Mozenrath and company.

"I'm not exchanging pleasantries with a ficus," Mozenrath grunted.

The ficus drooped.

"It's okay, Marcus!" Bushroot told him. "I still think you're doing great! Now! Grab that computer monitor and throw it out the window!"

"ARE YOU KIDDING ME?" Megavolt shrieked. "WHAT DID THAT INNOCENT MONITOR EVER DO TO YOU?"

"I JUST SAID YOU HAD TO BE OKAY WITH MURDER!" Mozenrath yelled.

"Of PEOPLE, yeah!" Megavolt replied. "Ducks? Dogs? I don't discriminate! But APPLIANCES? Poor, defenseless electronic creatures with no one to stand up for them in this world but me? Listen, I know you're a monster, but I didn't think you were THAT kind of monster!"

"We could use a technopath," the Huntsman whispered into Mozenrath's ear. "Especially given the state of our lack of Tesseract and making do with the pandimensional vortex inducer."

Mozenrath swallowed the rant he'd been about to unleash. "He's lucky I like you so much."

"I don't like standing up for a magical rat one bit, but we must think in terms of practicality."

Bushroot was now negotiating; "Can I have Marcus throw the stapler?"

"Yeah, sure," Megavolt said casually, as though he hadn't been completely incensed two seconds ago. "Right out the window."

"Ooh, maybe it'll hit somebody on the head at the bottom!" The jester-duck doubled over in laughter, rolling on the desk. "That'd be HILARIOUS!"

"Marcus," Bushroot asked, "could you please?"

The ficus wrapped his twigs around a stapler on the desk, brought it to the nearest window, opened said window, and hurled the stapler as far as he could.

(It ended up smacking a certain black-dressed duck villainess who made her career out of using living paint on the head, and the resulting impact gave her inspiration for at least twelve new deadly paintings.)

"Okay, Marcus," Bushroot said. "That's enough."

The ficus shuddered, then held completely still, as though he had never been sapient.

"Really, the plants do whatever I say," Bushroot said shyly, "b-but I always feel like it's b-better to ask n-nicely."

Mozenrath rolled his eyes until they landed on the dog. "You had better show me some bloodthirst."

"Tired of ordinary villains lacking luster?" the dog replied. "Looking for violence and extortion with a sense of refinement and class? Look no further than THE LIQUIDATOR! Now with more con-artist scams for your buck! Or is it more of your bucks that will fall victim to the Liquidator's con-artist scams?"

"I like it so far," Mozenrath said with a nod. "What's the catch?"

"There's no catch!" the Liquidator insisted. "The Liquidator guarantees satisfaction, or you get your money back! Though the warranty will be void if the Liquidator is not used for his intended purpose."

Mozenrath sighed. "He talks like that all the time, doesn't he?"

"And you never get used to it," Negaduck seethed.

"So I'm reading…water mage," Mozenrath observed. "How far is the nautical mileage?"

"Prepare to be wowed by all of these incredible bonus features, absolutely free to you with hiring of this lovable rogue!" the Liquidator replied.

He then proceeded over to the water cooler, filling a paper cup from it.

"Really, this is giving me unpleasant flashbacks to my former day occupation," the Huntsman sighed.

"…Wait, what?" Mozenrath replied.

"In New York," the Huntsman told him, "on the world we had just left, I had to assume a civilian identity by day so as not to draw attention to myself. I ended up in the role of a high-ranking accountant. An incredibly dull position I would be glad never to take up again."

"I never knew this," Mozenrath said with interest. "The Huntsman: pencil-pusher. You're going to have to tell me some of your stories from the water cooler – "

"ENOUGH WITH THE SAPPY SWEET TALK ABOUT YOUR MISERABLE PRE-WHAM-ARMY LIVES!" Hämsterviel broke in, hopping up and down. "WE ARE IN THE MIDST OF A BUSINESS TRANSACTION!"

"And one you won't regret!" the Liquidator promised. "Stand back!"

He stirred the water in the cup with his finger, then let it rise up, becoming a pretzel of liquid rope in the air.

"Good start," Mozenrath said with a nod.

"You should see what I can do with a municipal water line!" the Liquidator bragged. "But wait! There's more!"

He let the water fall back into the cup, then concentrated on it. Within a minute, the sound of a rolling boil could be heard, bubbles nearly spilling over before the bottom of the cup burned right through, the hot water sizzling onto the carpet.

"Now picture that on a city-wide level!" the Liquidator told him.

Mozenrath turned to Negaduck; "Is he just talking himself up, or…?"

"He dried the entire city's water supply up once," Negaduck stated. "First crime he ever committed, and the only one he needed on his résumé before I knew he was gonna be useful. Maybe the only one of these idiots I don't regret."

"Regret is not part of the standard Liquidator package!" the Liquidator insisted. "However, remember: our three other friends are! The Liquidator is not sold separately! But enough about that; let's show off the bonus feature!"

He gathered another cup from the cooler, then splashed it directly at Megavolt.

Megavolt braced himself; "HeyheyheyHEY – "

The water solidified into a hard white substance pooled around the rat's boot, holding him down.

"HARD WATER!" the Liquidator bragged as behind him, Megavolt struggled and failed to pry his foot up out of it. "Useful for droughts! Impromptu projectiles! Holding your enemies in place!"

"And – friends – apparently – " Megavolt grunted.

"But with a snap of my fingers," the Liquidator stated, "the hard water returns to a completely sanitary and drinkable state!"

He snapped, and the hard water liquified, spraying up onto Megavolt. This had the effect of shorting him out, which was a rather impressive display of him radiating blue energy while shuddering and moaning in pain.

"D-don't worry," Bushroot said quickly. "Th-this happens to him at l-least three t-times a week."

When Megavolt cooled off, smoke rising from his body, he grunted, "Great. Now I gotta go recharge." He stormed off to the nearest wall outlet, producing from his belt pocket an extension cord that he plugged into both his chest plate and the wall so that he could regenerate electricity. There, he sat cross-legged, waiting impatiently for full recovery.

Mozenrath turned to the last of them: the jester-duck, who was still sitting on the desk, legs kicking excitedly. "And you?" Mozenrath asked.

"Don't even bother," Negaduck grunted.

"This is my mission, and I say we're bothering!" Mim huffed. She then turned to the final duck, giving him a smile that was her best attempt to appear sincere; "Go ahead, dearie."

"Me?" the duck laughed, even though nothing seemed particularly funny about the situation. "Oh, you don't wanna know about little old me…"

The plush banana came back out, and in a falsetto voice, the duck made it talk; "Hey! You're messin' with none other than Quackerjack, Mack! He's a pretty tough cookie!"

"Greeeeaaaat," Mozenrath droned. "He pretends puppets are alive."

"Puppets?" Quackerjack made the toy say. "I'm no puppet! I got no strings to hold me down! No, I'm Mr. Banana Brain, a limited-edition Quackerjack Toys plush doll who was meant to hit the market in droves but got my line unfortunately cut off by the release of…" Quackerjack's tone turned foul: "VIDEO GAMES."

"So you made toys," Mozenrath figured, "got driven out of the business…aaaand decided supervillainy was your next career move."

Mr. Banana Brain was pocketed. "Well, it just seemed like the most fun," Quackerjack said with a shrug. "Besides, making toys lent itself really well to being a supervillain!"

"I'm looking forward to you explaining that," Mozenrath told him. "Tentatively."

Quackerjack brought out the top he'd been playing with earlier. "See?" he said excitedly.

"It's…a top," Mozenrath sighed.

"Go on, go on!" Quackerjack pushed it toward him. "Give it a spin!"

"Do I have to?"

"Do it," Mim growled.

"Fine." Mozenrath used his left hand to spin the top on the palm of his right. "Are you happy?"

"Now press that little button on the top!" Quackerjack was barely restraining a giggle fit. "But be careful!"

Mozenrath gingerly did as he was told.

A set of razor-sharp blades popped out of the top, spinning around with it.

"All right, that was pleasantly surprising," the sorcerer admitted. "So you're a gadgetry specialist."

"Oh, yes!" Quackerjack nodded. "I've got all kinds of things! Jacks that are filed to needlepoints, teddy bears stuffed with time bombs, and, ohohohohoooo, I just love souping up wind-up chattering teeth!"

Mozenrath handed the top back over. "So basically, if I stick you and Megavolt in the same lab, it might equate out to one decent technician."

"Megsy and I go together like peanut butter and marshmallows!" Quackerjack affirmed.

"Am I the peanut butter or the marshmallows in this analogy?" Megavolt asked from the corner where he was plugged in.

"Peanut butter," Quackerjack told him.

"But I wanted to be marshmallooooooows!"

Mr. Banana Brain was withdrawn to tell him, "Tough luck, Chuck!"

"Y'know," Megavolt grunted, "you could just tell me that yourself without involving the middleman."

Meanwhile, the Huntsman was muttering, "Spinning tops of doom. I'm certain I've seen that before."

"I'll be honest," Mozenrath admitted, "as far as fitting the brand goes, only one of you fills the bill." He looked to Negaduck. "This team has one brain cell, and it's in your head."

"Darn right," Negaduck confirmed.

"However," Mozenrath went on, "your talents are admittedly useful to a point. We'll have to field-test them before we make the final call. But…"

"We'd LOVE to have you all on the team!" Mim chirped. "Consider us sold!"

"MIM!" Mozenrath rounded on her. "WHAT ARE YOU DOING?"

"Annoying you," she said plainly. "And also getting us capable warriors in the process."

Mozenrath's brow twitched. "Okay, fine. FINE. But we're still doing the heist. We need the cash for the you-know-what."

"B-b-but you said we all get a cut, right?" Bushroot asked.

"I did," Mozenrath promised, "and you do. Take it as a gesture of good faith. However, the majority will go right into my coffer."

Negaduck didn't like the sounds of that one bit, but he figured if he played along, he could find a way to sway Mozenrath later – with words or with weapons. "Deal," he growled. "You're now part owner of the Fearsome Five. Just don't be as big of an idiot as four-fifths of the team."

"I can unfortunately make no promises regarding the rest of the WHAM ARMY," Mozenrath sighed.

"Oh, this is going to be SO much fun!" Mim was twirling round and round again. "I haven't had a good bank heist since – well, she who mustn't be named! AND THIS TIME, WON'T BE, THAT HORRIBLE MAGICA DE SPELL! Let there be bombs! Let there be guns! Let there be ROBBERY!"

"Oh, believe me," Negaduck replied, "this is gonna be a real blast."

...

The house that stood before Vexen, Ravess, Yzma, Wuya, Zevon, and Lady Caine was a paradox. By all rights, it should have been a small house. It only had a few rooms: enough for a family of three to live comfortably if tightly. (Or a widower who had lost his child to live a lonely life that involved converting the child's bedroom into a storage facility for crystals.)

Yet it was five times as large proportionately as any house the five would have imagined with this floor plan.

"So he's a giant," Yzma said dryly. "You know, you could have mentioned that earlier, when we were plotting the break-in. …I now understand why you shot down the idea of the bear trap. This man is much larger than a bear."

"This should change very little," Ravess scoffed. "Gundstaff – "

"One question," Wuya broke in. "Did you or did you not obscure information on purpose to get us to agree to what seemed like an easy job?"

"That isn't important!" Ravess snapped.

"Seems important to me." Wuya folded her arms.

"And, I mean, it's not like we would've said no anyway," Lady Caine pointed out. "Taking on impossible odds is kind of our wheelhouse."

"DROP THE SUBJECT!" Vexen commanded.

"As I was SAYING," Ravess went on, "Gundstaff is a former supplier who the Cyclonians had in our thrall. We gave him a couple…shall we say…warning shots to show him what might happen if he refused. Well, then he got to talking to the local HEROES – "

"And he refused anyway," Yzma sighed.

"Been there," Wuya commented, "done that, got the T-shirt." She snapped her fingers, and such a shirt that read "I SURVIVED GUAN'S BETRAYAL" slipped on over her bodice.

"So now he supplies THEM at their whim," Ravess went on, "and refuses to do business with any associates of Cyclonia…or anyone who seems like a shady character at all."

"For a large guardian," Vexen went on, "we will need a large diversion. I leave this task to you, Wuya."

"Any specifications?" Wuya asked.

"I don't care," Vexen told her, on the brink of exasperation. "A house fire. An alarm clock that won't stop ringing. An entire disco. Be creative."

"You asked for it. I'm going to make you remember that."

Vexen decided not to let that haunt him. "The rest of us will go for our goal. As many varying types of crystals as you can manage."

"For the last time!" Yzma groaned. "Let me come up with a PLAN! Then we won't be going in blind!"

"I'd sooner walk straight into their clutches," Vexen hissed. "Now let us proceed."

They split up, Wuya going around front and the rest heading to the rear of the house, where Vexen created a stairway of ice to lead them up to the back window. (No handrails, but Ravess had suspiciously managed to come across some nonslip mountain-climber's boots at one of the stops en route.) The window was pried open, revealing the positively massive storeroom. Vexen had never personally seen the interior of the Cave of Wonders, but he supposed it must look something like this, with walls and walls of glittering jewels of all colors neatly sorted by type.

Needless to say the actual Cave of Wonders would have irritated him a fair bit.

Through the door into the living room, the squad could see the enormous Gundstaff, a positively giant gray-haired man, sitting down to eat a bowl of soup for supper.

"Wait for it," Vexen hissed. "We move on her diversion."

"And how will we know what her diverstraction is?" Zevon whispered back.

"I literally just said the word," Vexen replied. "You could just repeat it."

"Repeatitate what?"

"Never mind!"

"Oh, don't you worry, Zevon." Yzma patted her son's shoulder. "You'll know a Wuya diversion when you see it."

All at once: an almost blinding array of rainbow-colored strobing lights. A disco ball descended from the ceiling, reflecting them into shards of luminescence that bounced around that adjacent room. At the same time, a loud, repetitive shrieking of a beep that assaulted the ears. And a flickering source of light that was far less benign than the strobes, accompanied by the telltale sounds of fire devouring a paper surface.

"WHAT IS THIS?" Gundstaff cried.

Vexen sighed, shaking his head. "Of course. Everything I suggested at once."

"That's my girl," Yzma said with a wide grin.

As Gundstaff scurried about the living room, attempting to put out the fire, hush the hidden alarm clock, and avoid having a complete panic at the disco, the others slunk into the storeroom, clambering from crystal receptacle to crystal receptacle on bridges of ice.

"Okay, so lemme see if I remember my homework," Lady Caine mused, holding up a purple crystal. "This is a Solar Crystal, right?"

"WRONG!" Vexen barked. "That is a Leech Crystal! Be CAREFUL what others you get it close to! It will absorb their energy and then return it in the form of an explosion! On second thought, wave it where you please. It might be refreshing to weed out the irresponsible."

"Geez," Lady Caine groaned, "I get it. Be careful." She pocketed it. "But the solar crystals were the ones that sucked up the sun to make energy, right?" Then, in a mutter: "Should see if they work on Princess Sunshine."

"Yes," Ravess sighed. "Very good. You've just won all the points at match-the-cards."

"Wait a minute," Yzma realized. "A Solar Crystal versus a Leech Crystal…yes! Yes, I can see it now!"

Vexen, Ravess, and Lady Caine all groaned. Zevon yelled "YES!".

"We fill countless Solar Crystals with solar energy," Yzma rambled. "Then we position a cluster of Leech Crystals in such a manner that they will leech all of that energy and explode on the grounds outside the palace. We use bomb after bomb of this exact sort to blow our way completely through the underground of Terra Vapos until we have created a secret passageway! Now, the enemy will no doubt hear the noise coming, so we will have to plant a rumor beforehand that the Terra is going to play host to a festival of highly illegal fireworks. This will not only put our foes on a goose chase for fireworks that don't exist, but also give us a cover – "

"JUST STOP!" Vexen cried. "We are NOT DOING THAT!"

"Besides, there's ALREADY a subterranean cavern network beneath Terra Vapos!" Ravess groaned. "The STORM HAWKS had to fill it up to stop monsters from coming out and razing the city! We don't need to make another one!"

"…So what you're saying is my plan is already half complete," Yzma commented.

"NO!" Vexen shrieked. "THAT IS NOT WHAT WE ARE SAYING!"

"All we need to do now is to figure out how to cover up the noise from the explosionation!" Zevon cried.

"Look, I'm still not sure why we can't just attack them head-on," Lady Caine sighed. "Just because SOME of us get triggered – "

"Do you WANT us to tip off Gundstaff to your presence and ONLY your presence?" Ravess hissed.

"I'm just saying we could coordinate a better attack this time," Lady Caine went on, rolling her eyes. "It's pretty much a straight shot from the throne room to the treasure room anyway. It wouldn't be that hard to get past them."

"You fail to account for our escape," Vexen informed her. "Once we have the crystal in hand, we will only have the way we came to exit."

"Unless we explosionated the treasure room floor into those tunnels!" Zevon chirped.

"We are NOT DOING THAT!" Ravess growled. "We are finding ANOTHER WAY to get around Maleficent's henchpeople!"

"But seriously, we're failing this bad against just the henchpeople?" Lady Caine sighed.

"Really, what idea sounds better?" Yzma asked. "Fighting them head-on like Lady Caine said, or taking a more subtle route like I suggested?"

"Obviously the subtle route," Vexen sighed, "but the problem is your route is not subtle! It will STILL involve an explosive force from the inside, which will lead to a fight either way! We may as WELL have agents on the outside to – "

He stopped midsentence.

"What?" Ravess asked. "What is it?"

"HALF the party serves as a diversion," Vexen rambled, "while the other half creates the escape route…no. Still too obvious. Yet it does seem to me that Yzma, Wuya, and Zevon would make a better advance party than a retrieval party."

"Unless it wasn't obvious," Ravess realized. "Lady Caine, you said it was practically a straight shot from the throne room to the treasure room?"

"Uh, yeah," Lady Caine replied. "What does that have to do with anything?"

"You're not suggesting…" Vexen realized.

"I do so hate how I'm going to end up validating Yzma with this," Ravess sighed. "However, it seems her runaround plan may not have been a complete waste of time after all."

"Then we must hurry," Vexen insisted, "before the sun has fully set!"

Wuya found the others out back of Gundstaff's home, holding up a set of Solar Crystals to the nearly blood-red setting sun. "…learned that from me, you know," Vexen was explaining. "The boy would have had no inkling of the wavelengths of colors in light if not for me."

"No one cares why the sun sets red!" Lady Caine snapped.

"What are we doing?" Wuya asked, her "I SURVIVED GUAN'S BETRAYAL" shirt flapping in the breeze.

"Acting upon Mother's extraceptional plan!" Zevon explained.

Wuya was silent for a moment, trying to figure out how to word her reply. She then decided to forgo subtlety: "I'm just going to admit I never thought I'd see that happen again."

"REALLY?" Yzma replied.

"Let's just go with that you're too visionary for the common man," Wuya stated dryly.

"…I'll take it," Yzma muttered.

The plan was explained, and Wuya admitted it seemed almost foolproof – "Which is good, given how many of us here are fools. And yes, I'm including Vexen and Ravess in that."

"Can you say anything without snarking?" Ravess snapped.

"Can you say anything without condescending?" Wuya retorted. She lifted her feet off the ground, floating around front of Ravess to tap the violinist's forehead; "Sounds strangely hollow in there for a supposed genius." Tap, tap, tap.

Ravess swatted Wuya away; "Leave me alone with your lies!"

"Suit yourself," Wuya told her. "Now, let's get over to Vapos so we can initiate the final act before next sunrise."

Vexen cast the Corridor, and he, Ravess, Lady Caine, Zevon, and Yzma all strode through. But Wuya held back for a moment to chuckle to herself.

She hadn't just poked Ravess to annoy her. She'd been overcome by curiosity, and she simply had to figure out what they were really chasing, since it obviously wasn't the Corona gem. Now that she'd made the contact, she knew the truth. She allowed herself one mutter of "Interesting. Very interesting…" before following her fellows.

...

A small crowd had gathered in the newly-furnished television room of Radiant Garden's castle, where Kazuichi had been encouraged to sit down on the couch while others fussed around him.

"Seriously, why are you all so set on making me not like Miss Mim anymore?" he asked. "Can't you just let me go with her?"

"No," Aqua told him firmly. "We can't. And we won't. She's dangerous."

"Yeah, but that's why she's so great!" Kazuichi sighed, nearly swooning on the couch.

"Why did you do it, Kazuichi?" Jasmine asked, anger seeping through her tone. "I spelled out why you should NOT use a love potion on anyone. You told me you understood. And you went through with it anyway."

"Because you came back!" Kazuichi told her. "Our secret, remember?"

"Our…secret?" Jasmine repeated.

"You TOLD me how Aladdin lied to you when you first met!" Kazuichi reminded – or thought he reminded – Jasmine. "You told me how Sonia liked me anyway, and this was just destiny! Sorry, but you were so totally wrong. Miss Mim's my only destiny!"

"What?" Aladdin cried. "Lying to Jasmine was the WORST thing I ever did! The only reason she and I were able to fall in love was because I STOPPED lying and was myself!"

"Yeah, that sounds more like something I'd do than something he ever did," Sadira butted in. "The love potion stuff, I mean. And if you knew me back when, you'd know that's not a good thing."

"But more importantly," Jasmine said with suspicion, "I never said anything like that to you."

"More of Mim's trickery!" Merlin raged. "She can take on any of our forms, you know! Likely she doubled back in your guise to sway him!"

"That's not fair!" Kairi cried. "We trust our friends!"

"How are we supposed to keep working if these villains can look exactly like people we trust?" Nani asked in frustration.

"I think the key is to remember how well we know our friends," Ienzo posed. "For example, Jasmine would never suggest using magic to force a relationship, not after experiencing victimization to that very crime."

"WE CANNOT BE SCARED OF EVERYONE WE MEET!" Papyrus insisted. "THAT WILL GET US NOWHERE! WE WILL HAVE TO RELY ON OUR SUPERIOR INTUITIONS TO TELL FRIEND FROM FOE! FOR EXAMPLE, I ALWAYS KNOW THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN SOMEONE COMING IN TO GIVE ME A HUG AND SOMEONE COMING IN TO STAB ME IN THE CHEST! AND I AM SURE THAT I WILL NEVER BE FOOLED BY SUCH AN IMPORTANT DISTINCTION!"

"Okay, doubts about Papyrus' intuition aside, he's right," Mal said. "Unless we get a clear way to dispel glamour, which we probably can't do without disabling everyone's magic, we might as well just keep going. No use getting paranoid if there's nothing we can do. We just need to stay sharp if someone's acting out of character."

"And unfortunately, Mal is correct," Merlin stated. "There isn't a good way to dispel glamour or shapeshifting without draining this entire kingdom of magic. First of all, we're already in no place to do that as far as public relations go. But more importantly, while I advocate relying on magic to do dirty work as little as possible, magic plays an important role in the lives of those who dwell in this kingdom. To take it away would be to remove part of them, and to deprive them of useful tools for protection and daily life."

"Can we focus on the problem in front of us?" Lianna snapped. "Kazuichi is still under Mim's spell, and he will surely walk into her clutches and his own doom if not stopped!"

"Not to mention betray all of us," Mal chimed in. "Just sayin'."

"Can't we all just get along?" Kazuichi whined.

"I mean, I could try some sand mesmerism," Sadira suggested. "Usually, sand mesmerism works best against other sand mesmerism, but this is actually a spell I cast once, and that's how it got broken, so, I mean…"

"What about an anti-love spell?" Mal asked. "Those are pretty common, right?"

Merlin sighed. "Alas, while sand mesmerism and anti-love potions would work against most low-level spells, Mim's concoction is potent. The heart emblems in Kazuichi's eyes betray the strength. She did not cut corners brewing this one. I'm afraid there's only one thing that will break the spell at all: an act of true love."

"TRUE LOVE'S KISS?" Kazuichi cried. "MISS MIM, HERE I COME!"

He made to leap off the couch, but Aqua seized his shoulders and forced him to sit back down. "NO, YOU DO NOT GO THERE," she growled.

"Guyyyyys," Kazuichi whined, "why can't you just let me go to Miss Mim? It's not like you need me around here fucking things up anyway. I'm not gonna betray you! Promise!"

"Do you think she even LOVES you?" Nani asked.

"I'm not sure what she would love about me," Kazuichi admitted, "but she's gotta! I mean, she set this whole potion thing up, right? And you said it was a complicated spell, so she worked for this! She's wanted this for a long time! It's destiny! How can I not let it happen?"

Sonia Nevermind had been withdrawn, leaning against a wall, arms wrapped around herself, for most of this conference. However, at that sentence, she took one loud, firm step forward, getting everyone's attention.

"Do you not see?" she cried. "Mim may want you, but that does not mean the two of you are any good together! She only wants you as a possession because of how you look! She does not understand you! She will not treat you properly! You are fulfilling no one's destiny! You are merely bowing to a command that should never have been given!"

She was well aware that she was crying by the end, and, ashamed of her tears but more importantly afraid of what might happen if she remained in that room a moment longer, she had turned to make an escape, bolting out of the room.

Down the twisting square hallways of the lower level, Sonia crumpled, sitting with her back to the wall as she sobbed openly.

The sound of soft footfalls. "Sonia? Are you okay?"

Sonia looked up through bleary eyes to see a blur of teal. "Jasmine…I am very much not."

Jasmine sat down beside Sonia, settling her back against the same wall. "You can talk about it if you want." Though she already knew.

"I do not know if that is diplomatic," Sonia replied. "After all, you and Kazuichi are good friends."

"Just because I'm Kazuichi's friend doesn't mean that I have to agree with everything he does," Jasmine told Sonia. "It also doesn't mean I can't be yours independent of him. I'm a little angry at him, myself. I don't blame you for that."

"What Mim has done to him," Sonia sobbed, "this mindless obeisance, this loss of individuality…he was going to do it to me. He wanted to change me into what he is now. How can I ever trust him again? I had wanted to be his friend, but now…I do not know if I can bear to even speak to him after this!"

Jasmine thought it over. "Well, first of all, I don't know if he thought of it like that," she stated. "I'm not trying to change your mind. But I do want to help you feel safe. Mim wanted a slave. Kazuichi…doesn't think things through. He heard of an easy way to make something he'd dreamed about come true, and he didn't think about what that would mean for you. But I don't think he ever meant to hurt you. All the same, what he did would have hurt you if it had done what Mim advertised. And he should've known that. When all of this is over…if you don't think you can talk to him again, I would say just talk to him one more time to explain that. And if he doesn't listen, I'll smack some sense into him, and I'll make sure it takes this time. This castle is big enough for the two of you to have your space. You'll still have to see each other, but you won't really need to interact one-on-one."

"Why did it have to come to this?" Sonia sobbed. "My heart is breaking for the friend I lost in him, and yet I know I cannot welcome him as such!"

"I'm sorry," Jasmine told her. "It hurts. It isn't easy. Friendship…isn't always as simple as people like Sora make it out to be. But I promise you will feel better again after some time. With or without Kazuichi."

"Do you still intend to befriend him?" Sonia asked softly. "I do not mean to drive a rift between the two of you. I am merely curious."

"I do," Jasmine told her. "I'm still not happy with him. But I think deep down, there's enough of him that I like that I want to see if I can make things work. Maybe he puts up the front that you're his whole world, but I know that's not the whole story. But that does not mean you have to forgive him. After all, it was you who was almost on the line. And if you don't mind me dividing my time between the two of you, I'll be here for you whenever you want to talk."

"Oh, thank you," Sonia said shakily. "Please – do not abandon him – but I do not want you to abandon me – "

"I can multitask," Jasmine told her with a smile.

"May we discuss something else, please?" Sonia asked. "I do not want to think about him anymore."

"You know," Jasmine realized, "I don't know much about the kingdom you were raised to rule. I know that might not be the best topic either, but – "

"The Novoselic Kingdom was beautiful before it fell," Sonia said immediately. "It was slightly outdated, however. I had thought to make changes when I assumed the throne. Changes for the better. After all, the people deserved a ruler who would give a fuck!"

Jasmine, caught off guard by the sudden curse, couldn't hide her laugh, and that set Sonia off giggling as well. "Truly, I do not mind telling you about it," Sonia said pleasantly, her tears beginning to dry. "It is gone, lost to despair. However, thinking about it gives me a strange sense of feeling as though I am home."

"So what were some of the changes you were going to make?" Jasmine asked.

"To start, the treatment of animals for ritual," Sonia began. "I am the first royal of Novoselic to not undergo the ritual of assuming adulthood by consuming a Skong."

Back in the television room, the conversation still ran hot as to how to fix Kazuichi's mental state. "How can we get him into an act of true love if he's never been in true love?" Kairi asked.

"I AM IN TRUE LOVE!" Kazuichi insisted. "WITH MISS MIM!"

Most of the room yelled back, "NO, YOU'RE NOT!"

"Ahem," Merlin cleared his throat to get back to Kairi's question. "Fortunately, true love is not relegated to the romantic sense. True love can be found among family members and even the best of friends. I do fear, however, that none of us in this castle has known our Kazuichi long enough to have forged a friendship that strong with him."

"What about on his own world?" Kairi asked.

"Look, I don't want you to get ANYWHERE making me not love Miss Mim anymore," Kazuichi grumbled, "so you might as well know that I don't even have any family left, and they never liked me anyway!"

"…What even happened where you came from?" Aqua asked, suddenly perturbed.

"DID YOU KNOW THAT SOMETIMES, TORNADOES PICK UP SEAWATER WITH FISH IN IT, AND THIS RESULTS IN FISH BEING RAINED ONTO THE PLANET?" Papyrus said quickly.

Everyone stared at him in disbelief.

Papyrus shrugged; "IT'S JUST AN INTERESTING FACT I THOUGHT WAS WORTH BRINGING UP!" More like the only thing he could think of to get the subject off of Kazuichi's past as a Remnant of Despair. He made a resolution to get better at improv.

"Well, you've gotta have friends back there, right?" Aladdin guessed.

"Yeah!" Kazuichi said without thinking. "I've got Hajime, of course, and then Akane and Fuyuhiko – heeeyyy, wait a minute! You're tryin' to get one of them to do…whatever they need to do to erase my eternal love for Miss Mim! Well, you know what? I don't give a fuck 'cause it won't work anyway! Miss Mim and I were meant to be, and none of your true-love-whatever is gonna change that!"

"It seems we may have to arrange for a visit to Kazuichi's homeworld," Merlin mused. "Those three, Hajime, Akane, and Fuyuhiko, may be the only chance we have to break the spell."

Then Aeleus burst into the room, which was an event that never went unnoticed. The fact that he looked flustered, even frightened, put a chill through everyone present.

"What's going on?" Nani asked.

Aeleus put out his hand. "This."

He held a DVD box set, several discs thick. Its title was obscured by a paper taped to the cover, filled with writing.

"It came for him," Aeleus clarified, pointing to Kazuichi.

"MISS MIM MUST HAVE GIVEN ME A GIFT!" Kazuichi cried, bouncing up and down in his seat.

"We can hardly trust anything of the sort!" Merlin huffed. "Aeleus, who delivered it to you?"

"Nobody," Aeleus replied, as though this were a grand revelation.

"Nobody?" Merlin raised a brow. "Aeleus, SOMEBODY had to have given you – "

"A Nobody," Aeleus clarified. "Dusk."

"The WHAM ARMY doesn't use those," Aladdin realized.

"Not even Even," Merlin mused, "and he would be most likely. No, he has seemed to want to sever all ties with his former Organization – which, knowing Even, tracks with his behavior. I now fear for this venture for entirely different reasons."

"What is it?" Aqua asked, stepping forward to take the box.

"Careful!" Merlin warned. "You don't know what enchantment may be placed there!"

"It doesn't look enchanted," Aqua remarked as she peeled away the paper.

"It looks like a DVD set," Mal volunteered. "Can I see that?"

Aqua handed her the paper, and Mal scanned it. "They're time marks for each of the discs," the young witch observed. "Like…scenes we're supposed to watch? Seven discs, and the seventh one, we just watch straight through."

Aqua turned the case over in her hands. "New DanganRonpa V3," she read from the cover. "What does that mean?"
"Bullet Argument?" Kazuichi translated. "No, it's more like…the first part's 'bullet,' but the second part's, like, when somebody makes an argument, and then you're like, no, that's bullshit…"

"Refutation," Merlin stated.

"It has nothing to do with what people think of you," Kazuichi argued. "It's about being right in an argument!"

Merlin shook his head. "When this is over, I am putting you under my tutelage for vocabulary at least."

"That still doesn't make any sense." Aqua passed the case to Mal. "You seem to know what this box is."

"Yeah," Mal confirmed. "Ienzo rigged the TV up to play these."

"How strange," Ienzo muttered. "The sensible thing to do seems to be to ignore this altogether. It can only lead to trouble. And yet…why would the mysterious sender put such detailed instructions if they could so easily be cast aside? I wonder if destroying this…message…would bring about worse consequences than watching it."

"Oh, no, you don't!" Merlin chided at him. "I've hopped around to enough worlds with these contraptions, and they're prime material for curses! All who look at the screen are doomed with no return!"

"We'll all watch it together," Nani reminded him. "It'll have to be safe then."

"That's the best way to all get CURSED together," Merlin argued.

"Hang on." Aladdin retrieved his GummiPhone. "I think I can solve this." He tapped in a number, then waited.

Jasmine's face filled his screen; "Aladdin?"

"Hey, Jasmine," Aladdin greeted. "Everything going okay out there?"

"Hi!" Sadira chirped, leaning into the frame to wave.

"Things are going…as well as they can," Jasmine replied. "How about on your end?"

"One of those Nobodies just showed up and gave Aeleus a weird package," Aladdin told her. "It might be cursed, but we're also kind of afraid something bad might happen if we ignore it. I thought maybe, since you're outside the room, you should know, and that way – "

Jasmine nodded. "If anything happens to you, I'll be able to get help."

"How long should this take?" Aladdin asked Mal.

"This person marked a lot of stuff," Mal replied. "It might take us a while to get through this."

"I'll text you updates," Aladdin told her. "If you don't hear from me in too long, then maybe get worried."

"I understand," Jasmine replied. "Good luck."

"I think we'll need it."

Once the connection was dropped, Aladdin nodded at Merlin. "Let's do it."

"Very well," Merlin sighed. "But don't say I didn't warn any of you!"

"You don't have to watch with us," Aqua reminded him.

"Of course I do!" Merlin spat. "I'm not about to ABANDON you to a horrid fate! Forge ahead!"

Mal slipped the DVD into the player, then, on a whim, snapped her fingers to dim the lights. "…Atmosphere," she said with a cheeky smile.

A strange sort of introduction was beginning to play out onscreen, with a round logo citing Team DanganRonpa as the creator of this masterpiece giving way to a pink bullet that began to travel through psychedelic graphics. Mal paid it no mind, quickly fast-forwarding. "The first mark is…here."

When she let it play, everyone held their breath, waiting to see what their mysterious sender had so desperately wanted them to know.

The camera had been following a blonde girl and a boy with deep blue hair, both looking to be in their teens, racing through the hallways of a decrepit building. They burst into a gymnasium, out of breath, to see a crowd of fellow teenagers, all wearing school uniforms of different cuts.

At the head of the crowd, a tall, thin boy with purple hair that spiked up tall from his head and a slight goatee hurried forward to greet the pair. "Did you all get chased by that monster, too?" he asked in concern.

And Kazuichi screamed a scream of the damned.

"WHAT THE FUUUUUCK!" he shrieked at the screen as conversation continued among the sixteen. "NO! NO, NO, NO, NO!"

"Is this a curse?" Kairi cried.

"No," Merlin said in concern. "There's nothing magical going on here…"

"Kaito," Kazuichi babbled, tears dribbling down his cheeks. "No, no, no…God dammit…Kaito…"

"Who is Kaito?" Lianna asked.

Kazuichi shook his head. "No…it can't be him…it can't FUCKIN' BE HIM…"

The teens discussed how sixteen of them had arrived in the gym. The purple-haired boy, apparently Kaito, asked, "Anyway, why does it matter if there are sixteen of us? There might be more coming."

"Sixteen – " Kazuichi gasped. "No, no, fuckin' NO – "

More eye-catching things happened. Giant mechanical suits arrived in the gym, their pilots teasing about how to violently murder the youths that stood before them. Then the suits opened up, their pilots popped out, and Kazuichi leapt up off the couch, wild-eyed.

Nani and Aqua were quick to restrain him, one per arm, afraid he would hurt himself. He looked about ready to rip the television off the wall and smash it.

"LET ME GO!" he screamed as he struggled. "LET ME GO! THOSE THINGS ARE LITTLE MONOKUMAS! THERE'S SIXTEEN OF 'EM! IT'S ANOTHER KILLING GAME! IT'S ANOTHER FUCKING KILLING GAME! I DUNNO HOW IT HAPPENED WITHOUT US KNOWING, BUT IT'S A KILLING GAME, AND KAITO'S GONNA DIE, HE'S GONNA DIE IN THIS GODDAMN GAME – "

"Please calm down!" Aqua yelled.

"It's already been recorded!" Nani added. "There isn't anything we can do!"

Kairi's eyes were fixated on the mechs' pilots: five tiny plush bears, obviously animated by internal mechanisms (or magic), each a different vibrant color. They introduced themselves as the "Monokubs," and Kairi softly repeated the word Kazuichi had screamed: "Monokumas."

"H-hey," Kaito asked onscreen, "what's up with these stuffed animals? How are they moving?"
"GET OUT OF THERE!" Kazuichi screamed. "GET OUT! YOU GOTTA GO! YOU'RE GONNA DIE! YOU'RE GONNA FUCKIN' DIE, AND I CAN'T…lose you…again…"

He finally relaxed, but Nani and Aqua didn't let go, gently guiding him back to the couch and holding him there, sitting to either side of him. "It's going to be okay," Nani told him.

"No…" Kazuichi shook his head fervently. "It's not…he wasn't supposed to be fuckin' alive…"

He trailed off into soft whimpers, and the others watched events play out onscreen, incredibly curious. The Monokubs distributed new clothing to the assembled teens; Kaito donned a purple jacket with an interior patterened with stars and nebulae, his pants a matching shade of violet and his T-shirt white with a purple design. Then the tiny bears activated a light of sorts, and everyone was bequeathed a "first memory," as they put it.

The camera reset to the blonde and the blue-haired boy who had originally been in the shot, this time relocated to a smaller room overgrown with ivy and lacking in light. The Monokubs reappeared, telling the pair to go out and explore the building, and they began to do so, finding each of the other students who had been with them in the gym.

"I think I'm supposed to skip to the next mark now," Mal muttered. "But…"

"Kazuichi," Aqua said softly. "Who's Kaito? Why are you afraid?"

"Kaito," Kazuichi panted. "Kaito Momota. He was…my best friend. Before Hope's Peak. When we were in middle school together. He was so confident, and I always wanted to be like him. He was colorful, and he stood out. Not like me back then. I was chickenshit. But he made me feel like I could be something…something important. He always called me his 'sidekick.' It was just a joke, but I still felt like it meant he could see how great I could really be, y'know? He wanted to be an astronaut. He wanted – he KNEW he'd travel through space one day. And we would always talk about rocket ships, and he said he was gonna let me build the one that took him up.

"But then…then he didn't study for the test, and I let him copy my answers. He got caught and I took the fall. He stopped talking to me. I freaked out. I didn't have anyone else. All I ever had was Kaito. My family was shitty, and I couldn't work up the nerve to talk to anyone else in school. When he cut me off, I lost everything. I changed my hair and I started wearing the contacts – all the stuff I told Lianna about. She knows.

"That…that can't be him, though. He wasn't supposed to still be alive. He died…he fuckin' died, and I saw it…" Kazuichi was once more overcome by tears. "I fuckin' saw it…"

"Perhaps what you saw was not what you thought you saw," Merlin suggested. "The young man seems to have survived – "

"I KNOW WHAT I FUCKIN' SAW!" Kazuichi screamed. "I'M THE ONE WHO FUCKIN' KILLED HIM! WITH MY OWN HANDS!"

Everyone except Papyrus regarded Kazuichi with an expression of sheer horror. After a short silence, punctuated only by the blonde girl onscreen chatting with a fellow blonde who donned goggles and a pink uniform, Papyrus broke in; "YOU KNOW, I KNOW ALL SORTS OF OTHER FUN FACTS ABOUT FISH, WEATHER, AND BOTH COMBINED! DID YOU KNOW – "

"Shut up," Kazuichi said softly yet firmly. "You don't have to do this. You guys…you gotta know. I did a lot of fucked-up stuff. You think Riku fucked up? You think Stork fucked up? I have it on all of 'em. I'm…trying so hard to be better. That's why I cut off…that's why I did a lot of things. I made a bad choice because I was scared and sad and I felt like nobody loved me. I got involved with the wrong person. I let her talk me into doing bad things, really bad things I never thought I could do…and Kaito was the person who started it all. That's what I thought. I thought I never would've reached that level of despair if he hadn't ditched me. So I tracked him down, and h…he was…the first kill I ever…I ever made…"

He shuddered violently, and Nani felt her sisterly instincts take over; she changed her grip to hold onto more of Kazuichi's upper body, cradling him as he trembled. "We know you're not a bad person now," she said soothingly.

"Do we?" Aqua asked in disbelief.

"Yes," Nani said, still softly. "We do."

"Please trust him, Aqua," Kairi begged. "I think if he wanted to hurt us…he would have."

Aqua nodded. "All right. You've known him longer than I have. I'll trust you."

"Besides," Ienzo added, "many of us are no stranger to the Darkness, as he noted."

"I'm so sorry about Kaito," Nani cooed. "If I could bring him back, I would for you. I'm just…so sorry…"

He leaned into her, the arm that Aqua wasn't holding wrapping around her back as he continued to weep. "God…dammit…"

"You're with us," Nani reminded him. "You're here now. You're not there then. We can help you."

"I…I gotta know," Kazuichi sobbed, turning his head toward the screen as it lay angled on Nani's shoulder. "I gotta know why he's here. There was nothin' left of him after I…there wasn't even a corpse…just PARTS…"

"Shhh." Nani stroked his dye-stripped hair.

Aqua wished she knew what to do or say besides keep holding on. It was now all the more difficult for her to simply accept that Kazuichi wasn't a threat. In her mind, it seemed there were good people and there were bad people, with nary an overlap. Yet she had already had to overlook so many cases in this very castle in order to reconcile that belief. Ienzo, who was in that very room, chief among them. If she opened up to accept the truth, she would have to deal with her thoughts butting into each other, sharp like sawblades, trying to cut each other down with greater logic. Yet the man she was holding in place simply didn't seem like a villain, bawling over his lost best friend – even if it was a friend he had removed from play. No, because of that, actually. He was consumed by regret. Aqua thought of nights when she had comforted Ven or Terra after emotional incidents, and wished she could summon up the strength to do the same now, but it had never been like this – not this extreme, not this violent, not over anything this consequential.

"Um…okay if I move on?" Mal asked.

At the back of the room, Aladdin furiously texted Jasmine a summary of what was going on, which, for Sonia's mental well-being, Jasmine would pretend was no big deal at all and only worth a cursory glance.

"Just do it," Kazuichi said hoarsely. "Show me."

The blonde encountered Kaito in an outdoor courtyard. "Geez," Kaito groaned. "How'd they even make this big-ass wall?"

Kazuichi shuddered all the harder; maybe the face wasn't quite right, and the voice a little off, just enough to make him wonder if maybe it wasn't actually his fallen friend, but the mannerisms were spot-on to the point where they couldn't have been scripted.

The blonde and her blue-haired companion expressed doubt that they could escape from the facility where apparently, these sixteen had been imprisoned. Kaito argued to the contrary, valiant and confident.

"I'm Kaito Momota, Luminary of the Stars!" Kaito cried. "Even crying children adore the Ultimate Astronaut!"

"…He wasn't an Ultimate," Kazuichi said softly. "I got accepted. He didn't. I couldn't believe it. I never thought I was that special compared to him, but…I know he wasn't an Ultimate. He just really liked space, that's all…"

"Perhaps this is a parallel world's version of Kaito?" Merlin suggested, mulling over the options. "Or an alternate timeline in which he was granted acceptance to Hope's Peak Academy, and you were not."

"It is strange," Ienzo agreed. "Perhaps further viewing would provide a clue. Furthermore, I am not sure what, exactly, this was intended to accomplish. Kazuichi is distressed, but could that really be the final goal?"

"What if this whole thing is to show him that Kaito's really alive somewhere?" Sadira cried excitedly.

"Let's…not get our hopes up," Ienzo told her somberly.

Kaito was explaining how he'd forged credentials to be able to undergo astronaut training underage, a broad smile that Kazuichi knew all too well and missed desperately spreading across his face. The youths he spoke to seemed simultaneously impressed and exasperated with him, and many in the room were starting to see how this boy had gotten along so well with Kazuichi – and how he'd rubbed off on him.

"Limits don't exist – " Kaito began.

Kazuichi finished the sentence with him: " – unless you set them for yourself."

The two youths who the camera seemed to be trained on concluded the conversation, then moved on, meeting still more people around what seemed to be the campus of a derelict school.

At the next time mark, they reconvened in the gym, where the Monokubs had corralled them up to inform them of their purpose. "IT'S-A-KILLING-GAME," the one piloting the green mech stated.

This went over as well as one would expect those words to go over among the teens onscreen. Kazuichi was set into harder wailing, screaming out, "I KNEW IT! I KNEW IT! I FUCKIN' KNEW IT!"

"My boy," Merlin said urgently, "you know something about all of this that we don't. Now, you've got a lot of explaining to do when this is over, and I do mean a LOT of explaining, but I'll need you to start with this. What sort of killing game are they playing, and how do you know of it?"

"I was in one," Kazuichi whimpered breathily. "I was in one…in the Neo World, before you guys found me…I survived, but…that's why all my other friends back home are out cold. They're brain-dead from dying in the program. But that's not even the first game. Junko…Enoshima…she made…she made the other Hope's Peak kids kill each other…we…I built stuff…we watched…and it was a game, she made rules, and she used this mascot thing, I used Chihiro's programs to wire it up, it was this demented bear, and she called it – "

The Monokubs were about to destroy each other in the mechs. A high-pitched voice cut in: "Now, now, now! My cute little cubs, you gotta knock off this awful fighting!"

Kazuichi wrenched in Nani's grip, shrieking again. "THAT'S THE THING! THAT'S HER! IT'S FUCKIN' HER!"

"PLEASE!" Aqua begged him. "HOLD STILL!"

"She can't get you," Nani told him. "It's all recorded. It's on the screen. You're all right. You're out here with us."

He calmed somewhat, ceasing his struggling in order to watch the screen wide-eyed.

The lights went off, blackening the screen. When they went up, the camera started out at the back of the gym and rocketed forward in time to meet a larger plush bear, black on one side and white on the other, who sprang into a podium at the gym's head on wings that fell off immediately after landing.

Kazuichi had no more words. Everyone watched in stunned silence as Monokuma explained the game. The goal was to get away with murder. Murderers who weren't caught would win instantly, but the goal of the survivors was to track down and implicate the correct perpetrator, ensuring that person and only that person would receive capital punishment – otherwise, the perpetrator was the only one who would leave alive.

"This…is what you lived through?" Merlin said in awe after the explanation had completed.

Kazuichi nodded, quivering like a leaf.

"I think we've seen enough," Aqua said firmly. "Turn it off."

"NO!" Kazuichi shrieked. "I gotta know why he's here! I gotta know if he survived! I gotta know if…if maybe…he really is okay…" He swallowed hard. "I know I'm messed up, but…could I seriously have gotten it wrong that I…killed him?"

"We're barely into the time marks on the sheet," Mal reminded the group. "We don't have the full message that whoever it was intended to send."

"And that might be a problem, depending on who sent it," Sadira piped up.

"We'll just have to do it together," Kairi resolved. She looked back toward Kazuichi; "We're here for you."

"We are," Lianna insisted, wishing desperately she could find a way to ease his pain, perhaps simply with a touch or a gentle word. She knew it wasn't that easy. It couldn't be that easy. After all, she'd had to dissolve in order to see her friends be truly happy. No one could have given her a word or a touch then.

Monokuma outlined the rules and regulations of the game. Upon hearing it all, Kaito could barely contain his rage: "Q-Quit screwing around…killing game…school regulations…" Then he could hold it back no more. "To hell with that! Who'd go along with something like that?"

He nearly destroyed the tablet Monokuma had given him, but a blond boy advised him not to, else he would face consequences. Kaito tried to make out that he didn't care whether it killed him to disobey, but was eventually talked down when the blonde girl – Kaede – brought up the necessity of teamwork.

They thought they could leave the school through an underground passage one of them had sighted during the exploration phase. They were filmed being stymied by all sorts of death traps that left them bruised and burned, with Kaito and Kaede trying to cheer everyone on until at last they could go no more.

Mal skipped.

A time limit had been issued on the first murder: commit one, or face death en masse. Kaito rallied a crew of fellow defiant teens to follow him into a secluded meeting place to discuss how to overcome the threat. Meanwhile, Kaede and her blue-haired friend – Shuichi, they now knew he was called – set out on their own mission to trap the mastermind of the game in the act before it could begin.

"It's not that easy," Kazuichi moaned. "It's never that easy. You can't do it."

The blond boy was killed in the library; a bludgeon to the head. Kaito was one of the first to arrive on the scene after the commotion. Investigation began.

Mal skipped.

A trial held with all fifteen survivors in a round, debating back and forth. Shuichi and Kaede seemed the two likely suspects, yet Kaito argued for their innocence based on trust alone. Kairi found herself tearing up. He was like Sora, in a way. He could see the good in people after knowing them only such a short time. She remembered feeling lost like Kaede and Shuichi, when she was a child on the Islands. Then the brunette boy with the big smile had invited her to come play with him and his silver-haired friend, and she had never been lost again, not truly, even when she was separated or captured.

She knew it wouldn't work out so well for Kaede and Shuichi.

The verdict was in. Kaede had been the murderer the whole time, thinking the blond the villain piloting Monokuma. This had been erroneous. Her execution was grisly, and left most of the room stunned that they had watched such a sight – Kaede strung up on a collar to hang by the neck, then brought up and down like a puppet onto a gigantic piano to play a macabre tune until her neck finally gave way. The piano keys' lid came down, lined with iron-maiden spikes that impaled Kaede's already-dead corpse.

"I think I have to go throw up!" Sadira cried as she bolted from the room.

Aladdin furiously texted Jasmine that WE'RE FINE BUT DON'T COME IN.

Kairi had found herself hiding her face in Ienzo's coat, watching from only one eye. Ienzo's breath stuttered.

And in all this, it was Kazuichi who was the least perturbed by the mutilation of Kaede. It seemed incongruous with his worry over Kaito until the others realized this was confirmation of his story. He was desensitized; he had committed this very crime over and over.

All he said was "I wanted her to end it so bad."

Kaito raged at Monokuma and went ignored. Mocked, even.

"That's the last time mark on the disc," Mal announced. "The list says to go to the disc one special features next. First, there's an interview with Team DanganRonpa." She shrugged. "Maybe we'll get some answers."

A jaunty clip show of the scenes from the killing game's start, with all sixteen getting to know each other, was edited to ring in the interview. At first, the woman onscreen seemed unassuming, until Ienzo realized, "Wait…she was among the subjects for the killing game."

"What?" Lianna asked breathlessly.

"What the hell…" Kazuichi gasped.

The laughing woman, bearing long blue hair and spectacles, was captioned "Tsumugi Shirogane." "Hello, DanganRonpa fans!" she cried cheerily. "Can you believe we're on the fifty-third edition of DanganRonpa already? Time sure does fly!"

"Fifty…third?" Kazuichi repeated. "There were FIFTY-THREE FUCKING KILLING GAMES? WHAT THE HELL?"

"Some of you may have recognized me as the Team DanganRonpa mole in the crowd," Tsumugi went on. "But that only matters if you're watching the DVD edition! This interview won't be shown in the live broadcast – spoilers, you know! Most of you probably didn't recognize me, after all. I am the plainest one here. I'm surprised I was so easily able to pass for a seventeen-year-old – but it turned out I was the most convincing 'teenager' in the entire production team!

"This first day didn't go…exactly as planned." She laughed, as though the death of Kaede had simply been a comedic mishap. "The Monokub pilots forgot to implant the full fabricated memory into each participant at the beginning! Can you imagine how horrible it would've been to let them get that far? Kaede almost recognized them as Monokuma offshoots! But I think my improv actually helped get us back on track! Then I think this was the hardest edition to get someone to kill each other in the first round. You won't believe the twist we had to add to get that to play out – but we'll talk about that at endgame. Maybe they'll even figure it out! The sixth chapter is always the one with no holds barred, after all!

"Oh, that's right – this is the first DanganRonpa for some of you. I keep forgetting we're always reaching new generations. It's exciting, you know? Getting to bring the struggle of hope and despair to new people every day. I know I've been accused of just being a sadist who likes to watch people die gruesomely, but I promise that nothing could be further from the truth!"

"It's not Junko," Kazuichi said in horrible awe. "It's her." He struggled into a frenzy again; "IT'S FUCKIN' HER! SHE'S THE ONE WHO'S GONNA KILL KAITO! SHE'S KILLING EVERYONE!"

"We don't know if anyone else dies!" Nani argued.

"We fuckin' do," Kazuichi told her. "Somebody always dies. Ten people at least. That's how the game works. She fucks with your head to get you to the edge and kill somebody. She keeps handing you new motives. Sometimes it's like you have no choice. They always die. They always kill each other, and the punishments just get worse. Hell, that piano shit was worse than any of the stuff I ever built for her…"

"We don't know if KAITO dies," Nani insisted. "You survived. You and he are made of the same stuff. I think he's going to make it."

"Like hell," Kazuichi grumbled. "Fuck hope. You know how many times hope worked out for me? Kaito's dead. He's – "

"Shhh!" Mal hissed. "She's explaining!"

" – how the game works," Tsumugi was saying cheerfully. "If you're at home feeling guilty about watching a teenager die in a graphic manner, there's no need to worry! The memories, the personalities, and most of the names implanted in the participants are all fake! They're completely fictional characters piloting bodies you can consider avatars in the real world! They don't exist! It's no worse than watching your favorite anime character die tragically in a blaze of glory so his team can soldier on without him!"

"She…she took real people and filled them with fake memories?" Kazuichi reiterated. "Just so she could KILL 'EM WITHOUT FEELING GUILTY? THAT'S FUCKED UP!"

"Don't worry," Tsumugi went on. "The actors who volunteered to be overwritten with the new personalities gave their explicit consent to be erased and replaced."

She leaned forward and gave a conspiratorial wink that suggested this was absolutely not the case.

"BITCH!" Kazuichi shrieked.

"Because of the Monokubs' little error this chapter," Tsumugi continued, "we had to sacrifice some of the names that we came up with. You saw Kaede and Shuichi introduce each other. And I had wanted to name Kaede 'Hitomi.' See, I'm the mastermind this time because I came up with most of the bios. Not to mention I've honed my cosplay talent to an art. If we get found out and anyone questions participation, I have fabricated audition tapes of the pregame dark sides all ready and raring to go – meaning I was able to write these characters twice over! We'll be putting those tapes on this same disc. All of those characters are me! You'd be surprised how far hair and makeup can take you! Which is actually how we got some of our characters to look less 'real' before the game even started.

"Let's see…fun trivia…there's always fun trivia about DanganRonpa. Rantaro Amami, we were always going to leave his name in, since, well, he did survive edition V2. I'm actually rather sad we had to kill him off so soon. The Survivor's Perk is usually an amazing tension builder. I guess we just didn't expect anyone to be so savvy about it. Oh! And one other thing!

"Kaito Momota is actually one of my favorite characters I've written for this edition, and I'm so excited for you to get to know him over the course of this DanganRonpa! Here's hoping he survives to the bitter end! See, I was actually going through the old concept files of when DanganRonpa was simply visual-novel video games with fully animated characters, before we decided to make it more palpable for mainstream consumption. Some of you might recall how in Super DanganRonpa 2, the character of Kazuichi Soda had an optional free time event in which he described a middle-school friend who betrayed him – "

The room was now in stunned silence, save Kazuichi, who whispered a constant "What the fuck what the fuck what the fuck" under his breath.

"Well, there were notes on what this friend's name and personality could have been like, and even some concept sketches," Tsumugi went on. "I decided I liked him so much, I wanted to make him a real character for V3! Without any ties to Kazuichi Soda, of course. That would make the lore a little too convoluted! This isn't a Square Enix production, you know! So I made sure we had an actor who matched Kaito's height and build, then a little hairstyling, a little makeup touchup, and voilá! Our very own Kaito Momota! Of course, I'm building on his character a lot. I have an incredibly exciting arc in the works for him, and I can't wait to see which hashtags trend for him! Oh, that reminds me! Hashtags for chapter one are #KaDead, #LuminaryOfTheStars, #AvocadoBoy, and #NeeHeeHee! See you on social media! Although I guess I have to get some sleep sometime, and you never know what will happen at night! Here's hoping for a positively stellar chapter two!"

The screen returned to title, and Kazuichi wanted to desperately to be able to pick at his hat, but his arms were still held in place by his guardians. He fidgeted, trying to find words. "She took some guy who looked like him…and she erased him so she could make a Kaito…just to play with? Just to fucking KILL? Because she – " He choked. "Wait, VISUAL NOVEL VIDEO GAME? Am I a fucking VIDEO GAME CHARACTER to her?"

"What does that mean?" Lianna asked.

"I'm…not sure," Merlin admitted. "There are several theories about this floating about, of course, but none yet proven. One is the concept of probability. If you put a hundred monkeys in a room with a hundred typewriters for all eternity, assuming the monkeys are immortal and treated humanely, eventually, one of them will write the Grimorum Arcanorum, if in text only. A game development team on her world just so happened to come up with your story, thinking it fiction. There is another theory, but it is more…dramatic, shall we say? The thought that every story told must exist as a world somewhere by virtue of being told, that we in fact create worlds by writing our tales. This, of course, has many implications that are difficult to swallow. After all, if we are responsible for conflicts on other worlds, what does that make us writers of tragedy and horror? Are we gods to an unsuspecting populace that questions why we allow them to suffer? I cannot yet speak to any theory. All we know is that your story, in whole or in part, is a work of fiction in her world. If it were you she were targeting on a scale of animation or writing, I couldn't blame her for not knowing she was inflicting suffering. But as it stands, she has admitted to hollowing out denizens of her own world in order to create new characters intended for the purpose of suffering physical pain and real-time emotional distress in her plane of existence, and that cannot be excused!"

For a while, no one knew what to say to this. Then Mal brought up, "The next thing we're supposed to watch is Kaito's audition tape. The one she said was fake."

"I'm not sure this is a good idea," Aqua told her.

Yet Mal had already selected it, and it was playing. Kaito, now dressed in a plainer uniform with a deep purple jacket and a red undershirt, approached the camera, which looked down on him at an angle from above, revealing only the floorboard pattern beneath him. "I wanna be in DanganRonpa!" he said with a grin that was almost malevolent. "It's been my life's dream! And I'm not just some ordinary kid who's gonna die in the first round!" He flashed a thumbs-up. "I'm not just gonna be in DanganRonpa; I'm gonna kill everybody and win! Once I've got fame and fortune, I don't gotta worry about what's impossible. That's why you can give me any character you want, and I'll tough it out! Go ahead! Gimme a good setback, and watch me overcome it! After all, the only limits are the ones you set for yourself!"

"Wh…why would you say that?" Kazuichi moaned, finding his eyes dry if only because he'd already cried all the tears he had. "You'd never say that, Kaito! You're not fuckin' like that! You wouldn't wanna kill anybody! You wouldn't wanna hurt anybody! Just…just me…'cause I deserved it. For being a punk-ass loser who wasn't like you. If I'd been this now, maybe you wouldn't have…"

"Hold on." Mal had turned the footage back, pausing it. "Yup. Definitely fake. Remember how that woman said she used cosplay hair and makeup to look like her characters?"

"KAITO ISN'T A CHARACTER!" Kazuichi screamed.

"Sorry," Mal replied. "But my point. Look." She tapped the screen. "See this? That's some extreme contouring on the cheekbones. If you look close, you can see it looks more like her face shape than his. And right here." Her finger moved. "There's a bit of blue sticking out of the hair. You can barely see it. But it's her hair done up in a wig. I bet the eyes are colored contacts that are prescription for those glasses she was wearing."

"How the hell can that be her?" Kazuichi asked, befuddled. "She had…you know…look, I know I'm not supposed to be focusing on those anymore, especially since no one has better than Mim, but, like, we ALL saw, right?"

"Oh, her boobs?" Mal replied. "A really good binder would do that, especially at this angle."

"A what?"

"Do you…not know what a binder is?"

When Kazuichi was silent, Mal explained, "Guys use them to make their chests flatter."

As one, Kazuichi, Aqua, and Kairi: "What guys – "

As one, Merlin, Ienzo, and Nani: "Transgender men."

Kairi blushed red, feeling embarrassed that she'd overlooked that possibility. "Sorry," she muttered.

"There's a tape on here for everyone," Mal observed. "Even herself. She really committed to the act in case people asked questions. The next mark we're supposed to watch is on the second disc."

"I don't think we should," Nani stated. "Already – "

"No," Kazuichi growled. "Put it on."

"But – " Nani tried to argue.

"I. NEED. TO KNOW." Kazuichi's eyes flared with a dark determination that no one in the room had ever seen him wear before. "PLAY IT."

"I think we have to," Kairi said softly.

As Mal loaded the second disc, Sadira jogged back in; "What'd I miss?"

"You okay?" Aladdin asked her.

"I'm fine," Sadira dismissed casually. "Maybe a weird nightmare about chains and pianos tonight, but I'm in this for the long haul."

"We should try to skip the other…executions," Aladdin suggested.

"If one of them is Kaito's, we may not have a choice," Ienzo muttered.

"HE'S NOT GONNA KILL ANYONE," Kazuichi insisted.

Disc two began. Immediately, Kaito rang the doorbell of Shuichi's dormitory over and over again to invite him to breakfast, then walked with him to the cafeteria where the survivors had gathered.

At the next mark, Kaito and Shuichi discovered a casino on the campus grounds, one Team DanganRonpa had installed for the participants' recreation. Monokuma challenged Kaito to a gamble; Kaito lost horrendously. He would then reappear in the casino with a clique of others only to lose even more money.

At nightfall, Kaito demanded Shuichi join him in the courtyard for an exercise session he called "training." As Kaito encouraged Shuichi to do an excessive amount of push-ups while slacking off on his own, they talked about Kaede and how Shuichi seemed too weak to carry her legacy, hence the need for training.

"He would do that," Kazuichi said softly. "He took me out on all kinds of adventures to make me stronger. I think he was trying to build my confidence up. And I never succeeded for him."

Another student died. A short-statured tennis player, devoured by piranhas in the tank of a gymnasium magic show. Kaito immediately partnered up with Shuichi to investigate the crime, again terming Shuichi his sidekick while in fact having Shuichi do the bulk of the work.

"That's how he used to treat me." Now Kazuichi was smiling. "It's just like me. And watch – it's all serious, but Kaito's gonna smile and get Shuichi through it with a laugh."

Which was what happened. Kaito remained enthusiastic and optimistic, while Shuichi found himself at the very least not consumed by depression as he might otherwise have been.

The next time mark had them skip the trial and execution completely; it was only by process of elimination that they would eventually notice the one who had been dressed as a maid was now gone. After the trial, a short, excitable mischief-maker revealed that one of the girls present had been hiding her true Ultimate talent: the Ultimate assassin. The girl attacked the boy as he teased, but this did not stop him from trying to stir suspicion regarding her. Then the disc ended.

"What did that have to do with Kaito?" Aqua asked.

"Maybe the sender made a mistake?" Kairi suggested.

The third disc suggested otherwise. As the other students explored new fixtures of the campus, the assassin girl, Maki, tried to remain locked in a laboratory of sorts she had to keep her amassed weaponry. Kaito stayed near, as he'd done with Shuichi, talking to her to encourage her to come out, obviously unafraid.

That night, he managed to win her over. She came to the training session he had been setting up with Shuichi nightly. Tension was thick between her and Shuichi, but Kaito mediated. When the session dispersed, Shuichi asked Kaito to explain his reasoning, and he said that he couldn't have left her to hurt the way she'd been hurting.

The Monokubs presented a book to the students: the Necronomicon, which they claimed could resurrect one of the currently dead. ("That isn't how the Necronomicon works!" Merlin complained. "It's a book of dead NAMES, not a book of death magic!") Kaito protested, shying away from the concept.

"Fuck," Kazuichi hissed. "He had this fear of supernatural stuff like that. Kinda makes me glad he's not here, actually. All this magic and necromancy stuff would give him huge panic attacks. Cold sweats and everything. He used to pretend he was fine, and…and I never knew what to do for him. I would always just leave him to it and get worried myself because I didn't know how to fix it. I could fix broken cars and bikes and the toaster, but not Kaito being scared, not when it got like that. I think…now that I've been around you guys…I've seen how you work with me, and with Stork, and maybe I could bring that to him. But I just fucking let him down…it's no wonder he ditched me in the end."

Nani, sensing Kazuichi was getting more comfortable, eased off, now just gripping his arm in case of another surge. "Don't think of it like that," she told him. "You were young. And I don't think he thought like that anyway. Look how he treats Shuichi. Shuichi is scared of a lot of things, and he isn't able to help Kaito with his fears, but Kaito just focuses on helping Shuichi instead."

"I wonder," Aqua mused. "I think…maybe I get why Kaito did what he did to you. But I'd have to see more to be sure."

Kaito isolated himself throughout the rest of the disc; no one saw the third murder, nor the third execution, and it was getting harder to keep track of who out of the sixteen was all missing. They knew Kaito, Shuichi, Maki, and the little troublemaker, now identifiable as Kokichi, were still alive in the bunch. The sender had them skip the third trial to the night afterward, when Kaito turned down a training session, sending Maki and Shuichi off to their dormitories while he went out on a walk. The camera followed him through the grounds alone.

He doubled over, coughing violently. When he stood, his hand was coated in thick blood – blood from his own lungs.

"D-damn it…" Kaito muttered. "I don't have time to be dying…I still haven't gone into space yet! Damn it…no way am I gonna die here! No way…"

Everyone gasped. Lianna began the obvious question: "Was he – "

"No!" Kazuichi cried, shaking his head violently. "He wasn't sick! That's something the new guy has! The blue-haired bitch picked a sick guy to be him, or she fucking GAVE him the cough! He was fucking fine when I knew him!"

"He hid it from Shuichi and Maki," Kairi pointed out. "Those were the two people closest to him. If your Kaito had been sick and about to die…would he have told you?"

"WELL, HE WAS STILL ALIVE AFTER, SO YEAH!" Kazuichi asserted.

Before any further argument could take place, Lianna simply stated, "I believe you."

Disc four. The time marks were largely training sessions with Kaito, Maki, and Shuichi, though it now became clear why Kaito slacked off physically, working up a cold sweat far too easily. He talked about the vastness of the universe. He asked silly questions, down to what Maki's favorite blood type was.

"Ohhhh, he likes her!" Kazuichi realized. "Trust me, I would know, and he LIKES her!"

Maki spoke of her childhood, raised in an orphanage with no one to mind her – though everyone watching knew this was Tsumugi's fabrication, something implanted in Maki's memory that hadn't been there before. Kaito reassured both her and Shuichi that they didn't have to shoulder their burdens alone, so long as they had him.

"God dammit," Kazuichi said with an involuntary smile. "I miss you, Kaito."

The other blonde girl was murdered, found dead in a chair while her mind had been plugged into a virtual reality. Another friend of Kaito's, a soft-spoken boy named Gonta, was the prime suspect. Kokichi confessed to having manipulated Gonta into the murder, but Kaito argued again and again that Gonta must be innocent. Shuichi tallied the evidence against Gonta and went against Kaito to accuse him. This turned out to be correct.

Mal skipped through the execution, catching the end of the trial.

Kaito tried again and again to batter Kokichi for his lies and machinations, only for Kokichi to mock him as he evaded every blow. Kokichi exited. Kaito spat blood. Maki and Shuichi rushed to him, but he refused to speak to Shuichi given the trial.

"But that isn't fair," Aqua argued when the disc ended. "If Shuichi hadn't picked the real killer, they all would have died. He did what was right."

"Right and wrong aren't always simple," Ienzo sighed. "Shuichi did what I would have done, but I can't say I have no sympathy for Kaito in this case."

"HE WANTED TO BELIEVE IN ALL OF HIS FRIENDS," Papyrus said mournfully. "HE WANTED TO SAVE ALL OF THEM. WELL, EXCEPT KOKICHI, BUT WE ALL HAVE OUR PET PEEVES. HE DIDN'T HAVE A WAY TO SAVE ALL OF HIS FRIENDS…AND…HE DIDN'T KNOW WHAT TO DO ABOUT IT. I DON'T KNOW WHAT I WOULD HAVE DONE." In fact, he thought, he was now developing somewhat of a fear of ever ending up in a killing game, knowing he could never murder and never implicate. His only hope was that he could be the first to die in the route to his friends' freedom.

"But I think this does tell me why he left you, Kazuichi," Aqua determined. "You said he needed your help to pass a test. Then you got in trouble for him so he wouldn't have to. Kaito seems very proud. He wants to be the hero, and to help all of his friends. When he realized he couldn't achieve his marks without your help, that was one thing. But when you put yourself in trouble for him…I think maybe the guilt ate at him so much, he couldn't deal with it anymore. He distanced himself from you because he was angry at himself for letting you fall. That's…something I know a lot about now, actually. And I know you said he wasn't sick, but if he was…then he wouldn't have wanted you to see that, either. Especially if it was getting worse around the time of the incident. Maybe…that's even the reason he had a hard time focusing on studies in the first place. He saw that as a weakness in himself, and he couldn't just let himself need anyone else. He had to be the one who gave to others and helped them get stronger. If he admitted he needed help from you…then he wouldn't feel as confident that he could help you in the future."

"I'm getting a sense you know about that firsthand," Aladdin pointed out.

"I do," Aqua replied somberly. "When Terra was slipping away, and Ven was in danger, and all I could do was – " She shook her head. "No. It isn't about me today." She finished the thought inside, where no one could hear: I pushed them away when they needed me most.

"Are we ready?" Mal asked, holding up disc five.

Many, many more time marks. Kaito shunning Shuichi in the dining hall. Maki teaching Kaito, rather intimately, how to assemble a portable crossbow. More coughing fits.

The entire survivor group taking a trip through the exit tunnel, now armed with gadgetry that disabled the traps. Finding the world outside to be a barren wasteland with a toxic atmosphere – special effects tricks from Team DanganRonpa. Believing their prison was also their only haven. Kokichi commandeering a mech to snatch away Kaito.

Kaito, imprisoned in a hangar on the grounds. Shuichi speaking to him through a window, making amends, the friendship repaired in almost too ominous of a manner. A rescue operation launched by the survivors to defeat Kokichi and rescue Kaito. The door to the hangar sliding open. A hydraulic press, stained with blood and gore. Between its permanently clamped halves, a purple sleeve falling out.

"NO!" Kazuichi screamed, loudly enough that everyone flinched. "No…nononononono…Kaito…"

"There's more," Mal said softly. "Maybe…it's not what we think."

It wasn't. It had been a last-ditch plot by Kokichi and Kaito to make Monokuma name the wrong culprit. Kokichi had died in Kaito's jacket, Kaito staying out of sight as the murderer, all agreed upon by the two of them in their final moments. It was better to end Monokuma's game than to waste any more time fighting. Shuichi figured out the swap, effectively shooting himself in the foot, yet when Kaito revealed himself, he didn't hold it against Shuichi at all.

Monokuma chose to regain the upper hand by revealing Kaito's sickness, saying it was something brought down from space in an incident that the skipping around hadn't clarified. Kaito had known it would end for him soon, and so he revealed the plan he and Kokichi had concocted, hoping they could save everyone else by dying.

Kazuichi trembled as he watched Kaito say, "That pretty much wraps up my explanation. Now, finally…I need to apologize to Shuichi."

"What?" Shuichi replied. "Me?"

"To be honest…I was jealous of you," Kaito said with a bright smile. "Because you were always saving us, y'know? Your detective skills kept us alive. You were just way too cool, and I got frustrated. So that's why I was so harsh on you. My bad."

Shuichi made a rebuttal about how all of his confidence had come from Kaito in the first place, but Kazuichi didn't hear it. Instead, he muttered, "It's okay, Kaito. I know you can't mean that. Not about me. But I know now you never meant it. I was the one who went over the line, and I just wish I could take it back. I'm so sorry, Kaito."

Nani and Aqua, on either side of him, heard. Their grips tightened a little, not out of fear but of comfort.

It came time for Kaito's execution. He coughed violently, finally allowing himself to show weakness as he admitted he was about to die. Tsumugi feigned concern. Maki insisted she would not let Kaito die, nearly leading the others into a suicide mission fighting Monokuma, but Kaito broke it up; "N-no…stop…"

The Monokubs reappeared. Apparently, they'd been dying off one by one, and the watchers hadn't really noticed. Monokuma took the opportunity to make an example of how easily he could replace life, such as finding new participants for a killing game.

Maki held her ground. Kaito protested. Maki confessed her love for him. Kazuichi knew how much Kaito wanted to tell her the same thing, but he couldn't leave her on that note, not when there was no way for them to go on. Instead, he laughed it off, noting how far she'd come; "You fell for a guy like me! Now you can learn to like yourself!"

Maki began to weep, and Kaito kept smiling; "Hey, hey…don't cry. Can't you send me off with one last smile?"

Maki couldn't. Shuichi couldn't. All they could promise was to hold back their tears. But Kazuichi, for all of them, smiled. He smiled at Kaito, because it was the least and the last he could ever do for him.

"And Shuichi," Kaito went on, "never forget you're not alone. You have friends. Don't try to do everything by yourself, okay?"

"I won't," Kazuichi whispered.

Then it began. Mal let it play. No one had to tell her to do so.

Kaito, still hacking and coughing, was stuffed into a small rocket missile. The rocket was launched, not up but down, down, down, tunneling through the floor and into the earth below. The view switched perspectives to a camera inside the rocket, which chronicled Kaito continuing to seize and cough as he was plunged into claustrophobic conditions.

Then, as the pressure mounted, he spat his last blood. Fell still.

The rocket turned around, unearthing itself. Kaito lay peacefully, a serene smile upon his face, as if asleep in the pool of his own blood on the cold metal.

The rocket surfaced. Kaito's body spilled out. And they all knew he'd died on his own terms before Monokuma's death machine could wring it out of him.

"YES!" Kazuichi cheered. "HE DID IT! HE DID IT! HE FUCKIN' DID IT!"

"Okay, I'm glad I stayed for THAT one," Sadira said gleefully.

As Shuichi, Maki, and the others tried to emphasize to Monokuma how this was Kaito's victory (Tsumugi's flawless performance finally starting to crack as her brow furrowed), Mal observed, "I don't think there's much more to see on this one. The sixth disc just says 'Figure out who's left.' I guess that means we go to the end to see if anyone else dies?"

No one really knew what had taken place on the sixth disc for want of skipping to the end. At that point, the five who remained were Maki, Shuichi, Tsumugi, a robot boy named Keebo, and a girl named Himiko who claimed to be a mage, pointed witch's hat and all. Apparently, the truth about the television show must have come out at some point during the last class trial. Tsumugi, the mastermind revealed, was showing off her cosplay skills yet again, now taking on the looks of people Kazuichi had known from Hope's Peak – his heart stopped when she did a perfect impression of Kazuichi himself.

"You don't get to be me, bitch," he growled.

Skip, skip, skip to see only the highlights and get to the end. Keebo decided to end it by destroying the entire school, rocketing out in a rampage –

And the feed cut.

White text over a black screen: "This is the final volume of DanganRonpa. No more will be produced. We want to thank the fans who remained loyal through it all. Keep hope alive."

"What did they mean by who's left?" Aladdin asked as he finally looked up from the phone where he had been texting Jasmine the best summary he could manage. "It looked like they all…"

"No," Kazuichi whimpered. "No, no, nooooo! He didn't die just so they could get blown up!"

"There's one more disc," Mal stated. "But it's…weird. It's not like the others. The others all had that nifty round DanganRonpa logo on them. This one…"

She held it up. It had its iridescent shine still, only a large black "7" drawn on its surface.

"And we're supposed to watch the whole disc," Mal explained.

"And here's the rub, I expect," Merlin huffed. "Well, we've come this far! No use in backing down now!"

The disc was inserted, and everyone held their breath. Nani and Aqua leaned in a little closer to Kazuichi.

With no intro whatsoever to prepare the audience for what was coming, a familiar yellow-eyed face stared directly into the camera, smiling without an ounce of true mirth. "If you have followed my instructions to the letter, you have just seen the tragic tale of Kaito Momota, but not the one you knew."

"YOU!" Sadira and Aladdin cried, about ready to rush the screen but held back by the knowledge that it was only a recording.

"Dilan," Kairi seethed.

Ienzo and Aeleus glared at their former colleague. "I should have been able to guess he was behind this," Ienzo admitted.

"I have not given up my quest to recruit a Remnant of Despair," Dilan explained. "Since you so humiliatingly escaped me, I have prioritized you as the one, and I will pursue you for a year or more if I must. Xehanort can wait for his vessel. I want to bring in the target I have chosen to hunt."

"He isn't lying," Ienzo pointed out. "He stalked the Beast close to a year before ever making a move. Once Xal – Dilan decides he wants a prize…he never gives up."

"That's some stalker shit!" Kazuichi cried.

"You would know," Sadira muttered.

"You may be wondering what I could possibly say in order to sway you," Dilan went on. "After all, I have just declared my ill intent. I mean to take you against your will, selectively remove pieces of your memory, and fill in the holes with Xehanort."

"I DON'T WANT XEHANORT IN ANY OF MY HOLES!" Kazuichi shrieked.

"However," Dilan went on, "if you have followed my instructions and familiarized yourself with the second coming of Kaito Momota, you will realize the significance of the hostages I have taken. If not…then I suppose you may consider this a laughing matter and leave them to a horrid fate."

He stepped aside, and now all could see that he was recording in a silver-gray room, obviously his chambers in the Castle That Never Was. Slumped against the wall were three bodies. Two were instantly recognizable as Shuichi and Maki. The third was their classmate with the witch's hat, the one called Himiko.

"The only survivors of the Academy for Gifted Juveniles," Dilan's voice explained. "The playground for Team DanganRonpa. These three and only these three emerged the rubble with hearts intact. You will recognize two as close friends of Kaito Momota…the ones he made in your stead. Oh, how that must hurt, to see him showering the affection that was rightly yours on them."

"SHUT UP!" Kazuichi yelled. "I'M NOT THAT INSECURE, DUMBASS!"

"As for the little false mage," Dilan went on, "rest assured, Kaito would not want to see her come to harm either. Though I don't need to tell you that. As of now, they yet live and breathe. Whether that continues to be the case depends on you."

He stepped back in front of the camera. "Tomorrow, at noon precisely in Radiant Garden time, I will escort these hostages to the fortress in the Cloudy Court Galaxy. Your housemate Rosalina can inform you of exactly where that is. You will come to the same location at that time exactly, no sooner, no later. You will come alone and unarmed. No tricks. No Book of Retribution. No plate hiding armor. I will know if you have gone against this demand, and the hostages will be punished accordingly.

"Once you have arrived at this predetermined location, then we can make an exchange. You will turn yourself over to me in full. You will be Xehanort's to use as he pleases, and you shan't complain. In return, the detective, the assassin, and the false witch will be awoken and released. They will have the chance to live out whatever lives they can carve among the worlds. Deviate from my instructions in any way and Kaito will have died in vain, for it will take me only half of my weaponry to quickly dispose of them. I may use it all simply to give you the pain of knowing how much it would hurt to feel the impalement, even in sleep.

"I look forward to our reunion, Kazuichi Soda. You and I both know you will be there."

The disc ended.

"All…that…was for that?" Kazuichi said hoarsely. "He made me watch all that…so he could get me scared for those guys?" Then, all of a sudden, "FUCK YOU! YOU'RE AS SICK AS THAT BLUE-HAIRED BITCH! TAKING THOSE GUYS WHO GAVE THEIR ALL TO PROTECT EACH OTHER AND NOT DIE IN A DUMBASS KILLING GAME AND JUST ENDING IT LIKE THAT! NOT AFTER KAITO WENT THROUGH ALL THAT TO BUILD THEIR CONFIDENCE UP! HE GOT THOSE TWO TO MAKE FRIENDS…AND I KNOW HE WOULDN'T WANT THAT THIRD GIRL TO DIE, EITHER!" He shuddered, both with rage and with fear.

"You can't go," Sadira burst out.

"I don't have a fuckin' choice," Kazuichi muttered. "I'm not lettin' him kill Kaito's friends like that. Get it? I killed Kaito, the first one. The real one, I guess. No…that second Kaito, he was just as real! It never matters! Dreams, AIs, clones, everyone gets to be real!"

"I mean, I'm not arguing there, considering," Mal said with a nod.

"I can't let the last piece of him die," Kazuichi went on. "If I don't go, it's like I just killed him all over again. I can NEVER bring him back. I can NEVER undo what I did. But I can give those guys a chance to live. All I gotta do is…say goodbye to you guys."

"What?" Lianna gasped. "Kazuichi, you can't! I cannot lose – we cannot lose you! Do you not recall what Kaito said to Shuichi and Maki? That they shouldn't shoulder everything alone – "

"I know," Kazuichi said firmly. "I heard."

"And I heard you promise Kaito you wouldn't," Aqua stated coldly. "You have friends. You have us. Let us help you." Wondering when, exactly, her distrust of him had melted away.

"Nuh-uh!" Kazuichi shook his head violently. "If you guys come, then those guys are gonna die! And you might get hurt too! The only one here who should get hurt is me!"

"At the risk of sounding callous," Merlin argued, "turning yourself in will give Xehanort another Seeker of Darkness and put him one step closer to instigating a Keyblade War that could doom us all! Therefore, you WON'T be the only one affected!"

"Does he even have all his other guys?" Kazuichi snapped back. "'Cause if he doesn't, I might be the last one he gets! Isn't that the kinda hope Hajime would want? No, wait, you guys don't know Hajime."

"CAN…I NOT TAKE YOUR PLACE?" Papyrus asked tentatively.

"Papyrus, no!" Aladdin gasped.

"No," Kazuichi told him. "That fucker wants me. JUST me. If you go, that'll fuck everything up. He might just kill you 'cause he's mad. It's gotta be me!"

Kairi felt a tap on her shoulder. Ienzo inclined his head toward the door, then began to move out of the room. Curious, Kairi followed.

"I wanted your opinion on something," Ienzo said once the two were outside the room.

"Okay," Kairi told him with a nod. "What is it?"

"I couldn't help but make a certain connection," Ienzo told her, "and it seems to me there just might be a way to kill two birds with one stone…so to speak. If it goes well, nobody will be killed at all. However, the plan I have is a risky one. And more importantly…it feels like something Zexion would have come up with. Not me."

Kairi shuffled her feet. "You're not Zexion anymore. I know you. But Zexion will always be a part of you. And I think what made him so good at being bad was the fact that he had your brain. No matter what, you're always smart."

"Well, yes, but Kairi, this plan…involves manipulating people."

"Tell me anyway. Maybe it's not so bad. I don't think it would be, if you were this worried, but if it is, I'll let you know."

He explained. Her eyes widened.

"I think Kazuichi should go!" Kairi said as she hurried back into the room.

The response was a unified "WHAT?" with dumbfounded looks to Kairi.

"He needs to go," Kairi insisted. "It's the only way to save Kaito's friends."

"I mean…" Kazuichi babbled, "that's what I've been saying, but I didn't think YOU'D agree."

"That doesn't sound like something a Princess of Heart would say," Aqua agreed.

"Doesn't it?" Kairi replied calmly. "I want everything to work out. But sometimes, we have to make hard choices. If Kazuichi goes over to Xehanort, he'll still be alive. We'll face him on the battlefield if there is a Keyblade War! We can get him back someday! But those three friends of Kaito's? If we stand up, then they die, and we CAN'T get them back, not ever. And I'm not going to let anyone else innocent die."

"But you're saying Kazuichi should just turn himself in to a fate that might be worse!" Nani spat.

"I wouldn't have said it," Kairi insisted, "if Kazuichi hadn't said it himself first. And I think he deserves to be the one to decide."

"I am the one who gets to pick," Kazuichi affirmed. "They're my friend's friends. That guy's my rival. This is my thing. And I wanna do what he says."

"No." Lianna felt her eyes watering. "No, no, no, you can't…"

"Can I get up?" Kazuichi asked, and Nani and Aqua both realized he'd passed the point of needing restraint a long time ago. They let him stand, and he approached Lianna first.

"We've still got a night to hang out, if you want," he told her. "I mean, I gotta offer that to everyone, since…since it's gonna be my last night here. Maybe one of you guys should call Sora and Ruby and tell 'em – "

"NO!" Kairi cried, drawing all stares. "…It's just that both of them would try to show up and play hero, and you know it!"

"I guess I got a lotta goodbyes to make," Kazuichi sighed. "Starting with you, Li. I know we didn't get to hang out much, but I liked having you in the KazuSquad."

"I…" Lianna felt her heart stick in her throat. "I…"

She wanted to tell him how beautiful he was, how much he meant.

It would have been the same thing as Kaito telling Maki he loved her before walking into the gallows.

"I wanted to know you better," she settled on.

"I can't believe it," Aladdin muttered. "This is really happening."

"I'M NOT CRYING," Papyrus sniffled.

Kairi looked back to Ienzo. His desperate gaze told her: This had better work.

Her confident eyes told him: It will.

...

Cyclonis had the Vaposians carry her on a litter throughout the palace as she doled out orders, giving the citizens busy work that required hard labor in order to make them miserable. As she was carried into the throne room, she scowled at where Amora lay on a chaise longue in the very center of the audience chamber, obviously positioned just to get Cyclonis' goat. Moreover, Zhao was cooling her with an oversized paper fan, and the Dark Ace was hand-feeding her grapes.

This should have been Cyclonis' first tip that something was incredibly wrong.

"AMORA!" she barked. "WHAT DO YOU THINK YOU'RE DOING?"

"Oh?" Amora asked mischievously without even turning around. "Am I offending you somehow? As lord of this Terra, I had thought I had free reign."

"I am master of this Terra!" Cyclonis barked. "Not you! Now move your furniture out of my way, and stop lying around indulging yourself when there's work to be done! Zhao! Dark Ace! Enforce my order!"

"No," the Dark Ace said flatly.

"NO?" Cyclonis repeated. "What do you mean, NO?"

"We mustn't displease Enchantress Amora," Zhao asserted.

"Why are you taking orders from HER?" Cyclonis snapped. "You are MY subordinates!"

"Not as of now," the Dark Ace stated flatly. "Amora has been very persuasive. She has shown us that she, not you, is the true master of this Terra."

"What is WRONG WITH YOU?" Cyclonis screamed. "YOU'RE ACTING LIKE SHE – "

She gasped. "No."

"Kiss kiss," Amora teased. "Their hearts belong to me now."

"But I – you – " Cyclonis sputtered. "THAT'S IMPOSSIBLE! THE DARK ACE IS GAY!"

"He's a man," Amora asserted, "and therefore, the magic works. I just had to be a little rougher about initiating it. Don't worry. I haven't violated his consent beyond that…except to demand one shoulder-rub, but a woman has needs."

"Um, I have a question," one of Cyclonis litter-bearers piped in.

"I already know what you're about to ask," Amora stated calmly. "The magic targets the heart. All men are susceptible. Having internal genitalia does not save you. However, women of all sorts may rest assured I cannot harm them."

"It's evil, yet progressive," Warp's voice sounded from the other side of the room. "I like it."

Cyclonis whipped her head toward him. "DARKMATTER! Tell me you've managed to evade her kiss!"

"Evade?" Warp was leaning against the wall, arms folded comfortably. "Not sure that's the word I'd use for it. More like Amora and I came to an agreement. See, she and I have one particular shared complaint about this whole mission. And we decided something had to be done about it. So we're doing it."

"And WHAT is it you're doing?" Cyclonis barked.

"Taking over," Warp told her. "This is a mutiny. From now on, we give the orders."

"WHAT?"

"You see, it's very simple," Amora explained. "You are a child. And I do not take orders from children."

"Yeah, that's kinda the thing," Warp agreed. "Look, I get you. I really do. I know how important it is to not do in the nemesis until you can do it right. And I like the whole purple aesthetic. But there's one problem: YOU'RE A KID. You're not old enough to be bossing me around! Do you even KNOW the level of dirty work you have to do in this job?"

"I have clawed my way through fire and rubble to get where I am," Cyclonis seethed.

"Didn't we all?" Warp retorted. "So you've got a sob story. We all do. Though you'd be surprised to know Acey actually tried to stand up for you for once in his life when we tried to bring him into the fold."

"Therefore, I posed him an argument he could not win," Amora giggled. "One written in lipstick."

"So basically, starting now, we're gonna need you to get off that litter," Warp told Cyclonis. "Amora and I call the shots."

"NO!" Cyclonis snapped. "YOU ANSWER TO ME! I HAVE ALL OF TERRA VAPOS ON MY SIDE!"

"Oh, funny you should bring that up," Warp said with a smirk. "See, if there was one thing about taking your orders that I actually liked, it was how you played right into my hands. Pretty much literally. You put the Serpigris in my hands. Which means…"

He used his organic hand to lift the green pendant. With a single metal claw, he traced a new hairline crack in its surface.

The litter bearers all collapsed in pain, dumping Cyclonis unceremoniously to the floor and spread-eagling her on the tile.

"See, WITH civilians to subjugate, you – and by that I mean we – have a conquest," Warp informed her. "We have a Terra. We have resources. But if I break this crystal and take all that away, you have a bunch of empty buildings to practice yelling at echoes in. So, really, you're in a no-win situation here, but if you want to keep ANYTHING of value in this city, you're not going to make the guy holding the Serpigris mad."

"WHY YOU – " Cyclonis leapt to her feet, staff akimbo, ready to charge.

The Dark Ace and Zhao slid between her and Warp. "Enchantress Amora made it clear she wanted Warp Darkmatter left alone," Zhao said with a sly smile.

"THE OVERTAKERS WILL PUNISH YOU!" Cyclonis yelled at Warp. "BOTH OF YOU!" Her glare turned to Amora.

"Will they?" Amora sighed. "Loki and I have a certain sort of trust to our relationship. We trust each other to be completely untrustworthy. We strand each other in Hell on a regular occurrence."

"Lokester knew what he was doing when he signed me on," Warp chimed in. "But more importantly, while we're obviously going to put you back in your place and humiliate you and make you do all the dirty work for us, we're not gonna hurt you. You're an asset."

"You've no idea of the plans the Overtakers have for you, do you?" Amora taunted. "The vessel they considered you fit for?"

"What vessel?" Cyclonis asked, now simply baffled. "What power do they want to give me?"

"Something you can't use if you're dead," Warp told her. "Which, if you drive us to self-defense, is what's gonna happen. Maybe you ran the show when the heroes were kids, too, but you're not swimming in the kiddie pool anymore, Cykes. But you know what would be even worse than you dying? You having to go back to HQ and report in that you killed all of us over a dispute that everyone else will have NO trouble taking our side in. I think exile would be the best you could hope for then."

"I believe this is a checkmate," Amora chuckled.

"No…NO!" Cyclonis screamed, throwing her staff to the ground in anger. Yet the act also signified that she had given in. She was outmaneuvered. "I should've never let you take the Serpigris, Darkmatter."

"Yeah, you should've," Warp told her. "Saves you learning this lesson from someone who WOULDN'T be this nice. Oh, and one more thing. You know that thing you did back in Clockenshine – "

"Glockenchime," Cyclonis seethed. "Terra…Glockenchime."

" – whatever. When you fired all that magic stuff into Acey and made him extra strong? I want that."

"I CAN'T JUST GIVE YOU THE BINDING!" Cyclonis screeched.

Warp replied by simply tapping his metal fingertip on the Serpigris: tink. Tink. Tink.

"Fine," Cyclonis snapped through clenched teeth. "You win. For now."

"For eternity," Amora corrected. "Now, as your first task, I believe you're familiar with the chicken housing in the farming district? The coops need to be mucked…dreadfully."

Cyclonis, knowing it was no use to argue, stiffly bent, swept up her staff in order to have a tool that would make the task slightly more efficient, then stormed out the palace door. Her litter bearers scuttled back into the palace's depths, hoping not to face any fallout from this.

"So," Warp suggested, "you wanna celebrate our victory by hitting up the public bathhouse?"

"I do think that sounds like a fine idea," Amora stated, peeling herself off the chaise. "Come along," she barked at Zhao and the Dark Ace. "Your Enchantress needs a pair of more…able masseuses than the locals."

"You really need a pair?" Warp asked as the quartet moved out.

"Hm…I suppose not," Amora realized. "Zhao, you can be in charge of oiling my limbs. Dark Ace, I daresay your interest in Warp has waned considerably, but it would make me so happy if you would take a strigil to him."

"Whatever pleases my Enchantress," the Dark Ace stated.

"Just so we're clear," Warp asked, "a strigil isn't a horrible torture device, is it?"

"Dear, you've never had a good strigil scraping? You haven't lived."

By the time night had fallen, the quartet finally returned to the palace. "You weren't kidding about the strigil," Warp said in awe. "I don't think I have any dirt left on me anywhere. Clean on the outside, filthy on the inside. Just the way I like it."

Amora chuckled. "And speaking of people who could use a good scraping of filth off of them…"

Cyclonis had one of her boots propped up on a table, where she scrubbed at it with determination. Her clothing had spatters of chicken bodily byproducts best not mentioned all throughout, which had pasted white feathers to her here and there, but her boots had gotten the worst of it.

"How'd it go, Chickenfeathers?" Warp asked smugly.

"Don't call me by that name," Cyclonis seethed. "Ever."

The tink-tink-tink of the Serpigris echoed like a pin dropping.

"…It went well," Cyclonis spat. "The chickens have sparkling clean accommodations."

"You'll get used to the arrangement soon enough, darling," Amora chuckled. "A little hard work never killed anyone. Then again, I wouldn't know much about that firsthand…but I intend to keep it that way."

"You," Warp told her. "I like you."

"To not like the Enchantress is a crime," Zhao stated.

"I don't know about you," Amora stated as she led the others further into the room, the door shutting behind, "but I'm feeling a bit peckish."

"Getting pampered sure works up an appetite," Warp agreed. "Also, I'm sure the minions could eat, too."

"I was rather waiting for Amora to decide when she was finally hungry," the Dark Ace sighed.

"We can't begin without you," Zhao told her, "and I'm starving!"

"Cykes," Warp called over. "How about you run our order down to the kitchen staff? I'm in the mood to fry up one of those birds that decorated your duds."

There came a loud, resounding knock upon the door. "Hold that thought," Warp said as he and Amora turned to answer.

As they pried the door open, they beheld a rather unusual sight. Four movers, dressed in baggy brown uniforms that obscured their figures as well as black sunglasses to hide their eyes, overlarge hats, and obviously fake mustaches, stood outside the door gathered around a rather large trampoline.

"Excuse me," one of the movers (whose hat did not conceal a mane of long red hair) asked, "but did any of you order a giant trampoline?"

"Uhhh…no," Warp replied. "We did not order a giant trampoline."

"So you were not expectationing this?" another mover asked.

"Not in the slightest," Amora sighed.

A mover with distinctly lavender skin chuckled before declaring, "Then I bet you weren't expecting THIS, EITHER!"

The four movers ripped off their uniforms, and with them came the hats, sunglasses, and mustaches. Yzma, Wuya, Zevon, and Ravess, now dressed in their usual attire (though Wuya had decided to keep the "I SURVIVED GUAN'S BETRAYAL" shirt for fun), revealed themselves, striking dramatic poses.

"Oh, nooooo," Warp said dryly. "It's the WHAM ARMY. Whoever would have guessed that the four people who showed up in bad costumes to deliver a random thing we never would've ordered would be the people who were after us in the beginning and still have beef."

"Wha – " Yzma sputtered. "YOU AREN'T SURPRISED? DO YOU KNOW HOW LONG IT TOOK ME TO COME UP WITH THIS ENTRANCE?"

"Oh, do spare us the secondhand embarrassment of knowing that," Amora sighed. "Aren't you two short?"

"I mean, the ice guy, I get," Warp pointed out. "I snap my fingers: instant liability. But there was one more. Can't remember which."

"The one whose gay sword blinded us all at the start of the fight?" Wuya filled in.

"Yeah!" Warp recalled. "That one!"

"We kicked her out for that," Wuya lied.

"You know what we're here for," Ravess stated. "We know what we're here for. Shall we skip the formalities?"

"Cutting to the violence," Warp said with a grin. "I like that."

The two parties stared each other down for a good thirty seconds. Then Warp and Amora leapt back to allow their forces to flank them, and Yzma, Wuya, Zevon, and Ravess charged.

"ZHAO!" Amora cried. "DARK ACE!"

"ENCHANTRESS!" the two men yelled, hurrying to the side of their master.

"CYKES!" Warp yelled. "YOU'RE UP!"

Ravess skidded to a halt mid-charge once Cyclonis took her place in line, and her fellows halted as well to preserve the synchrony. "Why, Master Cyclonis!" Ravess cackled, nearly doubling over. "I hadn't realized you'd taken Commander Chickenfeathers as such an influence."

"SILENCE!" Cyclonis roared.

"See, again," Warp chided, "we might not be in this position if you saw how it looked from her perspective, taking orders from a kid. She might be on our side!"

"PLEASE," Ravess sighed. "As if I'd throw my lot in with you and yours."

"Are we done?" Wuya asked.

"We are," Ravess stated. "Proceed."

The two sides clashed instantly. Wuya and Amora met again, hands surrounded by green aura bouncing off each other with electric sparks. "I still can't believe you're the famous Heylin Witch," Amora remarked. "You can't even hold your own against me. Though, then again, who can?"

Wuya spun a kick at Amora's head, which was quickly ducked. "Don't hate me because I'm beautiful," she quipped.

"Oh, believe me," Amora huffed, throwing a magical punch that sent a plasma beam rocketing into the wall when Wuya dodged, "that was never a concern for you."

Zevon took out a particular Shen Gong Wu pendant from beneath his shirt, holding it straight out. "EYE OF DASHI!" he cried, aiming it at Zhao.

Zhao stared momentarily in horror at the lightning bolt that rushed toward him –

Then, in the split second it took the bolt to reach him, smiled wickedly and extended his hand.

The electricity entered him through the hand, crackling up his arm and showing as a fleeting pattern on his skin as he flowed, redirecting the lightning out his other arm. It shot back at Zevon, who hit the dirt to avoid being fried.

"I'm not even sure where I learned that," Zhao said smugly, "but my guess is that dying to the spirit that protects the Water Tribe clues you in on some things about flow."

Yzma's hammer flew at Cyclonis again and again; "WILL – YOU – HOLD – STILL?"

"I will if you will," Cyclonis said smugly, her staff loosing a ray of heat at Yzma.

Yzma cartwheeled expertly out of the way before spinning the hammer, loosing a dart. The Dark Ace leapt forth to cleave it in half, letting its pieces hit the tile harmlessly. He then took up Cyclonis' stead, his blade lashing out toward Yzma and her weapon; the hammer's head clanged into the metal, ringing out and sending the sword off course time after time.

Warp had retreated to the air to take aim at Ravess, his arm transforming to a cannon. Ravess trusted in her own strength; she had played this game before. She strung her bow, taking aim.

He loosed his blast at the same time she loosed her arrow. The two projectiles collided in the air.

Ravess waited and watched, smirking.

As it always had, her arrow pierced through the blast, rocketing upward at Warp.

He batted it aside quickly with his cannon arm. "That the best you got?" he yelled at her.

"Hardly," Ravess retorted.

She gave him a chase, strategically aiming to drive him lower and lower in the air. Then, on purpose, she missed, sending an arrow into the rear hallway, all the way back to the treasure chamber, where it planted in one of the mounds of gold.

Its tip was a glowing golden Solar Crystal, charged with the evening's twilight.

Across the Terra, Vexen and Lady Caine had watched their four cohorts enter from atop a cliffside into which was carved some sort of prophetic mural involving a spiky-haired boy. Vexen sighed in dismay as they revealed their disguises and got no reaction for it. "Why must they be this way?" he muttered.

"I think you secretly like it," Lady Caine told him. "Correct me if I'm wrong, but didn't you have the exact same problem with the people at your goody-two-shoes castle, and you left them specifically for this?"

"I will only ask you once NOT to bring that up again."

"Everyone knows, Vex. Everyone can see it. And you know what I think?"

"I may be intelligent, Lady Caine, but I am not a mind-reader."

"I think you like the chaos because it gives you an excuse to be the order," Lady Caine said with a smirk. "You LIKE being the smartest person in the room. When it comes to Ravess, you want that whole 'intellectual equal' thing to open up to. But if the rest of your friends were smart, you wouldn't be special, would you?"

"We will leave the discussion at the concurrence that Ravess and I are a cut above the rest," Vexen stated sharply. "We have limited time in which to carry out our half of the mission. Now, hurry!"

The moon had risen, and hung full and bright in the sky. Lady Caine drew Tsumugari, holding the deep-blue blade aloft. When moonlight touched the sword, the weapon gained a bright silver aura.

Below them was what had obviously once been a great, neatly-split chasm in the earth, now filled with boulders from a massive landslide. Lady Caine leapt out right off the edge, Tsumugari glowing against the dark night as she sliced downward at the blockage.

As the blade touched the boulders below, it cut a larger swath than would be expected from a sword its size, completely severing the blockage in entirety and reopening the chasm in a rain of pebbles and dust. Lady Caine dropped gracefully beneath the Terra's surface into the caverns, her fall cushioned by still more of the silver-moon aura. Vexen was soon to follow, sliding down a line of Blizzard to stand beside her.

"Keep Tsumugari at the ready," he warned. "These caverns were sealed for a reason."

This was punctuated with a snarl and the appearance of several luminous eyes against the dark.

"I can see about twelve of those reasons right now," Lady Caine sniffed.

She braced the still-glowing Tsumugari. Vexen called his shield to hand. Offense and defense, they faced the horde to press further into the caverns.

Back in the audience chamber, the fight raged on. Ravess put the second half of her plan into motion, missing yet again; her second arrow, tipped with a purple crystal, zipped past Warp and down the same hallway.

It planted in the same mound of treasure as the Solar Crystal. The Leech Crystal in this arrow put out its feelers, seeking out its twin.

Warp's blaster nearly gunned down Ravess again only to be thwarted by her reflexes. However, this didn't sit well with him that all. "How could she miss me that hard twice?" he asked himself.

Then, with a flash of clarity: "She wouldn't."

He spun in midair, yelling, "CYKES! FOLLOW ME!" before blasting toward the treasure room where the stray arrows had been launched.

"I suppose I don't have any choice in the matter," Cyclonis muttered before rushing after him.

"NO!" Ravess screamed, racing after Cyclonis. If their plan had been discovered, they'd already lost.

It was probably a good thing for her mental state that her back was turned to the fray during the moment that it got all the worse.

"ZIPPITY ZAP!" Zevon cried as he used the Eye of Dashi to attack Amora. "ZAP-OW! KER-ZAPPITY!"

"Will you CEASE?" Amora seethed as she evaded the third time. "Someone should shut that mouth of yours." It then occurred to her: "Perhaps that someone should be me."

Zevon suddenly found his arms bound to his sides by a thick green rope of magic that encircled his torso. He struggled as Amora pulled on the lasso, reeling him in.

"UNHANDLE ME!" Zevon screamed in anger.

"Why are you resisting?" Amora cooed. "You love me. All men do."

"I ABSOCERTAINLUTELY DO NOT – "

She'd brought him in close enough. She leaned forward to close the distance, pressing her mouth to his.

He felt warmth flood throughout him from the mouth outward. So this was what it was like to feel love, he thought fondly. To preserve this feeling, he would do whatever it took, whatever his adored asked.

As Amora parted her lips from his with an audible smack, she told him, "Help me get rid of your mother and her concubine. Then you and I can be together forever, with no one to get in our way."

Zevon's smile grew and grew. "IMMEDIATONCE!" He spun on a heel, aiming directly for Yzma; "ZAP-ER-OO!"

"WHAT?" Yzma cried once she noticed the electric bolt hurtling toward her.

Wuya slammed into her before it could reach, bringing the two of them into a tangle of a somersault. The Eye of Dashi's attack shook the wall behind them. When their rolling stopped, Wuya sprang into the air, hovering high as Yzma got up and brushed herself off.

"ZEVON!" Yzma barked. "WHAT DO YOU THINK YOU'RE DOING?"

"I AM OBEYDIENCING MY NEW MASTERESS!" Zevon cried triumphantly. "THE ONLY PRIORICESSITY THAT MATTERS TO ME IS HER AMORATION!"

"A love spell," Wuya hissed through gritted teeth. "She…used…a LOVE SPELL."

"WHAT?" Yzma screeched. She pointed directly to Amora; "YOU! YOU FORCED MY SON TO LUST AFTER YOU WITHOUT HIS CONSENT?"

"He isn't complaining now," Amora said slyly.

Yzma's face began to tint a warning red. "You…chose…THE WRONG TARGET! GIVE ME BACK MY SON, AND I'LL SMASH YOU TO A PULP!"

"Don't you mean 'or'?" Zhao asked as he and the Dark Ace fell into line among Amora and Zevon – an Enchantress and her slaves.

"No," Yzma seethed. "I don't." The hammer was hefted high. "SHE'S GETTING SMASHED TO A PULP NO MATTER WHAT!"

Wuya's entire body was engulfed in green flame, ready to be hurled as ammunition at a moment's notice. "That's if I don't immolate her first," she stated coldly.

"Surely you realize how outnumbered and out-armed you are," Amora taunted.

"GET HER!" Yzma yelled, and she hurtled forward while Wuya soared ahead.

"…Or perhaps you don't," Amora said with a shrug. "Oh, well. Tear them apart, boys."

"AT ONCE!" Zevon, Zhao, and the Dark Ace chorused, leaping into action.

Amora settled herself back on the chaise, crossing one leg over the other casually as she watched the show. The trio was more than enough to handle Yzma and Wuya as far as she was concerned. While she enjoyed flaunting her power, there were few joys more satisfying than watching your slaves deal the killing blow for you without you having to lift a finger.

When Lady Caine and Vexen had descended, they had failed to notice the pair of Keyblade skimmers quietly coursing toward Terra Vapos. Doubly unfortunately, the pilots of those skimmers hadn't managed to see Lady Caine or Vexen, either.

"We gotta be double sneaky here, remember?" Lea called over to Roxas. "Wallops woulda thrown us out. THESE guys'd put us in an early grave. And one death was enough for me."

"What," Roxas challenged, "are you saying I can't sneak without getting caught?"

"No, I'm just saying I'm older, wiser, and sneakier than you."

"You wish!"

The two Keybearers landed on the peak where Lady Caine and Vexen had been standing moments before. "Hey." Lea inclined his head downward. "See that?"

Roxas peered down to spot the passageway the two villains had opened, thinking it a natural fissure. "Yeah! You thinkin' what I'm thinkin'?"

"That there is a very good chance of that being a secret underground tunnel that leads us to the prize? Or were you thinking about how you wanted some sea-salt ice cream to wash down that omelette sandwich?"

"Well, NOW I am. Gee, thanks, Axel."

They regained their skimmers to sail down into the caverns.

Far further ahead of them, Lady Caine and Vexen, not much worse for wear despite the monsters they'd battled, had arrived at a dead end. "Judging by the topography," Vexen muttered, "this SHOULD be beneath the treasure room. No, it's CERTAINLY beneath the treasure room. My calculations are never wrong. But why haven't they opened the way already?"

A few feet above him, Warp Darkmatter had found the two arrows. As Ravess slid into the room, she gasped in horror as Warp crushed the Solar Crystal in his hand.

"Nice try," he said with a smirk. "But you can't con a con man."

"Always the clever one, Ravess," Cyclonis chuckled. "Where did that brilliant mind ever get you?"

"Someplace that is NOT! COVERED! IN CHICKEN! EXCREMENT!" Ravess barked.

"You know what else you're not?" Warp taunted. "About to become the recipient of the Binding."

"What does the BINDING have to do with – " Ravess suddenly gasped. "Oh, dear…"

"Cykes," Warp demanded. "Fill me up."

Cyclonis was past the point of arguing or even groaning about it. Refusing to accept her role would cost her precious time. She ripped the crystals from the ends of her staff, brought them together, and then, with a scream, channeled their energies into Warp.

The cyborg glowed with a wicked violet aura as he rose off the ground without the need of his propulsion pack.

"No," Ravess muttered as she stepped back. "NO – "

Warp's cannon arm fired on her, its blast three times as potent as usual.

Ravess dodged and rolled as the mound of coins nearest her exploded, gold raining from the ceiling.

When she stood, it was for the briefest of respites as Warp flew toward her, aiming a punch that would have broken her bones had it connected. Her reflexes were just fast enough; she vaulted into the air, feet springing off Warp's shoulders before Warp's punch connected with the wall hard enough to crack it. Ravess landed behind him, then immediately sidestepped, seeing the next blast coming. More coins rained from above in a threatening jingle.

"Why is his CANNON more powerful?" Ravess hissed to herself as she attempted to hide behind another pile of gems. "The Binding has only ever increased the energy of crystal-based weaponry – "

The gems scattered from impact. Ravess didn't escape without a few bruises.

"Wait a moment," she said under her breath as she hustled to the next mound. "Crystals. He'd MENTIONED crystals back on Glockenchime. Yes, 'crystallic fusion,' that was it! His cannon is powered by crystals! Which means…"

He'd only shattered one of her arrowheads.

Ravess led him on a chase around the treasure room, gold and jewels ricocheting around the stone chamber as she finally dove back toward the one arrow he hadn't gotten. She then whipped out her bow, took aim, and let fire.

The Leech Crystal stabbed right into Warp's cannon, and energy crackled through his cybernetic bits.

"Okay, WHAT?" he growled, having to give the arrow several tugs before it disengaged from the metal.

The Leech Crystal dropped to the floor, glowing brighter, ever brighter, flashing in and out. It had been sunk into his crystallic-fusion generator just long enough to suck up enough energy to do what Leech Crystals do best.

"I mean, I GET missing on purpose for whatever it was you were trying to do here," Warp told Ravess, "but THAT? That was just pathetic. Oh, and speaking of pathetic…"

He turned the cannon on her full force. "Make your last words good."

He triggered the mechanism. No reaction. The Leech Crystal had taken all of his energy and brought it to the floor where it was now flashing longer, slower, still brighter –

As Warp began to ask, "WHERE'S MY – "

Boom.

The Leech Crystal's eruption opened a hole in the floor, connecting the treasure room to the tunnels. Vexen rose on a pillar of ice while Lady Caine vaulted up with Tsumugari.

"WHERE IS IT?" Vexen yelled.

"Got a visual!" Lady Caine spotted the box thrown to a corner, slightly singed. She dropped to the floor and slid, picking it up on her way.

"Good thing I know how to deal with you," Warp said as he floated down before Vexen. He put the fingers of his organic hand before the ice mage, bringing them together.

Ravess slid between the two of them, decking Warp in the face.

Because of the strength granted him by the Binding, it was like punching a brick wall. Ravess recoiled, shaking her sore hand.

"…Seriously?" Warp asked in disbelief.

"Are you kidding?" Cyclonis sighed from the sidelines.

"You know, I expected smarter from you," Vexen told her.

"Well," Ravess grunted, "the POINT wasn't to hurt him! The POINT was – "

"TO BUY TIME!" Lady Caine yelled as she hurled herself back down to the tunnels with box in hand.

Vexen dropped after her, then Ravess. Vexen then sealed over the aperture with all of the ice he could muster.

Warp normally would have been able to melt through it instantly, especially under the Binding, but with his reactor drained, he was left with nothing but the ability to pound fruitlessly at the ice floor. "NOT HAPPY RIGHT NOW!" He then stood and sighed. "Well, at least all they wanted was that stupid box. Any idea what was even in that thing?"

"How should I know?" Cyclonis retorted.

"Obviously, it was something important to them," Warp figured. "Now, whether that means bad news for US or just that they win something unrelated remains to be seen. And I, for one, am not gonna waste my time if it turns out to be the latter."

"Let us return to the throne room," Cyclonis began. "Perhaps we can – "

Warp turned to fire a glare at her. "I'm sorry, Master Chickenfeathers. Was that an ORDER you were trying to give me?"

Cyclonis sighed. "What do YOU want to do?"

"Go back to the throne room and see if we can vaporize the other three," Warp told her. "I'd just prefer to be at the head of the vaporizing. See, I get the feeling vaporizing is just a job duty for you, but for me, it's an adrenaline rush."

"…Well, in that, you may be correct."

Out front in the audience chamber, it seemed Amora's forces wouldn't need Warp's help to subdue Wuya and Yzma. Zhao, used to Agni Kai, was resilient to Wuya's incessant, fiery attacks. The Dark Ace's blade bit into the floor almost as quickly as Yzma could cartwheel across it, never leaving her an opening to use her hammer. And through it all, both women had to watch out for the Eye of Dashi attempting to pierce them.

Wuya knew they would never get anywhere like this. After all, it didn't matter if they could subdue the other men. As long as Zevon remained brainwashed, he would be the biggest liability. They had no idea how to break his spell, and both would sooner take a mortal hit than land one on him. What they needed was a smarter way to go about this, but there didn't really seem to be an indication as to what that way should be. How did you remove a glamour that was written into a man's very heart?

By getting up close and personal to the source, Wuya realized. By changing the battlefield. And in order to do that, she would have to abandon Yzma, which meant first getting her to safety.

"THEY'RE OVERWHELMING US!" she yelled. "WE NEED TO RETREAT!"

"NO!" Yzma cried back, leaping out of the way of the Dark Ace's sword yet again. "I WON'T LEAVE HIM!"

"WELL, I'M NOT GIVING YOU A CHOICE!" Wuya decided, seizing Yzma by the shoulders.

Then they both stood on the peak, Yzma still lashing out at a foe that was no longer there. "WUYA!" she seethed. "LET ME KILL THEM!"

"No can do," Wuya stated casually. "You were losing. I'd rather not have you dead, even if it is temporary. Now, if you'll excuse me, I have some business to take care of."

She promptly vanished.

"Wuya?" Yzma said in confusion. "WUYA! HOW DO YOU EXPECT ME TO GET DOWN FROM HERE?"

After sealing off the crude entrance from the treasure room to the tunnels, Vexen bade Lady Caine, "Hurry! We haven't much time!"

Lady Caine pried the box open, revealing the dual crystals. Vexen and Ravess heaved twin sighs of relief, both having gained the sudden irrational fear that they had picked up the wrong box. Tsumugari was raised, still glowing, as Lady Caine used her toe to nudge the crystals into place. Then she brought down the sword heavily, striking the conjoining, splitting each crystal neatly into its own entity.

"FINALLY!" Vexen yelled, bending and picking up the Key. "I should say by this point, we deserve this."

Wuya flashed into existence before them, demanding, "Put me in it."

"Put you in WHAT?" Vexen, Ravess, and Lady Caine chorused.

"The Key," Wuya stated flatly. "Put me in it, then let me immediately back out."

"Key?" Ravess said nervously. "I don't know what you're talking about. None of us has a key."

"Cease this nonsense," Vexen stated coolly. "None of us present bears a Keyblade – "

"I know that isn't for the Corona Aurora." Wuya pointed to the freed Key. "It's a Key that used to hold an Oracle. You're fetching it to bring back to Mozenrath to solve his Tesseract problem." She considered telling them he'd already figured that out, but decided it would be more humorous to learn what their reaction had been to learning this was a goose chase.

"It's a WHAT?" Lady Caine barked.

"They have no idea where the real Corona gem is," Wuya went on. "They haven't even been looking for it."

"YOU MEAN THIS ENTIRE TIME," Lady Caine yelled, "WE'VE BEEN PICKING FIGHTS AND RUNNING ACROSS WASTELANDS FOR SOMETHING THAT ISN'T EVEN WHAT WE CAME FOR?"

"NOW IS NOT THE TIME!" Wuya hushed, putting up a hand toward Lady Caine. "If the Key can hold an Oracle, then it can hold me. Then let me out IMMEDIATELY."

"Have you gone mad?" Vexen asked. "That would reduce you to your ghostly state!"

"Exactly," Wuya told him. "Now do it before I decide to call up Mozenrath and tell him exactly what you did."

The words came out sharp and salty: "Very. Well." Vexen held out the Key toward Wuya.

Its brilliant light surrounded her, and her body warped as she was pulled into the crystal's confines, vanishing from view. When Vexen willed it, the Key released her: a translucent spirit of purple tentacles, topped off with an ornamental mask.

"Was that so hard to do when I asked?" Wuya snapped before floating up through the ice blockage and back into the palace.

"What IS she doing?" Ravess scoffed.

"No time!" Vexen hissed. "We must make our escape!"

Lea and Roxas, by that time, had fought through hordes of the monsters of the trench. "I'm starting to think this was a bad idea," Roxas grumbled.

"You had a better one?" Lea panted.

"You didn't give me a chance to think of one!"

They both halted when they heard the faint echo of voices in the passage ahead. Lea's protective instincts took over; he took Roxas by the shoulders, looking him dead in the eye. "Stay here," he warned. "I'm gonna scout ahead."

"Seriously? Axel, I can help – "

"Roxas, I just got you back. I'm still not fully convinced this is just some prank the worlds are playing on me and you're not gonna get taken away from me again. I think you'll understand if maybe I'm a little PARANOID when it comes to you. You got that one memorized?"

"Fine," Roxas sighed. "But if it sounds like you need help, I'm coming for you, no matter what. I had to lose you, too!"

"Deal."

Lea pressed himself to the wall, quietly edging forward in the dark and relying on the cover of the shadows. Now he could hear the voices more clearly:

"Was that so hard to do when I asked?"
"What IS she doing?"

"No time! We must make our escape!"

Upon hearing the third, Lea gasped. "Vexen?" he whispered.

Now surprised, himself, that he'd chosen that name over "Even."

He put two and two pretty easily. Vexen was on the WHAM ARMY. Cyclonis was on team Maleficent. That meant he and Roxas had just walked into a territory war. Not an ideal time for the Storm Hawks to descend.

As he contemplated this, he failed to truly process that Vexen stating he was about to make an escape meant Vexen would be moving back down the tunnels toward him. With Ravess and Lady Caine in tow, Vexen stormed forward, only to flinch when he saw the silhouette of the spy against the wall. "WHO'S THERE?"

Lea could sometimes be rather naïve. He chose to do perhaps the worst thing he could have done: step forward and reveal himself. "Oh, I dunno," he said casually. "Just the guy you have a mean habit of betraying. Look, I know fire and ice don't mix, but you didn't have to take it this far."

Vexen's heart nearly stopped. Every muscle in his face strained. He'd desensitized himself somewhat back at Radiant Garden when it came to Lea's presence, but after so long away, after rejoining the Darkness, things had changed. Lea's very existence there seemed a terrible nightmare. Vexen couldn't even focus on what he was saying; just on the fact that they were on opposite sides again. All Lea had to do was snap –

Red hair, green grass, the Twilight Town mansion, where did that all even come from down here in the tunnels? Was he even in the tunnels anymore?

A woman's voice was yelling his name. Oh, right. That was Ravess. He was a thousand miles away.

He only knew he had to take Lea down before Lea decided to do so to him.

His hand lashed out, and a wicked burst of Blizzard thrust from him and into Lea.

Lea gave a start when he was impacted, at first fearing he'd been impaled with a projectile. Then he was left with utter confusion. Vexen's spell had definitely hit him, right in the chest to boot, and yet he felt fine, if a little chillier than usual.

"I've done it," Vexen said shakily, smiling to himself. "I've done it!"

"You didn't do ANYTHING!" Lady Caine groaned. "HE'S STILL THERE!"

"WE MUST LEAVE! NOW!" Ravess insisted.

That got through to Vexen loud and clear. He cast a Corridor of Darkness, its edges fuzzy, then bolted through, his companions following.

"AXEL!"

Lea turned to the sound of rushing sneakersteps. He hadn't realized he'd cried out when impacted; Roxas was hurtling toward him.

"Be careful!" Lea hissed. "You know Vexen was just here? He just tried to obliterate me!"

"He WHAT?"

"I dunno! He seemed out of it!"

"You okay?"

"Yeah, but we're caught between a rock and a hard place right now. We gotta make sure the heat dies down before we land the crew. Recon just doubled and got dirty."

"Then you better not make me stay back this time," Roxas grunted.

"Fine," Lea relented. "Probably could've avoided whatever that was if you'd been here. Then again, I don't think he really…did anything. I think he just kinda panicked. …Huh. I almost feel bad for the guy. Pretty sure I know what made him act like that, and it was not one of my finest hours."

"Axel," Roxas said softly, "it's okay. You weren't you then."

"Guess you're right. Anyway, no use moping now! We gotta figure out a game plan!"

As they returned to the tunnels, they ventured deeper into shadow – shadow that concealed the truth from them. Roxas was unable to see that one of Lea's bright red spikes of hair had turned shocking white.

Amora was pleasantly surprised to see that Wuya had taken Yzma out of play and given up. "Well done, boys," she said sweetly as she stood. Her heels clicked on the floor as she approached her newest plaything; "Especially you, Zevon." Amora cupped his cheek in her hand. "You're going to make a fine addition to my deck."

His eyes, ringed with her green, stared piercingly back. "I await for your next commandence, my enchantrorceress!"

"Excuse me!" the Dark Ace snapped. "Am I not also worthy of your attention?"

"I will be more servile than both of them combined!" Zhao chimed in.

"Oh, of course," Amora said sweetly. "All three of you have your uses."

She sat back down on the chaise. "Zhao, you can begin preparing our dinner. Warp had requested chicken, and I am inclined to agree. Dark Ace, I could use some fresh, cool water. Zevon, my fingernails look positively dreadful; you can get started improving them."

The three snapped to attention immediately, hurrying to their appointed tasks;

"Yes, Enchantress."

"At once!"

"Immedianstantly!"

As Zevon hustled down the palace hall, he was only faintly made aware of the violet blur rocketing toward him until she struck his chest and disappeared into it.

Entering another's heart was always a unique experience to Wuya. Hearts always followed a basic structure – their metaphysical nature manifesting as best as the mortal eye could perceive into a stained glass mural for some reason – yet varied greatly in design. As Wuya descended through the black void, Zevon's mural became clearer and clearer to her, a perfect circle tinted a most un-Zevon-like green. An image of Amora took up its space, eyes closed as if in slumber, a distaff with starry, sparkling yarn wound around it resting in her folded arms. Behind her, the background was divided into sky and earth: sheet lightning illuminating clouds above, purple milkwort peppering a rye field below. The border was made up of amber teardrops connected by a silver chain.

Once close enough to see the mural more clearly, Wuya spotted Zevon lying on his back on it, limbs splayed like a snow angel. His eyes, too, were closed, and he smiled a smile of bliss.

"Zevon!" Wuya hissed, flitting over him like an insect. "ZEVON! Get up!"

"Wha?" Zevon pried his eyes open. Then immediately went on the attack, arms flailing. "GET AWAY FROM ME, GHOSPIRIT! HEYAH! HEEYEAH! HEH!"

"WHA – " Wuya dodged each strike. "ZEVON! IT'S ME! WUYA!"

"Wuya?" Zevon ceased his assault, scrambling to his feet. "Why are YOU here? And why do you look like THAT?"

"Long story," Wuya sighed. "The part you need to know is that you're not yourself. Now, normally, I wouldn't go out of my way to do this, but your mother is very, VERY important to me, and you aren't allowed to scare her."

"My mother?" Zevon replied. "What did I do to scare my mother?"

"I think you might have a better perspective from in here," Wuya told him. "Look down. Who is that?"

Zevon did as she asked. "Amora," he sighed dreamily.

"Is Amora SUPPOSED to be the most important person in your heart?" Wuya asked.

If she'd posed this to Zevon physically, on the outside, he would have immediately said "Yes." But this Zevon was a representation; an avatar of his innermost heart. He could see here what he couldn't from outside. Therefore, he gasped; "NO! I'M SUPPOSED TO BE THE MOST CRITICRUCIAL PERSON TO MY OWN HEART! I DON'T EVEN LIKE AMORA!"

"Well, she's got you under her spell," Wuya told him, "so you might want to go about fixing that."

"How?" Zevon asked. "HOW DO I ELIMERASE HER INFLUENSION?"

"Just break the glass," Wuya told him. "Now that you know what's wrong, you can shatter it from the inside."

"How does that even work – "

"It's all a metaphysical analogue. Don't ask me to explain. Just do it."

"UGH!" Zevon jumped, stamping both feet onto the glass hard. When that did nothing, he continued to leap, accentuating a word with each stamp: "I! DON'T! LOVE! AMORA! I! LOVE! MY! MOM!"

On that final word, he broke through, the entire disc shattering into splinters of green, gold, and amber. Zevon plummeted into inky blackness as the platform gave way.

"ZEVON!" Wuya cried, speeding to catch up with him. "HANG ON!" She steered herself beneath him to break his fall.

He passed right through her incorporeal body.

"Oh," she grunted. "Right."

However, Zevon's own heart-space was prepared for this. The Zevon-body avatar was caught and lifted by the abyss itself, turned to land softly feet-first on a rising platform: a new glass. The correct glass. It was tinted blue, with Zevon, eyes closed, reclining on the border. Said border was made up of stylized flasks of multicolored potions. Near his head, five circles were grouped. Four were filled with the outlines of the heads of people close to him: Yzma, Wuya, Draco, Irmaplotz. One was empty, a simple blue circle.

Zevon's boots touched down on the glass, and he smirked. "Now, this is how it should be!" he proclaimed, hands on his hips to strike a confident pose.

"Good," Wuya told him. "Now let's talk about this on the mortal plane."

She took her leave then, floating right out of Zevon and back into the Vaposian palace hall.

The Zevon out here was lightly shaking his head to clear it from all that had happened. "You broke Amora's glamourchantment!" he said in awe to the still-ghostly Wuya.

"We'll talk about that later," Wuya said dryly. "Right now, you need to get out of here. I'd make a Corridor, but I sacrificed my ability to do THAT in order to fix your heart. You're welcome. Now, if we're careful, and if you're quiet, maybe we can sneak – actually, no, scrap that. You're not careful and you're not quiet. Which is admittedly what I like about you, but – "

"Worry not," Zevon said proudly and slyly. "I already have a getawayscape route-tine."

"Then hurry up with it," Wuya said before vanishing into the wall to take the short way out.

Zevon hurried back into the audience chamber, crying out, "AMORA! HEED YE, HEED YE! I HAVE BROUGHT THE POLISHINE FOR YOUR MANICURATIVE!"

Without giving him too close of a look, definitely not noticing the absence of her influence from his eyes, Amora stretched out a hand. "It's about time."

Zevon had never painted anyone else's nails before. That, combined with the fact that he was doing the biggest rush job possible, made for a very sloppy coloration on Amora's nails. She didn't notice at first, just holding out her other hand for Zevon to paint while she focused on drying the first with a magically-conjured wind.

"And now I must exeuntit!" Zevon cried. "You are faminished, and I intentionend to assistancate Admirational Zhao with your supperations!"

He bolted from the palace, making not for the kitchens at all but for the main road by which to leave the kingdom altogether.

Amora felt the skin of her cuticles tighten. Only then did she take a good look at her new manicure. "That's the last time I order a commoner to treat my hands," she muttered. "I shall have to find a slave more versed in – "

Her scalp prickled ominously. The nail polish on her hand glowed. Polish? No, potion. It was a magical concoction of some sort, and it had gotten into her system through her cuticles.

The moment Amora realized this was the moment when it had its intended effect: all of her golden hair simply fell out.

Amora's howl of agony brought Zhao, the Dark Ace, Warp, and Cyclonis running to the throne room. Zhao and the Dark Ace gasped in horror; Cyclonis knew better than to do anything but hold her tongue. Warp, however, doubled over in laughter when he saw the now-bald Amora.

"Loving the new look," he chuckled. "Is that some kind of Vaposian vogue?"

"IT WAS HIM!" Amora screeched. "HE WAS NOT BRAINWASHED! HE CURSED ME! AFTER HIM – WHAT ARE YOU DOING?"

After the flash of the phone clicked in his hand, Warp tossed the device up and down. "Lokester's gonna love this."

"SEND IT NOT TO HIM!" Amora cried. "HE CANNOT SEE ME GONE THE WAY OF SIF AND GLIMDA! FURTHERMORE, THE WHAM ARMY BOY MUST BE STOPPED! AFTER HIM! SHOOT HIM!"

"No go," Warp told her. "The archer sucked my cannon dry. I'm gonna need a recharge before I can go another round. And believe me, we've been holding the Hawkette hostage long enough, I give it half an hour before her friends show up."

"They know not where we reside," Amora seethed. "However, if you are to recharge your device, then I must be presentable before we face another foe. Nay – I must be presentable before we face so much as a commoner!"

She stalked off into the depths of the palace, heels clicking forcefully on the tile.

"If I may," Cyclonis broke in, "this just makes me happier I never cared about vanity."

"How could you SAY such things about our Enchantress?" Zhao barked.

"If the WHAM ARMY hadn't been due to pay up before," the Dark Ace proclaimed, "they certainly are now. Why do we not pursue them?"

"And waste our energy?" Warp replied. "All they wanted was some stupid box. I'm more interested in finding the Key than whatever was in that box. You wanna waste YOUR time going on some goose chase after it? No. Thought not. Also, it's not that I care, but you guys might think more about how Maleficent would fry your bacon if you didn't come back with the Key. Speaking of, how about getting back to searching the Condor for it?"

The two men stared at him blankly.

"I'm sure Amora would LOVE if you did that," Warp said smugly. "In fact, she might even have another kiss ready for whoever finds the Key first."

Zhao and the Dark Ace nearly didn't make it out the door for all the struggling and shoving each other they were doing.

"Boy, remind me not to get on Amora's bad side," Warp muttered. "Oh, and by the way, Cykes…"

"I know," Cyclonis growled, stomping after the men. "I'm going to search with them."

"Good girl."

At the edge of the Terra, Yzma, Wuya, Lady Caine, Zevon, Vexen, and Ravess reconvened. "We need to have a talk," Wuya stated.

Vexen sighed. "I suppose. But not here."

He cast a Corridor, and all together, the six departed Vapos before any rivals could follow.

Deep down in the dungeons of the palace, Piper had heard the sounds of the struggle overhead, feeling completely powerless. Her wrists and ankles were both bound with crystal-reinforced cuffs, and furthermore, the cell she was in was locked and sturdy. She'd worked out how to get from a sitting position to standing and back, but nothing beyond that.

"Oh, it's useless," she muttered, out of both desperation and exasperation.

She remembered the other time she had occupied one of these cells; Junko had broken Aerrow out by simply punching his way through the wall. If only she had him here now. Her eyes drifted to the wall in her cell that corresponded to the one he'd wounded back then; an ornamental tapestry of a Strix owl adorned this one.

But why would anyone want to hang a tapestry in a dungeon cell? Unless…

"Oh, DON'T tell me they just covered up the hole with a tapestry!" Piper cried, hoping against hope that the Vaposians actually had done something so silly and her captors had failed to realize it. She shuffled along the wall until she was beside the tapestry, using her mouth to pull it back.

The hole Junko had punched was revealed. It was the same cell.

Now Piper had a way out, but was still bound by restraints. However, given the jagged stone edges of the aperture, she had a feeling that wouldn't be for long. She angled her back to it, striking the cuffs against the stone again and again.

"I'm getting out of here," she muttered. "And after that, I'm getting some help."

...

It was an ordinary day for the St. Canard bank. Tellers tapped away at computers. People (well, anthropomorphic animals, but still, truly, people) lined up at the ATMs that lined the wall for quick service to avoid the hassle of speaking to the tellers. A custodial employee watered a decorative plant. Security guards changed posts after filling up their water bottles from the nearest fountain.

At first, no one thought much of it when the four figures wearing trenchcoats and huge hats walked into the bank. However, when they flung off their coats, revealing themselves to be Negaduck, Megavolt, Bushroot, and Quackerjack, the bank patrons immediately flew into a panic.

All in all, still an ordinary day for the St. Canard bank.

A few blocks away, atop a skyscraper, Mozenrath, the Huntsman, Mim, and Hämsterviel watched the heist through a magical window. "So far, so good!" Mim chirped.

"Listen," Mozenrath sighed. "We all know Negaduck is the only person here with half a brain. He's as twisted as we are. The rest are weak tea. Why not just dump the dead weight and take the person who matters?"

"Because I want a powerful army that can outdo anything Magica De Spell could ever come up with!" Mim screeched, stamping up and down. "I WANT IT, I WANT IT, I WANT IT!"

"You realize with that, she has the final word," the Huntsman groaned.

"I knowwwwww," Mozenrath moaned.

"Remind me how she advanced to the uppermost echelon of your leadership," Hämsterviel bade them.

"First dibs," Mozenrath grunted. "Also, we owe her for a rat incident. Don't ask."

Inside the bank, the chaos was mounting. "NOBODY MOVE," Negaduck growled as he withdrew an enormous rifle. However, knowing it was nowhere near enough to kill everyone at once, he ordered, "BUSHROOT! GET THE DOOR!"

Bushroot gave a sharp whistle. "Friends! We could use some help!"

The plants that adorned the corners spread out their vines and branches, closing and covering the polished wooden doors to leave no chance of exit.

"Thank you!" Bushroot called out.

"Looks like IT'S PLAAAAY-TIIIIIME!" Quackerjack yelled.

"GUARDS!" someone yelled.

The security guards attempted to spring into action, only for their water bottles to suddenly explode in rains of plastic shards. The water splattered over them, then hardened to a white, concrete-like substance, freezing them in place before they could draw any sort of weapon.

The leftover water pooled in the center of the floor, rising up to reveal itself as the Liquidator, who'd smuggled himself in through the drinking fountain and hidden himself in pieces in the bottles. "SURPRISE!" the Liquidator cried. "Now with twenty percent more stealth action…and thirty percent better taste! Ten out of ten security guards agree: Liquidator will leave you immobilized with satisfaction!"

Meanwhile, Megavolt had begun to go after the ATMs, overloading their circuitry so they spat out dollars like confetti. He snagged the bills out of the air, remarking, "Ooh, these are the new ones! Crisp! BUT SO HARD TO SHUFFLE APART IN YOUR FINGERS! WHY DO THEY PRINT LIKE THAT?"

"Now hand over the money!" Negaduck demanded, menacing the nearest teller with his gun.

"NEVER!" she spat back haughtily. "And if you shoot me, then you'll have no one to give it to!"

"Oh, that's right," Negaduck said with a grin. "Yo, Megs. Stop fooling around and put some spark in her step."

"But I'm getting us money!" Megavolt protested. "Look, I already got about two thousand – "

"JUST…DO IT, SPARKY," Negaduck growled.

"OOOOOH, I KEEP TELLING YOU NEVER TO CALL ME THAT!" Megavolt yelled as he turned his attention to the teller. Stuffing his aggregated bills into his pocket, he rubbed his hands together, creating sparks between his fingers. "So we have a feisty one, eh? Well, guess what?"

He loosed the electricity he'd built up all at once. She was struck, but instead of being harmed in any way, her hair and clothing were magnetized, gluing her to the wall behind her.

"Static electricity!" Megavolt laughed. "I guess you could say…this is a STICKUP!"

"Clever," Negaduck sighed. "Just hack her database already!"

"Okay, okay, fine!" Megavolt groaned, pointing to her computer. "You don't have to be so BOSSY, you know?"

He cycled the computer through its paces, muttering, "There's gotta be codes for the vaults somewhere…"

"Oh, don't bother," Quackerjack called from one space over. "I already got everything I want outta this one."

"Then ma-a-ake it sto-o-o-op!" the teller laughed in agony; Quackerjack had unleashed a device upon him that tickled every vulnerable spot at once with several fluffy feathers.

"Hmm…no, I don't think so," Quackerjack told him. "I'm having too much fun!"

He left the guard to laugh and writhe as he made his way toward the rear vaults, with Negaduck, Megavolt, and Bushroot following. Liquidator had made a detour to the security deposit box vault, where he was using his hard-water ability to fashion crude keys that fit the tumblers of each lock, allowing him to pick out all sorts of jewelry and store it in the center of his body.

Quackerjack danced around, twirling as he input the code he'd gotten into a wall-mounted keypad. The door to the vault began to swing open.

"Don't think this improves my opinion of you," Negaduck grunted.

"But I got the code you wanted!" Quackerjack protested. "I'm the one who got you all your money!"

"Yeah!" Megavolt agreed. "Quacky succeeded where I failed! Which is actually kind of annoying, but what's MORE annoying is you not noticing it! In fact, you don't notice when ANY of us – "

"WILL YOU SHUT IT?" Negaduck yelled, turning the barrel of his rifle directly on Megavolt. Bushroot positioned himself behind the rat, quivering with fear, but Quackerjack, a new fire in his eyes, stood before the both of them, putting himself in the line of fire.

"Stop being a bad sport and just grab the money!" Quackerjack barked.

"FINE!" Negaduck yelled back, swinging the gun away as he turned to the vault once more.

"Phew!" Megavolt wiped his brow. "Thanks, Quacky. I thought I was actually gonna buy it that time!"

"Aw, c'mon!" Quackerjack clapped him on the shoulder. "You know we don't BUY anything we don't wanna pay for! And what're pals for, huh?"

"I guess you're right," Megavolt told him. "Y'know, I'm pretty lucky to have a friend like – "

Quackerjack quickly seized a flower he had pinned to his shirt, then angled it at Megavolt, revealing it to be a hidden water squirter. The stream that hit the rat was enough to short him out again, causing Bushroot to skitter away as Quackerjack laughed it up.

"NEVER MIND," a singed Megavolt grunted – though, really, it was the moments like this that made life with Quackerjack exciting. And they both knew Quackerjack only pulled pranks that would inconvenience Megavolt or hurt him mildly – never seriously injuring him, never putting him in danger. Where would the humor be in that?

The levity of the situation was interrupted when a dark cloud of purple smoke began to rise from within the vault.

"Oh, not this again," Negaduck moaned.

"Wh-what?" Bushroot stuttered. "H-h-h-how did he even – "

"I AM THE TERROR THAT FLAPS IN THE NIGHT!" a voice boomed from inside the cloud. "I AM THE TOOTHACHE THAT REVEALS ITSELF WHEN YOU PARTAKE IN THE ICE CREAM OF INJUSTICE! I AM THE STONE IN YOUR SHOE WHEN YOU TRY TO MAKE A CLEAN GETAWAY!"

"OKAY, OKAY, WE GET IT!" Megavolt yelled. "I'VE ONLY HAD TO LISTEN TO YOU DO THIS, LIKE, A HUNDRED TIMES!"

A silhouette made itself clear in the smoke, proclaiming, "I AM…DARKWIIIIING DUCK!"

The figure who emerged was Negaduck's exact double; the only way you could tell one from the other was by the palette of their clothing. On Darkwing, the ensemble trended more toward deep purples.

A second duck followed him out of the cloud: taller, broader, wearing a brown aviator's jacket and hat. "Right behind ya, D.W.!" this duck stated with a sincere smile.

"Oh, great," Quackerjack groaned. "He brought Lunchbox."

"It's actually Launchpad," the larger duck corrected. "But I don't blame ya for gettin' it wrong. Not a lot of people remember – "

"It was a QUIP, Launchpad," Darkwing sighed. He then pointed to Negaduck; "And so we dance the dance of heroism and villainy yet again, Negaduck, waltzing in time to the beat of justice. Well, I'm taking the lead in our little foxtrot!"

"You could just say you're gonna stop me," Negaduck said dryly. "Though that'd be wrong, come to think of it."

"The darkness of justice will ALWAYS prevail over the light of evil!" Darkwing proclaimed, finger held high.

"Gee, D.W.," Launchpad remarked, "ain't the Darkness the evil stuff? I thought the Light was what the heroes used. That's what they say up in Disney Town – "

"WELL, WE'RE NOT IN DISNEY TOWN, ARE WE?" Darkwing yelled at him. "THIS IS ST. CANARD: A GRITTY HIVE OF CRIME AND VILLAINY! AND HERE, DARKNESS! IS! GOOD!"

Megavolt, Quackerjack, and Bushroot were beginning to back away slowly.

"NOT SO FAST!" Darkwing rounded on them. "I'm not letting you get away THAT easily!" He withdrew a gun from within his coat – a gun that only fired gas canisters meant to immobilize the enemy rather than kill, but still a weapon that the Fearsome Five had come to find effective enough to be annoying.

"You wanna arrest one of us?" Negaduck posed. "Fine! HERE! TAKE ONE!"

Before anyone could get their bearings, Negaduck had grabbed onto Megavolt and hurled him at Darkwing, bowling the hero over. Negaduck then turned and bolted.

"Ugh…why do we always end up in these compromising-looking positions?" Megavolt grumbled as he peeled himself off Darkwing.

"I don't know," Darkwing mused. "Perhaps you're just magnetically drawn to my charm."

"Yeah, the one magnet I DON'T wanna be attracted to."

"In any case – " Darkwing had snapped a pair of handcuffs onto Megavolt's wrists. "One down!"

"I didn't even get to show you my latest electric sword yeeeeeet!" Megavolt whined, looking to a bladeless hilt strapped to his belt. "I was saving it for when you showed up!"

"I'll take a look at it before we send you off to jail, if you want," Launchpad offered.

"That'd at least make me feel like the work I put in MEANT something," Megavolt stated.

"NO TIME FOR THAT NOW!" Darkwing yelled, using his gas gun to gesture to the retreating backs of Negaduck, Quackerjack, and Bushroot. "THEY'RE GETTING AWAY!"

"I'm k-kinda shocked you l-l-left Megavolt like that," Bushroot admitted to Quackerjack.

"Well, I can't bust him outta jail if I'm in there too!" Quackerjack argued.

Liquidator rolled in as a small tidal wave before taking on his bipedal form to run alongside the others, stolen goods jingling inside his body. "Act fast before this escape opportunity becomes null and void!" he proclaimed.

"Oh, yeah?" Darkwing aimed his first gas canister. "Well, as I always say, SUCK GAS, EVILDOER!"

The canister exploded out of the gun, piercing into Liquidator and erupting inside of him. Its contents reacted with the water in such a way that it slowed the dog down, alerting him to his gradual (if temporary) petrification.

"Misuse of Liquidator wiiiiill affeeeeeect performaaaaance," the dog managed to get out before he came to a stop.

"And now," Darkwing said as he switched out canisters, "suck HERBICIDE!"

This canister punched into Bushroot's back, releasing a gas that targeted his floral body and weakened his cells. Bushroot doubled over, coughing.

"GO ON WITHOUT MEEEEEEE!" he yelled dramatically.

"C'mon, Negs!" Quackerjack yelled. "We gotta hustle – "

Launchpad positioned himself between them and the doorway. "Oh, no you don't!"

The pair of thieving ducks attempted to turn on a dime, but Launchpad managed to trip Quackerjack with his foot. "I GOT ONE!" he yelled back to Darkwing.

Negaduck searched within the recesses of his coat for a bomb and a lighter. Igniting the fuse, he tossed the bomb through the nearest window, a tall, gothic-arch affair that left plenty of escape room after its shatter. Really, the bomb would have worked on its own as a bludgeon to break the window, but once Negaduck had jumped to the street and run out of range, he chuckled to hear it explode behind him, likely causing hundreds of dollars of property damage (and maybe a casualty or two if he was lucky).

Cuffed and bound, Megavolt, Quackerjack, and the ailing Bushroot were gathered around the immobilized Liquidator. "Yep, yep, yep," Darkwing said as he dusted off his hands. "All in a day's work for St. Canard's most courageous crime-fighter! Rest assured, citizens: your savings have been saved!"

"Uhhhh, not to burst your bubble, D.W.," Launchpad pointed out, "but I think we're missin' one!"

"EGAD!" Darkwing cried. "NEGADUCK! Where DID that duplicitous duplicate escape to? Well, it's not like it matters. After all, he is only one! After taking down the muscle of his team, surely we can handle arresting one slimy supervillain!"

"You really think we're the team's muscle?" Megavolt cried in delight.

"Yeah, because that really makes up for us getting caught, Sparky," Quackerjack huffed.

"I TOLD YOU NOT TO CALL ME THAT!"

Negaduck emerged onto the rooftop where Mim, Mozenrath, the Huntsman, and Hämsterviel had watched the heist go down. "Liked what you saw?" he asked coyly.

He was rather surprised when all four turned their most venomous glares on him.

"What?" he asked slyly. "Oh, lemme guess: you're mad 'cause I let all the loot slip away. Well, guess what: I got some news."

He fished a blue pouch out of his coat: Megavolt's belt pocket, which he'd ripped off when he'd used the rat as a bludgeon. "I still got all the cash from the ATMs," he bragged. "At least two thousand. Now, about the division. I've got a few reasons why I think I deserve a majority cut."

"Excuse me?" Mozenrath cut him off. "We all just saw you walk into that bank and do nothing but wave a gun around. And now you're telling me YOU deserve the majority cut of what was supposed to be OUR PROFIT?"

"The bumbling buffoons did more work than you, you felonious fowl!" Hämsterviel reminded him.

"In fact," the Huntsman went on, "we saw each of them contribute in ways you did not."

"You also saw them all get caught by Dipwing," Negaduck reminded them, "and me be the only one to get outta there without new matchin' bracelets."

"BECAUSE YOU SACRIFICED THE ONES WHO DID THE HEAVY LIFTING SO YOU COULD GET AWAY!" Mim screeched. "I WANT A SUPERPOWERED ARMY, NOT A COWARD! I WANT THEM, I WANT THEM, I WANT THEM – "

"What Mim is trying to say," Mozenrath stated with faux calm, "is that I'm glad we went ahead with this trial run. It was revealing in multiple ways. See, I was all ready to welcome you onto the team and be ready to cut the other four imbeciles off. But that was before I saw the imbeciles block the escape routes, incapacitate the security force, torture information out of the hostages, manipulate the database, AND collect the money you're holding AS WELL AS the treasures currently frozen inside the Liquidator…while you used them as stepping stones to get away without contributing a single thing."

"I DID CONTRIBUTE!" Negaduck raged. "I INTIMIDATED! I STRUCK FEAR INTO THEIR HEARTS! I WAS READY TO KILL THEM ALL AT A MOMENT'S NOTICE! AND I WAS THE ONLY ONE RESOURCEFUL ENOUGH TO GET AWAY FROM THAT ZERO OF A HERO!"

"I'm afraid we're rescinding your invitation," Mozenrath stated. "You are now the only member of the Fearsome Five NOT welcome among the WHAM ARMY ranks. Trust me, it's from a practical standpoint. We simply can't use you in a field operation."

"Now, your four associates, THEY were impressive!" Hämsterviel cried.

"And I'm sure they'll be good and grateful that we got them away from a scoundrel like YOU!" Mim yelled, swinging her fists dramatically. "They deserve a better scoundrel! A scoundrel like ME!"

"Now, if you'll excuse us," Mozenrath told Negaduck, "we'll be on our way to the prison facility to break your associates – oh, I'm sorry, your FORMER associates free and extend our proposition to them."

Within a flash, Negaduck had traded the loot pocket for his twin launchers. "YOU THINK YOU CAN JUST WALTZ IN HERE AND TAKE MY FEARSOME FOUR AWAY FROM ME?" he screamed. "THIS IS MY TOWN! THEY'RE MY MINIONS! YOU'RE NOT EVEN FROM THIS WORLD!"

Mozenrath began to laugh heartily. "Oh, this is just HILARIOUS! You think you're in a position to bargain against two sorcerers and the Huntsman!"

"EH-HEM," Hämsterviel broke in.

"And a strategist who is pretty quick on the draw," Mozenrath went on. "Also, if I have my lore right, this isn't YOUR world, either. YOUR world is in the Negaverse. So, really, our claim is as legitimate as yours."

The Huntsman stepped forth, staff blazing. "I have no qualms with striking you down where you stand," he seethed.

"Go ahead," Negaduck challenged, trigger fingers tightening. "Try me."

"NOW HOLD ON!" Mim teleported herself between them, holding up a hand to each. "Let's not get violent, boys!"

This drew a confused "WHAT?" from Mozenrath, the Huntsman, and Hämsterviel.

"I'M the one who wants to get violent," Mim clarified.

All three sighed, "Oh."

"Now, you see," Mim stated, "I've just lost a very important duel. As it turns out, I never needed the toy we were dueling over, but I'm still mad I lost, see? I've got a reputation to protect! So I'm challenging you to another one so I can win!"

"You wanna duel me for the idiots?" Negaduck asked. "They ain't worth it, sweetheart."

"DON'T YOU EVER CALL ME SUCH A DISGUSTING NAME AGAIN!" Mim yelled, bristling. "And even if they're not worth it, well, my pride is! I'm getting SOMETHING I want, by hook or by crook! Name a place! We'll duel to the death! Anything goes!"

"Anything?" Negaduck asked slightly. "I think I might just have to take you up on that offer."

"Mim," the Huntsman said sharply, "he obviously has a plan. The odds are stacked considerably in your favor, which means if he truly is accepting the challenge, he has already accounted for that."

"If he wants to fight dirty, then let him," Mim stated. "After all, that's the only way I fight."

"Main Street," Negaduck stated. "You on the East half and me on the West. There, we settle this like brutes."

"And while you two work out your differences," Mozenrath stated, "obviously, you're not going to want any interference, so the Huntsman, Dr. Hämsterviel, and I will go ahead and liberate the collateral."

"Just so you don't go spiritin' 'em off with your hoodoo magic," Negaduck snarled.

"Okay, FIRST of all, my magic couldn't be FURTHER from West African Hoodoo," Mozenrath stated. "SECOND, between the lack of mentors willing to teach a Seven Deserts man and the reliance on what I understand to be Christian scripture, I wouldn't even touch that style. THIRD, we're not moving the collateral until this is settled because we know Mim would kill us all in our sleep if we hurt her pride."

"Not that I'm opposed to cheating in other ways," Mim stated, "but you boys have at least got to make it look realistic by heading out on your mission first."

"You just told me your entire con," Negaduck said in amazement.

"Because there's NOTHING YOU CAN DO TO STOP IT," Mim said gleefully.

"Which brings me to FOURTH," Mozenrath concluded. "If we do move the collateral, that means nothing to you. Or are you going to bake a cake that links to our base between worlds at coordinates you don't know and bring a gun to a brawl with even MORE sorcerers?"

"But just so we're clear," Negaduck stated, "if you did play by the honor system, you'd let me keep my men if I managed to kill her, right?"

"That's almost physically impossible for you to accomplish," Mozenrath told him, "and really, we're just going through the motions to get Mim an extra victory, but yes. If you kill Mim – which you won't – you get your morons back."

"Deal," Negaduck stated. "I'll see you on Main Street. Don't chicken out."

"Says the duck," Mim huffed. "I'll be there, all right! And you'll be sorry!"

Negaduck chuckled. "Then I'm gonna borrow Dorkwing's schtick for a one-time use only: LET'S GET DANGEROUS."