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CHAPTER 37:
DEATH FROM AWAKENING
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Author's Notes: The Tracks for this Chapter are, in order of scene: 'Sealed Door,' from the CHRONO CROSS Original Sound Version, Disc Three; and after this 'Orphanage Of Flame,' from the CHRONO CROSS Original Soundtrack, Disc Three.
Xion shifted slightly, but she was unable to move any more than that.
Lea started violently.
Mare clenched her teeth so tightly they should have broken into fragments.
Elsa's jaw dropped.
Tears appeared in Namine's eyes, and fell down her face.
Isa pressed his lips together very tightly.
"I know better than to argue with you about this now; but if you honestly believe you're an exception to my promise to always bring people back whenever they run away, it's not your heart you needed to worry about not having," Lea snarled, his voice an amalgamation of terror and horror and protectiveness and worry and fury and concern and agony and determination.
"Leave for Ivalice Zodiac if you want, but you won't reach it."
But Roxas said nothing.
Aqua knew there was no point in him saying anything.
There was no way he could avoid making the choice to either become a final artificial Kingdom Hearts, or the Note Blade.
It wasn't even inevitable.
It was blinding and incontrovertible fact.
The sole question left at this point was who would accept this fact first; and just give up and give into the darkness, permanently this time.
Aqua didn't understand why she hadn't, yet.
She wasn't afraid of someone pounding it out of her, as Ven had through Sora the first time.
If anyone did, she'd just give right back into it as soon as it was forced out of her.
To her dot of a silhouette of a concave complete shock, she hadn't seen any reason to give into the darkness a second time as soon as Maleficent had tricked Xion into murdering Ven, but Aqua was under no illusions she'd give up sooner or later this time.
She hadn't even been able to hold on in the realm of darkness; even when Xehanort's Heartless' discovery of her had made it very likely news of her whereabouts would reach someone in the realm of light, and she'd known it was very likely she was on the verge of returning home after so many forneverunfolding eternities of torment and despair.
Now that Ven was deaddeaddeaddeaddeaddeaddeaddeadshe'dbeenrightthereshe'dbeenthererighttheretheretherethereshe'dbeenrightathissiderighttherethererightrightbesidehimthere
"Stay out of this, also-ran."
correct?
Noshewasstillintherealmofdarknessthiswasanotherillusionanotherinsideoutdistortedphotonegativecoilingnightmarephantasm
how long could she even alwaysnilpresentpossibly hold on this time?
If Terra had made the mistake of holding her, as Lea was Roxas, she very likely might have.
But Terra
believed he
knew her well enough at this time to know any attempt to offer that much comfort would wash clear anything hallucinationneverforfact that had never been or was anywhere left of her.
Lea gave Isa a look that clearly said to keep his mouth shut this time.
Isa met Lea's gaze quietly.
Ephemer sighed with a heaviness that was both familiar to Aqua and as alien as the farthest reaches before the nilbeginning of nadirending eternity present neverwhere.
The faintest surprise, if Aqua wasn't imagining all concepts of surprise, passed through her at the knowledge she was still capable of feeling guilt at how wrapped up she was in her own loss and self hatred; when Ephemer must have been through far worse.
"All I'll say to advise you against going down that path is this," Ephemer spoke, his voice a mix of understanding empathy and reproving sympathy.
"One of the core reasons Yozora has spent so many millennia forging the Note Blade is because the Kye-Blade is incapable of harnessing the pure light at the nexus of the true Kingdom Hearts, or all of its darkness.
"From the start, he was as aware as all of you are now what would happen if he attempted to control all of Kingdom Hearts with the Kye-Blade.
"So, because no natural means existed to wholly control the power of Kingdom Hearts; he spent all these millennia casting an artifact that can do this."
Aqua was further faintly surprised to feel her eyes widen slightly at this revelation.
"Think about what this means you'll be if you become the Note Blade."
"It's either that, or something even worse," Roxas responded, his tone still unchanged.
"You can't be sure of that," Ephemer replied.
"I know even less about what Yozora wants the artificial Kingdom Hearts for than the Note Blade; but I do know one of his goals for it is merely to create a Kingdom Hearts that functions as the heart of Gaes, and all of the endless oblivion outside of it, and thus becomes the heart of even the worlds and realms that fashioned Kingdom Hearts."
"You can't be sure I won't be," Roxas replied.
Aqua should have put those pieces together herself.
It was another reason she didn't even belong in the d–
Oh.
Of course.
She hadn't given into the darkness as soon as Ven had died because she'd known from the instant she'd been told he was dead that she needed to die herself first, and then give into the darkness once she was a true ghost as Ven was.
But, for whatever blinded of even obfuscation reason; the concept of giving into the darkness when Ven would need her in ways he never had before caused her to feel as though she was about to retch weakly.
So she'd just think of a fitting way to kill herself while Mare and Terra were bringing him to Twilight Town.
Ven needed to be the one to do it, but she knew he'd never do that, so she had no choice but to commit suicide.
Aqua didn't know whether she wanted to laugh brokenly, or cry until her eyes were so bloodshot she'd bleed to death from their redness.
She couldn't even die properly, after what she'd done.
Bleeding to death.
Perhaps the best choice for how to kill herself was not to give up her heart to darkness, in part or in full; but todigtheprongsofStormfellintoherbodyandliterallycarveherheartoutofherchestanduseherheightenedathleticismasaKeybladeMastertoremainconsciousthroughtheagonyandbloodlossaslongaspossibletolookatitasitsentwhatbloodremainedinitfountaininginvolcanicgeysersalloverheruntilshesuffocatingchokingasphyxiatingstranglinglaughinggigglingcryinghowlingincareeninggyratingwildlyinpinnaclesofascendingspiralshystericallygraspingwiththelackofhopesheneverboundlesslyhadn'tknownforthelastgossamerinfinitesimalfilamentsoflightdrownedinitfrombothallwhereaboutherandaroundherandanywithin
Elsa looked over at Aqua, clearly having seen something in Aqua's face or eyes.
Her gaze told Aqua she was entirely aware of what Aqua was thinking now, and the Keyblade Master wouldn't be taking a step out of this alleyway unless someone was with her unless she could guarantee to Elsa she wouldn't do anything stupid.
Hatred and fury blinded away anything Aqua knew and remembered and registered and perceived.
But Aqua could still pick up, on the barest horizons of her awareness, the knowledge she wouldn't be able to give Ven any love this time if Elsa told Terra about this, and the two of them were spending most of their time attempting to be there for her why for h
"You sacrificed yourself for me?"
"I love you."
Right.
Of course.
Ven had seen, and heard, Elsa ask Anna that question, and Anna respond; as clearly as Sora had.
Aqua didn't know why a minuscule string of the self hatred and fury faded at the memory of Ven telling Terra and her about this, but it did.
Aqua knew the answer to that as well as Elsa did.
She forced a tired smile to her face, and nodded at Elsa.
Elsa looked away.
"Now what's wrong?" Terra questioned.
But Aqua just glanced at him, and the depthless terror and worry in his visage, with an expression that said she'd talk about this another time.
Whenever she figured out how to convince Ven and Terra it was still fact she'd eventually give up, and give into the darkness, a second time; and this time, no one and nothing would be able to be a wayfinder to light her way home.
I was right about one thing.
Things have gone back to normal.
Because darkness is what is normal.
"In any event, we should all head for the Old Mansion welcome Ven back home this time," Terra advised them.
"Perhaps even Hayner, Olette, and Pence; and Lucca, when they get back."
Roxas sat up, and he turned to face Terra.
"Xion, Axel, and I have filled them in about a lot of what living as a Keyblade wielder entails; but they don't fully know how painful a life as a Keyblade master, or Keyblade Master, can become.
"They don't need to find out this way."
"And we won't need to go to the Old Mansion," Ephemer put in, now keeping Kairi out of his eyesight as much as possible.
"I don't know how much you know about the Books of Prophecies, but they can create datascapes themselves; and I have one with me."
Weak hope rose within Aqua, causing new tears of her own to obscure her sight.
"Then there's no time like the present," Mare said.
She turned and walked purposefully in the direction of the Usual Spot.
Terra turned and took a number of steps, and he appeared to be moving relatively decently.
So Aqua turned to Riku and Kairi as she forced legs that didn't want to do what she wished to follow them, and this time she was genuinely shocked to find she was moving far faster than she would have believed she had.
But looking at Riku, and to a far lesser extent, Kairi, caused her to feel even more uncomfortable than she'd believed she would if she looked at Riku, and Kairi, right now; and she felt much too exhaustedly relieved, so much her legs almost gave out, to see the two of them were unsteadily helping each other to their own feet and turning to accompany them.
Don't even think this.
Elsa just told you not to do anything ill advised.
So you are not going to push Ven and Terra away in search of atonement with Riku, Kairi, and Sora; either.
And this was one of the very last times she should be thinking about how Riku was the sole person she'd been able to protect.
Even though that was one of the almost absent number of things left she still wanted to think about.
As well as the desperate past encompassing by feeling or thought, but totally and fully and entirely and completely and wholly and utterly shard strewn and gouged and scoured blinding exposed while kept safe and secure and close and protected; need to know he was doing okay, or happy, at least a little, and near her, or at least within easy reach, she'd first truly become aware of when she'd heard he was a full Keyblade Master now, and she knew, at least in part, was due to what he'd said to her when she'd given up.
So why did Aqua perceive, if she paid attention to those feelings and trusted Riku to be the sole person who could keep her from giving into the darkness this time; it was factually measurelessly more inevitable that she would?
For a reason Aqua didn't understand, now Anna was the person who was looking at her in worry, with an understanding and aware empathetic and knowing sympathetic but kindly admonishing and warning expression that told Aqua that Anna would be keeping an eye on Aqua as much as Elsa would.
It didn't matter, though.
Particularly when thinking about herself too much, and not enough about Ven and Terra, had been what had caused her to give up the first time.
Riku had shown her that.
Anna shifted as though she was about to walk over to Aqua and say something.
For reasons Aqua didn't understand, sheer stark irritation rose.
Aqua looked away.
But she still clearly picked up Anna whisper quietly to Elsa, "It's not just you she's acting like.
"Remember what I did with Hans."
The stark irritation became so much blinding hatred Aqua didn't know why it hadn't evaporated her into a vacuum gaping of even absence.
How did Hans a member of the Summation Organization Thirteen, the group that had murdered Ven and all deserved to die in the most excruciating and lingering brokenly shattered and wiped erased fragmented ways it was possible to create within all the potentialities of the ethereal and the material, from Hans through Pete to Christopher through Maleficent; connect to Riku, the incandescently brilliant wonder who had been determined to find her in the most profound darkness and understood her pain to clasp her heart in the jet oblivion when everyone else had given her up for torture or death?
Aqua realized she was about to retch violently in actuality, and she struggled desperately to keep her insides within her.
Because it hadn't been Riku who had saved her.
It had been Ven, through Sora.
Why couldn't she keep that in mind?
But Aqua knew the answer.
Because, in the end, she hadn't been able to do the same for Ven.
She alone of Eraqus' students had graduated the Mark of Mastery Exam, yet no matter how much effort she gave, the most inversely gouging blinding irrefutable fact of all was that she could never protect or safe keep or love or keep safe or call home or cherish anyone.
All she could foreverfactnilnever do was stagger on her supposedly magnificent Keyblade as though it were a crutch, the wholeness of her heart and mind and brain and soul and body broken and crippled into chips and shreds; while person after person who she loved and wanted with all her heart to protect ceaselessly and for all eternal boundless time and every place and any continually died and hurt struggling and striving without let up to love and safeguard and protect and call home her.
She admired Riku and Kairi?
"We can look out for her."
She envied them; with anything she was incapable of, and did, contain and not constrain.
A spoiled brat who was too full of himself and who lazed his life away on the beach while dreaming infantile fancies of padding a twig down a placid creek, and a tissue paper fragile Princess who could fall apart as though she were weightless soot and spent her days cavorting after dancing Sun-drenched butterflies with empty headed giggling whimsies; could love and care for and cherish and protect, people better than she could.
They needed to be the first to die, in the most abominable agony anyone or anything could convey.
They had willingly chosen to wield the darkness, while deluding themselves into believing they could harness it rather than the other way around; so they were the greatest dangers to Ven everywhere of anyone.
With the sole exceptions of Vanitas and Chirithy and Yen Sid.
And, factuallyendlessnilforneverimmeasurably, XehanortT
T
"We will."
She didn't need looking after.
Ven did.
"Get a grip, if you would," Vanitas' voice ripped through Aqua's awareness, dripping with scorn.
"Even now, you still haven't picked up on how much Ven hates being treated as nothing more than a tiny child?
"Terra remembers how I tricked him into leaving the Land of Departure.
"It wasn't just because he was frightened he'd lose Terra.
"He bought my lie in the first place because I that implied Terra saw him as nothing more than a small boy who was dragging him down, who Terra longed to ditch in the mud somewhere so Ven would presumably stop holding him back; thus feeding on Ven's terror Terra blamed Ven participating in the Mark of Mastery Exam and causing Terra to wish to coddle him to provoke Terra into calling upon the darkness and failing it."
Even the diamondonyx hatred Aqua realized had now burgeoned into something that was a photonegative of not even black or white but clear, to bring Vanitas to justice for doing that to Ven, and everything that had resulted from him doing so; vanished in a wash of cold that stormed everywhere throughout her and around her like a blizzard and clenched her heart in such a tight vise it should have been squeezed into a singularity, casting reality crystal acute around her once more.
She had just entered the Usual Spot with Terra on her left, and Ephemer holding the curtain open to their right.
"As much as I don't like agreeing with Vanitas, he's right," Terra spoke up from Aqua's other side, unease in his voice, but also much more of a set and resolved conviction in it than Aqua had believed Terra was capable at a time like this.
"Ven was as responsible as you and Mickey for shattering the first Kye-Blade, and he brought the two of us home; when we almost severed our friendship, and all it meant, because the two of us, and Master Eraqus, couldn't agree about how to protect him."
Everything Aqua comprehended and didn't no place encompass told her not to believe this, because Terra was agreeing with Vanitas.
But if Terra believed this, Aqua needed to.
Otherwise, they'd hurt Ven even worse, and the same way they had the first time, by straining or severing their connection because they were taking separate paths to the same destination of attempting to love and cherish and safe keep and be there for him.
Then she couldn't breathe for a few seconds.
Because, whether or not the prophecies Vayne had heard had been real or just attempts to forge baseless fears; Aqua at last understood how the Foretellers intended to break Ven's and Terra's hearts, and convince them to give up all hope in anything but their inscribed fates for the two of them.
Terra had learned from his mistakes so well he didn't want to step out of Eraqus' shadow and become a capable Keyblade teacher of his own.
He'd learned not to do that just fine, from what attempting to live up to Eraqus and Xehanort had tricked him into causing to happen.
As Terra now saw Ven as exemplary; it was the person who he'd Bequeathed the Keyblade to and who had followed in his footsteps and learned the same lessons, and far faster and better than Terra had, Riku; and how Riku had come to terms with his own darkness; who Terra believed he should emulate.
For whatever delirious deranged reason, Aqua realized she actually believed she could convince Terra to stop doing that, before he made another terrible error.
But it didn't matter whether or not she could.
Now that she knew what the danger Terra was in was; whether or not it was inevitable fact she'd give up a second time, and this time for good, for as long as she could, she now had no other option but to keep searching for a way to pull through.
"You two don't get to choose what Ven seeks," Kairi spoke up, a small amount of protective anger and guilt in her voice.
"Ven does."
"Most of us have made that mistake one time or another," Ephemer spoke up, a contained pain of his own in his voice, and even a self hatred Aqua doubted anyone but she herself could hear.
She didn't know if he was referring to Empyreal, or Ava, or both of them, or one or more other people, or another combination of people.
"But we've all learned where that leads by now; so I advise all of us, myself included, to put that aside for now and focus on creating a better tomorrow."
Mare was now holding an unfamiliar book with a tan cover, obviously Ephemer's Book of Prophecies.
Marshmallow took up a position behind the curtain, turning to face the alleyway, and Ephemer closed it behind all of them but the giant snowperson.
Mare strode quickly over to a regular personal computer set up on a desk to the left and placed the book down near it.
As soon as she did, her five left fingers morphed into a single thin black cable with two connecting jacks, one at each end; appearing akin to what someone would use to connect a portable Floppy Disk Drive to a computer.
She extended one into the spine of the book, and a pale rainbow of transparent holographic three dimensional pixels shimmered into being in various arrangements around the book and beneath it within the desk itself, a large number of dark crimson and black Blox the same size as the pixels dancing among them.
But then she turned her head to look at Roxas.
"Pence gave me permission to use his computer if I have a good reason to, including its Networking features; and to extend that permission to any of my friends outside of the three of them.
"You can boost the Book's processing power with their computer."
Mare nodded and turned to insert the other jack into the back of the computer's equipment segment.
The same holograms of pixels and Blox appeared around the computer, and Mare closed her eyes.
Aqua barely remembered to keep standing, tears obscuring and drowning out everywhere another time; and for several seconds, she was unsure she could stay on her feet.
Elsa had one of Xion's arms over one of her shoulders, and was supporting her carefully on her feet, while Lea was holding the other.
It was Riku who asked Ephemer the question, where he stood at Kairi's left with one of her hands clasped firmly and reassuringly in his.
"Are you willing to tell us what your plan is before Mare brings Ven back here, or would you prefer to wait for him?"
"Before that, there's something you should know," Ven's voice spoke up from out of nowhere from the direction of the closed Book of Prophecies.
Aqua lost all awareness of anything and everyone but Ven's voice, and the new tears obfuscating everything that was and wasn't real.
And the new all drowning out terror and horror that wiped clear washed lacking reality and everywhere and eternal not beginning and nadir ending time, for there was a broken resignation in Ven's voice she'd never heard before.
"Yes, Jack, my Connection is stable," Ven said to someone Aqua couldn't hear, slight irritation now in his voice.
"I'm the person who designed the new cockpit for Radical Dreamers, Unstolen Jewel.
"Unlike Sora, I can computer."
But then, before Terra or Vanitas or she could say anything, the irritation was gone.
"At any rate, as soon as Roxas returned to the light, I got my memories back.
"Including the ones Vanitas erased when he first merged with me.
"And I understand now one of the core reasons why I was so terrified of becoming the Kye-Blade.
"Aeons ago; although I used the first Kye-Blade to erase Sis' memories of what happened, and of how I was Ava's younger brother by blood; Ava, Yozora, and I once sought to do what most people that day believed couldn't be done, and we set off on a journey to explore all the reaches of the great wide realm when it was one World.
"But I wasn't one of Yozora's actual students; so I increasingly felt left out, and excluded from Ava and Yozora and their bond, and thus incredibly lonely. This eventually hurt me so much Faerie and Strelitzia offered to perform a joint experiment to study the darkness causing me so much pain in order to attempt to figure out how to take my pain away, which led to her creating the initial Heartless and Nobody from Strelitzia.
"Eager to prove myself to Sis' and Yozora and be taken as Yozora's seventh apprentice, I then went against Yozora's advice and called the first Kye-Blade to myself defeat Strelitzia's Heartless and Nobody and recomplete them all by myself.
"I was successful, but during the confrontation, my recklessness resulted in me needing to cut one of Yozora's eyes out in order to keep Strelitzia's Heartless from claiming his heart.
"It later became the Gazing Eye in No Name and survived to the present.
"So, when I was about to give up the Kye-Blade, I then saw a vision in one of Yozora's first drafts of what he'd in time alter into the Books of Prophecies.
"Of Sora, Kairi, and Riku first beginning to dream of setting off on a similar journey soon after they met Kairi; sitting together in the Secret Place on the play island and discussing ways to cause their dreams to come true.
"And Kairi's heart sheltered Ava's.
"Thusly, out of fear of them repeating my mistake; and this causing Ava to become a Heartless and Nobody as Strelitzia had, or even die; I sliced the first sword in a war between light and darkness that culminated in the death or cascade into darkness of most of the people Yozora cared about, ending with Faerie; and thus Yozora's descent into darkness and every last single event that unwound afterwards."
Kairi still knew who she was, but that was the entirety of it.
Even what Young Xehanort had told Sora he was doing to her and the other Princesses of Heart, and the discovery of what not telling Xion and Roxas what Luxu had said about them right away had caused to take place, and Riku's hand around hers, were gone; lost beyond a never and cannot have be margin somewhere ending past her hot tears.
And, if losing any concept of who she was would have meant she'd be able to escape what Ven had just said, Kairi knew she would have lost all perception of that, as well.
"Strelitzia and I have talked about this repeatedly," a kind and soothingly reassuring voice replied.
Kairi didn't know why she was aware the person who had just spoken was named Ephemer.
And he was talking to someone named Ven.
"I refuse to hold either of you two accountable, but Strelitzia maintains she's as responsible as you.
"Faerie believed she understood what she was doing when she performed the experiments on Strelitzia's heart.
"But Strelitzia had had enough experience by that point, with what it felt like to live in Lauriam's shadow; and to continually be overlooked by people she wanted to become friends with while they paid attention to her older brother and just assumed her responsibility was to live as Lauriam's shadow and remain there for the rest of her life, to have a very good idea something very bad could occur if Faerie removed her darkness from her heart to examine it more closely.
"But when she heard about Ven through Lauriam from Faerie, she refused to let Ven become the same kind of victim she was. So she was determined to be studied regardless of her misgivings, and she even refused to back down when Faerie and Yozora had their own second thoughts about tampering with the darkness inside her."
"And plenty of us make bad choices due to feeling unwanted, or from fear of losing someone," an older male voice Kairi knew she should remember the name of, but whose identity she couldn't grasp even the most frayed gossamer filament of, put in.
"Look at what I did for the same reasons.
"You didn't do anything unusual."
"So?" Ven's voice now sounded on the verge of hysteria, even though it was restrained.
"I still set the entire cycle in motion!"
No.
That was wrong.
Kairi had.
She was the source and the cause of all of Sora's and Riku's torment and despair in every way she could imagine a person could be.
Dad's, as well.
And his death.
And that of her other two younger brothers.
And their deaths.
And Mom's.
And her death.
And when Sora learned how responsible he himself was
"You know better than to believe that," the older male voice reproved Ven with sure gentleness.
"If Yozora's heart was so weak he was willing to give into the darkness as profoundly as he did due to what you blame yourself for, almost anything could have convinced him to take his eyes off of the light.
"Yozora made his own decisions, and you made yours."
"Will you let me finish first?" Ven responded, a small string of anger in his voice.
"Whatever you have to say, I'm still not going to buy it," the unrecognizable male countered.
"But fine."
"When I saw the vision of Ava stuck inside Kairi, I pretended to give up the Kye-Blade.
"Ava believed my lie, but Yozora wasn't deceived; and I knew he'd tell his other students about it as soon as we returned to Daybreak Town and then the six of them, perhaps with Ava, would take it from me by force and put it back where it belonged.
"So, as soon as Yozora left to inform Luxu and Ira I needed to be dealt with, I got desperate.
"First; believing the less connected to me she was, the less of a chance there was of anything happening to her, I locked away all of Ava's memories we were related to attempt to distance her from me a lot.
"Then I went after Strelitzia for the first time, without being maneuvered into doing it by Vanitas.
"One of the core reasons Vanitas sent me after Strelitzia was because he knew if I was played into attacking her a second time, my guilt from the part of me that knew what I was doing would create more darkness than if I ambushed anyone else.
"I attempted to alter her memories as Namine does, and then use her as a tool to do the same to Faerie, and Yozora and his students; thus ensuring no one knew I had the Kye-Blade.
"But Strelitzia retained all her memories of her Heartless' and Nobody's battle with me, and she also knew a lot more about what dark emotions of the kind I was feeling can drive me to do; so she was able to anticipate how I'd battle and outwit me.
"But when she took the Kye-Blade from me and beat me; my hope of altering her heart and dreams of ending my loneliness caused twelve fragments of her heart, each carrying a chamber of her darkness, to separate from her. And unlike with Xehanort, who needed vessels for his heart fragments; Strelitzia and Lauriam loved each other so much that Strelitzia was a Princess of Heart in every way but the literal sense, because Kingdom Hearts hadn't formed the means for them to exist then.
"Those twelve heart fragments thus harnessed the Kye-Blade through mysterious means, to become entities I can't identify similar to Dream Eaters, although I have no way of knowing whether they qualify as them or something else."
Sora didn't need a fifth kind of dark entity out there somewhere, and particularly not one Kairi herself might be able to create.
"And they attempted to end their loneliness by imbibing all of the hearts and worlds around them, seeking to fill up the emptiness inside them through continual growth.
"Strelitzia took the Kye-Blade to Yozora and he returned it to Kingdom Hearts, and he didn't report either of us to any authorities because the two of us hadn't intended for Strelitzia's heart to splinter. He had no idea how to fix Ava's memory at that time, because I'd sealed it away with the Kye-Blade even though he knew how chains of memories operated. So he told me if I stayed away from Ava until he'd repaired it and didn't do anything wrong later on, once he and his students and friends had dispatched or contained the darknesses, he'd see this issue as over and done with.
"However, all of us underestimated how terrible and determined the darknesses were; and how efficiently the darknesses could create other Heartless to reinforce the ones Strelitzia had already formed before I changed her back and, less frequently, Nobodies, or convince people to give into the darkness through other means.
"By the time the twelve darknesses had retreated out of Daybreak Town, all of the people he loved but Faerie and his students had lost their own hearts or died.
"Yozora swore to forge the Keyblades to ensure no one else became the victim of a similar tragedy, but then Faerie died doing so herself.
"Now do you understand?
"I didn't just make the kinds of mistakes anyone could, and thus break a heart that might have shattered sooner or later anyway due to his own weaknesses.
"You're discounting what I told you.
"I literally unsheathed my sword first, and fired the first shot.
"I declared the First Keyblade War."
"And then Yozora strung Strelitzia into assisting him in creating me," Vanitas
why was Kairi aware of who these people were, but not anyone else
perhaps it was due to a dim desperate longing she could sense from an unknown distance far off
interjected before anyone else could say a word.
Kairi wondered what point Vanitas was making by bringing this up, but she felt no surprise he'd answered before the stranger.
"Whose Chirithy is Ven's new or old friend, genuinely?
"I'm assuming its Ava's Chirithy, the first one; Ven's; or Empyreal's; but I can't tell one way or another for sure, or if any of those guesses are correct.
"Nor can I trust anyone else's claim who he belongs to; or memory of whose Chirithy he is, including Chirithy himself.
"But that does make him yours, for now; and, by his very nature, he can't leave you out of anything.
"That means, of course, you'd really better not do to him what you've done two times before, or you'll very much get a piece of my mind this time."
Kairi didn't understand why.
But for an unknown reason, Vanitas' evasive and roundabout attempt to be there for Ven caused her to want to smile very slightly, and filled her with a little hope.
And had Vanitas just indirectly thanked Ven for enabling his creation?
Kairi wasn't sure about that one; as Vanitas could have just brought that up as a means of entering the conversation in a way that would keep anyone from interrupting him before he was done, but that caused even more hope to rise.
"I can't remember myself," the hope increased a little at the incredibly surprised, but a huge amount defensive, gratitude in Ven's tone.
"All I know is, whether Ava's Nightmare Chirithy was created from him or not, the Nightmare Chirithy that fomented the First Keyblade War does have ties to him.
"I'm a lot more worried about precisely how those darknesses were created, and what they are; Dream Eaters, or something worse, very possibly much worse.
"As soon as Mare began setting up the link, I picked up enough of Vanitas' memories to know something I don't care for him having not seen fit to tell the rest of you yet."
Vanitas snarled, but he didn't interrupt in any other way.
"Yozora didn't only seek to corrupt the Foretellers to convince them to act out his script.
"He also wants to turn all six of them into vessels for darkness comparable to the lights inside Princesses of Heart, and then reclaim Vanitas."
Ephemer inhaled with harsh, horror and terror.
Dim pain washed through whatever location was so distant, yet so close by.
"Strelitzia assumed she was supposed to be that vessel; and for all of the thirteen Dream Eaters, including Vanitas."
"Don't look at me," Vanitas himself said.
"Yes, Strelitzia is the True Dandelion. But all I know is that means she's supposed to become 'the shadow of kaleidoscopic light' to the 'incandescent night' of Roxas' artificial Kingdom Hearts, and complement him as he 'casts radiance into the Gap Amidst Transparency.'
"At first glance, that looks as though she's supposed to be the sole Princess of Heart to Roxas' Kingdom Hearts as Kairi, Anna, and Elsa and the others are the seven for the true one; but if it was that obvious, Yozora isn't so conceited he'd leave his intentions for Strelitzia concealed just for the thrill when his intention for her is this apparent."
"Particularly not when Yozora also wants Ava to enable Xion's Keyblade of Hearts to become not just the Keyblade of Hearts of the real one, but the Kye-Blade of the artificial one."
Faint, exhausted surprise and resignation rose somewhere inside Kairi.
"Perhaps Strelitzia is meant to be the Note Blade of the artificial Kingdom Hearts," another unfamiliar older male voice, one Kairi felt a lot guiltier at not being able to place, offered.
"That's a good idea," Ephemer replied.
"I'll think that one over, and see if it fits in with the rest of what Strelitzia told me and what I've deciphered from the Book of Prophecies; and what I pieced together myself after I lost my faith in Yozora and his teachings when Empyreal gave into the darkness."
Terror and horror and self hatred and despair so drawn and stark it brought new tears to Kairi's eyes ripped through her.
"Not in you," Ephemer cried, horror and terror of his own in his voice, along with desperate assurance and reassurance.
Ava.
Ava must have woken up, at least in part, when they'd met Ephemer; and Kairi was now feeling her emotions.
Something was tugging at Kairi that this was unfathomably important, but she couldn't remember what.
Whatever Ava was truly feeling, all Kairi could pick up on in response to Ephemer's words was a far more exhausted relief; as well as a wariness that told Kairi she practically saw it as inverted inside out photonegative switchback fact Ephemer couldn't be telling the truth.
Kairi was almost sure she could partially understand why Ava felt that way now.
"Ava, I want you to listen to me," Ephemer said from where Kairi could now hear him standing right in front of her, his tone convinced and refusing to be argued with.
"I've had plenty of centuries to think about how to attempt to convince you what happened was no more your fault than Ven's, and a lesser amount to discuss how to reach you with Strelitzia.
"We still have no idea.
"So for now, I'll just say the obvious, because you still need to hear it.
"The Nightmare Chirithy was created because your bangle cast a shadow of treacherous greed from your establishment of the Dandelions, a Union hoarding the most capable Keyblade wielders for yourself while leaving the other Unions to rot if the prophecy came true.
"But these Dandelions were meant to enable the realms to pull through their obliteration, and pick up the pieces of the ravages of the First Keyblade War to put their lives back together.
"Feeling it would have been better if you'd never forged the Dandelion Union, if the cost was the cosmos; means it would be better to let countless innocent people around you suffer and die when you know there's a forthcoming calamity about to happen you can prepare your fellows to weather."
"I have my doubts as to whether this causes you to be the actual traitor; or Luxu was lying about that, or at least he believes you're the traitor while, as you believed, he himself is the real one."
Knowing her heart might not harbor a traitor to the equivalent of an entire cosmos strewn civilization didn't cause Kairi to feel better, even a bit.
"But even if you are the traitor, for the above reasons as well as the following ones; if your reasons for being the traitor supposedly cause you to be untrustworthy and unreliable, trust has no foundations upon which to stand at all.
"The other reasons you may be the traitor, and you created the Nightmare for sure, was because your refusal to believe in Yozora with as little to no questions as the other Foretellers, even at the beginning, was a darkness of rejection and dismissal. Your desire to live for what you believed in, rather than to be told what to feel and think and say and act upon, and to attain happiness rather than just serve Yozora, also created more selfish darkness within you from the outset than any of the other Foretellers; while the other Foretellers developed this later.
"But if it's unforgivably selfish merely to want to have loved ones and friends, and live your life as you choose to yourself, then light doesn't even just cast shadows that are inextricably intermingled with it.
"If wanting to love others and befriend them, and be loved and befriended yourself, and walk your own path while enabling other people to live their own lives, is an indelible sin; light itself is nothing but darkness."
Then maybe light really was nothing but darkness, and a crazy hallucination.
"Yozora wants you to believe all love, all warmth, all kindness, and all homes; every solitary shade of light; does nothing but create darkness and pain.
"And the New World of Synchronicity Perceptual he dreams of is a World where no one will be hurt again, and darkness has been obliterated because all pain has been erased from existence; at the cost of any form of happiness, through forming connections or trusting other people, or anything else.
"To Yozora; connections themselves are the abomination, both ones forged and severed, through trust and betrayal, or understanding and rejection, or of any other kind.
"Yozora wants you to believe, in order to keep yourself from being hurt once again for all time, you should close off your heart to anything, sadness and smiles."
Now that Kairi was at last beginning to understand, from what Ursula and Young Xehanort had revealed, how much pain connections caused; she could no longer fully believe it would that horrible if the price of ending all despair and darkness for unending eternity was to remove all warmth and light along with it.
"Do you truly see it as wrong to believe in a world of love and warmth and dreams and bonds, rather than a fanciful fiction of a dream reality without hurt at the cost of all laughter?
"And, even if you are the real traitor, you're also the sole Foreteller who refused to be broken.
"If you hadn't given the Book to Brain, the Dandelion Unions may have followed the first five Unions into the darkness.
"Yozora separated Vanitas from himself specifically to maneuver Ven into murdering Strelitzia,"
An older female voice Kairi should know inhaled with sharp harshness.
The other stranger's male voice snarled through clenched teeth.
"So he could sow dissent among them, and set off a Second Keyblade War much earlier, in the datascape cosmos through similar methods to how he set off the first one.
"But thanks to you, we were able to keep history from repeating itself, and although we failed to protect most of the Dandelions from the datascape's decay; among other things, a lot less Darklings and Nightmares were created the second time around; this time from the cream of the Union's crops, so Yozora has less servants at his disposal, and he doesn't have anywhere close to as many of the most lethal ones among the forces that are at his disposal as he sought.
"You ended one universe, but you protected another and gave the repaired universe a fighting chance.
"Take all of this as you will, but this doesn't change how true it all is."
Kairi had no idea which of the two of them was wondering, if it wasn't both of them; what they were actually fighting for, in the first place.
"You did the same yourself, Ven," the older male voice reentered the discussion.
"How?" Ven returned.
"There's one last thing none of you have picked up on, but I figured it out as soon as I saw Vanitas' memories.
"When Brain traveled to the future, he arrived at Scala ad Caelum at the cost of his memories; because Ephemer had gotten there first and the Book of Prophecies was still there and connected to Brain.
"He was a dark haired Keyblade wielder and who kept his emotions contained to enable him to make rational decisions more often than not."
Reality returned as Kairi realized what Ven was now about to say; but all of it but Ven, Ephemer, Vanitas, and Ava weren't just separate from it now, but starkly and harshly twisted and wrenched disjointed at the same time; and almost all feeling was still inverted drowned out.
Aqua's mouth was open wide.
Terra's teeth were clenched tightly; and both his hands were, too, although no fist was drawing blood.
Ephemer's mouth was open slightly.
"All three of us knew someone like that," Ven ended.
"Brain became Eraqus," Aqua stated.
"Whoever the Brain is with Skuld, he's a Nobody or Heartless or heart fragment."
It was a comment, not a question.
"So that's what went wrong," Ephemer breathed in understanding horror and guilt.
"Strelitzia and I knew Empyreal had sensed a potential kindred spirit in Xehanort when he was born, and traveled into Xehanort's heart to recover from the sacking of the datascape.
"In order to ensure Xehanort would have a chance to form closer friendships in a smaller community that might keep him from following Empyreal's path, or taking a worse one; while also providing Empyreal with a closer knit community that might enable him to heal through bathing in more light than darkness; she disguised herself and then met with Kairi's grandmother to convince them to move from Scala ad Caelum to Destiny Islands.
"This was so Xehanort would have a chance at growing up in a small community himself, and learning about the importance of ties with other people at a location where they weren't as interchangeable; the opposite of the environment Empyreal grew up in.
"But Empyreal's cascade into darkness had been arranged so, when he gave into it; he'd lead Yozora to a potential architect of a future Keyblade War at the time around the waypoints Yozora had set up during which he needed it to happen.
"Luxu, or one of the other Foretellers, must have found Brain after he reached Daybreak Town; and sent him to Scala ad Caelum to undo our attempt at teaching Xehanort the value of warmth by giving Xehanort a friend who was as inquisitive as he was, but who valued reason a good deal more than feeling."
"Then it wasn't just Sora and I," Riku interjected.
He was still clasping Kairi's hand, even more assuredly close and reassuringly tightly, now.
Kairi didn't know whether she felt a little sick to her stomach, or calmer and lighter, at becoming aware of its warmth.
"This whole generation of Keyblade wielders, from Eraqus to Sora, existed to prepare the stage for Kairi."
"Yes, and no," Ephemer said back.
"Mickey isn't a Keyblade wielder because of Luxu.
"He's a Keyblade wielder due to Strelitzia and I.
"Initially, the Disney Kingdom used to be known as the Disney Dukedom; an oligarchy under the Beagle Family as its Head Representatives that had participated in internecine factional family rivalries for decades, at the cost of throwing away the countless lives of its civilians and any other planets or cultures with space travel who had the ill fortune of being dragged into the conflicts.
"But decades before today, Scrooge, a middle class citizen who had still developed a genius mind for economics, developed dreams of leaving his name behind in the annals of mercantilism; and he and his best friend, the noble born knight Oswald the Lucky Rabbit, both disliked how their world functioned.
"So they realized Scrooge's economic skills and Oswald's martial talents gave them the means to end this way of life.
"They found as much support among the people of the lower class as they could, and then Scrooge funded a revolution Oswald arranged into a cohesive military. The war ended with the oligarchy's removal from power and the flight of the Beagles; a number to their colony in the Country of the Musketeers, others to conquer the people of Ivalice Zodiac and found a second colony there, and further refugees to seek asylum worlds or nations with space travel, such as the Turo Federation or the States of the Sword and Stone.
"Scrooge and Oswald met Merlin when the King of the States of the Sword and Stone, Arthur, refused to grant the Beagles asylum and they attempted to invade and create a refuge there by force.
"Yen Sid was an unremarkable magician who had been employed by one of the circus troupes working for Scrooge when Strelitzia met him while we were confirming Luxu wasn't playing any of the sides of the war, and she performed the Bequeathing Ceremony on Yen Sid when she learned of his dreams of stepping out of the shadow of other enchanters and becoming a renowned wizard in his own right.
"She never told him who we were, or how I'd founded Scala ad Caelum.
"But she left enough of an impression on Yen Sid he turned the fledgling Disney Kingdom into an effective wild card."
Ephemer then turned to face Donald and Goofy, and he inclined his head in apology.
"The Foretellers never intended for your world, and your people, to be a part of this.
"Strelitzia and I dragged you into this.
"The Foretellers recognized the Disney Kingdom, and its idealism, as the threat it was. Because of this, to teach Yen Sid and Mickey the cost of poking their nose into matters they were never meant to be a part of; they extended strings into the last holdouts of the Beagles on Ivalice Zodiac after Mickey finished arresting them in the Country of the Musketeers and took Minnie as his Queen.
"The Country of the Musketeers was the last place the Beagles had continued their operations other than Ivalice Zodiac; so from this, and Mickey taking a Queen, Luxu was able to convince them Mickey had now become corrupted by his new power and intended to exterminate the Beagles rather than see them dragged out of the last civilization they were oppressing and sentenced to prison. They then offered the Beagles their aid; and used a number of means to intimidate the Beoulve and Solidor native families of Zodiac, two well regarded noble families who were attempting to drive the Beagles out on their own terms, into believing the Beagles were a much greater threat than they were.
"As you know, the Beoulves and Solidors had initially pledged to assist Mickey in arresting and removing the Beagles, but the Foretellers' methods of intimidation had now thrust an ideological wedge between the Beoulves and Solidors as they each embarked on different radical measures to remove the Beagles.
"This is why, when Mickey arrived and sought aid from the Beoulves and Solidors; all the victims of the family rivalry that had broken out between them thus believed the Disney Kingdom was an enemy, and the Beagles were able to rally most of Ivalice Zodiac against the Disney Kingdom and invade."
Goofy gave Ephemer an understanding but accepting and dismissive smile.
"The four way war that broke out; between the Beagles, the Disney Kingdom, the Beoulves, and the Solidors, to say nothing of the peoples and cultures caught between them; taught Mickey and Yen Sid the need for a policy of a world order."
Kairi was shocked to discover she needed to suppress the urge to cringe.
"A lot of people were hurt, or worse; and Yen Sid retired as a Keyblade Master.
"But we learned a lot of valuable lessons from the War of the Skies.
"Mickey is most likely a lot better of a Keyblade Master than he'd have been, if the war hadn't happened.
"So I have no hard feelings, and I'm very thankful to you."
"Me, too," Donald said, but his voice was slightly edged.
"You're welcome," Ephemer said.
He gave a grateful smile, but there were shadows in his face and eyes that fell too deep for Kairi to see the foundations.
"Do you see the points we're making; Ven, Ava?" Riku questioned.
"This is still new proof there is light to be found in any darkness."
Anna appeared as though she wanted to say something; but whatever it was, she kept her mouth closed.
Kairi wanted to ask what it was.
"And how Yozora's belief all light creates darkness does nothing more than prove the reverse is true in new ways."
But Kairi felt nothing from Ava.
"This isn't getting anywhere," Ven said back, though.
Aqua pressed her lips very tightly together, and her face drained of all of its blood another time.
Terra sighed in knowing understanding, and uncountable other things.
Vanitas rolled his eyes, but there was a new forced quality to it.
"What is your plan, Ephemer?"
"I did intend to wait for you to return to us before telling you, but in your current mindset, I'm not sure I can trust you with the details," Ephemer replied, his voice sounding apologetic and guilty.
Roxas stiffened violently.
Xion thinned her own lips.
Lea crossed his arms and gave Ephemer a flat, set, challenging gaze.
Namine cringed.
Isa frowned slightly.
"This isn't an issue of keeping things from you," Ephemer held up his hands, palms forward, sounding even more sorry and guilty now.
"But, don't take this a wrong way, now is one of the last times we need loose cannons."
Anger surged within Kairi, but she pushed it down.
Along with the self hatred at her awareness; even with what keeping Luxu's words about Xion from Xion and Roxas had done to Ven, Xion, and Roxas; this meant it very likely was best that she, and Riku and Goofy and Donald, not tell anyone else, particularly Anna and Elsa, the rest of what they'd learned from Young Xehanort and Ursula.
Sora couldn't murder Kairi excruciatingly and torturously and agonizingly and lingeringly and irrevocably and totally enough.
"If I can't trust you not to make things worse, I'm including you in our plan as little as possible; and if Strelitzia and I can think of a way to have as much of a chance of doing so without you as with you, we'll end this all on our own."
Roxas just looked away.
Xion's face concealed anything she thought and felt.
But Lea and Namine and Isa gave Ephemer expressions with different types of understanding.
"That's why I'm so determined to make things right," Ven said.
"With that in mind, I'm trying to think things through for once, and I realized something.
"I know Vanitas would have picked it up if either Xehanort was scrying on us, now that he knows we're still out there. So he'd have alerted me before I brought up merging with Vanitas a second time and attempting to fool them that way; and that means how Mare is trying to fake my reconnection with Vanitas and has a decent opportunity of working.
"But the Xehanorts may be able to pick up if our pure light and darkness become active enough to forge the Kye-Blade, whether they're scrying on us or not.
"So I recommend we stay as far away from each other until we've worked out how to falsify a second reconnection, and just talk to each other through Mare and the Book, to make it as hard for Young Xehanort and Terra-Xehanort to perceive the two of us as possible."
Aqua staggered violently, and she needed to reposition her legs.
New tears brimmed in her eyes, but she nodded wordlessly.
"Very well," was all Terra said, his voice keeping his emotions as hidden as his face.
Vanitas' visage was just as much of a shield.
Kairi didn't wait to see if Ven said anything in return.
Within a matter of seconds, almost before she was aware she'd decided to lean back; her legs had never been there, and she was sitting back against the wall, Riku's hand no longer around hers,
Kairi barely registered this meant she finally had time to come to terms with all the horrible things that had gone wrong this day since Christopher had revealed toys were alive to the biological living beings of Toy Box.
Because this was time she refused to take the thinnest fraction of an instant of.
Ven and Ephemer and everyone else could do whatever they wanted; but this time, she wasn't going to abandon Sora to the darkness long enough to risk almost losing him to it past any and all recovery.
She'd done her part in telling Namine, and Lea, and the others what had happened.
She knew precisely how to protect Sora, and shine his way home from the darkness, this time.
And while she could tell her reserves of light and darkness needed maybe a couple more days to become replenished enough to perform a Valkyrie in Rainbow Bridge Formchange; if she got a decent amount of rest, she would almost certainly be able to maintain it for the minority of minutes she'd need to to defeat Young Xehanort and Terra-Xehanort all by herself without dying.
It didn't matter that doing this would make her a much worse loose cannon than Ven, because attempting to achieve this would require her to journey to confront two brilliant scholars proficient with tactics and strategy in both subterfuge and direct combat, when she had a very brief amount of time within which she'd have a valid chance of defeating them.
She'd get a decent amount of hours more sleep when they turned in.
And then, as soon as everyone else was no longer watching her, she was heading for Scala ad Caelum.
Hold on a little longer, Sora, she promised with all her heart in the silence of her mind.
This time, I won't even wait long enough for you to sink into the darkness.
.
"Is this what you were hoping for, you b-stard!?"-Mu La Flaga
"You shouldn't blame me! This is mankind's dream! Mankind's desire! Mankind's destiny! To be the strongest! To go the farthest! To climb the highest!"-Rau Le Creuset
"Get real!"-Mu La Flaga
"To compete, to envy, to hate each other, and devour one another."-Rau Le Creuset
GUNDAM SEED:
Phase 49: THE FINAL LIGHT