It has been a day since they started work on their new raft. On the second day, they were already set to leave Destiny Island.

‘Food, check. Potions, check,’ Kairi said softly as she ticked off her check list. ‘Raft… Hey, we don’t have a name for the raft yet.’

Sora, who was loading their items onto the raft, made an involuntary movement by dropping the box of equipments and yelling. ‘Highwind!’

Riku retrieved the box from the floor, raising his eyebrows at his shorter friend in inquiry. ‘What about Excalibur?’

‘Well, when I think back, I think Excalibur would be quite a weird name…’ said Sora, his right elbow against his left hand as he tapped his finger on his chin. ‘So I say that we name it Highwind!’

Riku laughed. ‘I think we should name it Excalibur instead.’

‘What?’

‘You guys at it again?’ Kairi giggled. ‘Come on, we don’t have time for a race. You know what, we’ll just stick with my choice. We’ll name it… Falcon!’

‘Huh?’

‘Too late for buts, I win!’ Kairi smiled. ‘Alright, with that settled, shall we get on now?’

‘Aren’t you going to say good bye to Selphie?’ asked Riku.

‘I have,’ Kairi nodded. ‘She was kind of upset to hear that we’re leaving again. But she’s alright with it. She said she didn’t want to see us off because she might cry.’

‘Okay then,’ Sora nodded as he hopped on the raft. He took out the orange gummi block from his pocket and tied it onto the mast. ‘Everyone, aboard the Falcon! Since Kairi got to name the raft, I’ll be captain!’

‘And what do I do?’

Sora turned to Riku who had his arms crossed. Sora scratched the back of his spiky head as he started thinking. ‘Uh… You’ll get the honour to draw our flag!’

‘I’m honoured,’ said Riku jokingly. ‘But no thanks. I’ll push the raft off the beach. Kairi, if you please…’

Kairi nodded. She boarded the raft and sat next to Sora. As Riku pushed the raft off the sandy beach, they turned around to take one last look at Destiny Islands. When the raft was finally floating in the water, Riku hopped onto the raft.

‘How long would it be until we come home this time?’ Sora wondered aloud.

‘It won’t be long. As long as you keep Destiny Islands here,’ said Riku, his hands on his chest.

‘See you, Destiny Islands!’ Kairi yelled back to the island, waving at it like it was her best friend. Suddenly, the raft was engulfed by a bright, white light as the water below them disappeared. As they came to their senses, they found their raft on land. They were at the Dark Depths, overlooking the Villain’s Vale, once the fortress of Maleficent. The cliffs at the area had a prominent blue and purple hue.

‘We’re here already… It’s Radiant Garden,’ said Sora as his eyes wandered around.

‘Wow,’ Kairi smiled gleefully. ‘This is it. I’m finally here. This was where I came from!’

Riku stood up from the raft. His alert eyes started scanning his surroundings. ‘Don’t get excited too soon,’ he said, whipping out his Keyblade, Way to the Dawn above his head swiftly. ‘We’ve got company.’

Surely enough, they were surrounded by a group of Dusk Nobodies. Sora summoned his Keyblade and stood in his battle stance.

‘Stay back, Kairi!’

‘No,’ Kairi retorted, her Keyblade already in hand. ‘I will fight too!’

Sora was hesitant. But with a reassuring nod from Riku, he decided to concentrate on the enemies before them.

Very quickly, the three friends dispatched the Dusks.

‘Not too bad, huh?’ said Kairi as she waved her Keyblade. Sora simply smiled back, relieved.

‘But I don’t get it…’ said Riku as he withdrew his Keyblade. ‘We’ve defeated Xemnas and the whole of Organization XIII. And Nobodies don’t attack without orders or a plan. Who could be behind this?’

‘I don’t know,’ said Sora. ‘But we’ll definitely know more once we find Leon.’

Kairi nodded in agreement. She then started looking around before stopping with a gasp. ‘Oh no! The Nobodies destroyed the raft!’

Sora turned towards their raft. Their hard work had been destroyed in just minutes. The logs were taken apart and the mast had been broken into pieces. He walked towards the Falcon’s remains. He found the gummi block, tightly tied onto a piece of wood. He took it out and realized that the orange glow it had earlier had faded away. Sora pocketed the gummi block.

‘We’ll go to Merlin’s House first to find Leon and the others. They are probably there,’ said Sora. ‘As for the Falcon… It has done its job, but we’ll have to leave it here.’

With one last look back, Sora, Riku and Kairi left the Dark Depths and headed to the town of Radiant Garden. It was not a walk in the park as the three Keybearers were constantly attacked by Heartless and Nobodies.

‘Take that!’ Sora yelled as he hit the last Soldier Heartless, defeating it and releasing the captive heart. Sora then turned to Riku. ‘Hey… Don’t you think the number of Heartless and Nobodies here have increased?’

Riku nodded in return as he lowered his Keyblade. ‘It must’ve been as the King said,’ he stated. ‘There must be someone who is controlling the Heartless and Nobodies. Whoever they are, it isn’t for good intentions.’

‘Stay away!’

Sora heard a familiar voice from afar. It took him awhile before he recognized who it was. ‘It’s Leon!’ he said. ‘He needs our help! Let’s go.’

The party ran towards the source of the voice. Sounds blades clashing could be heard.

‘There’s too many of them!’ came a female’s voice.

‘I’ll go get Cloud!’ said another.

Soon, Sora, Riku and Kairi arrived at the scene in front of Merlin’s House. A dark haired man, a short haired ninja and a long, black haired girl were fighting off a large group of Heartless and Nobodies.

‘Leon!’ Sora called out as he ran forward, joining in the battle.

‘Sora, you came just in time,’ Leon answered as he sent another blow to a Creeper Nobody with his Gunblade. ‘We need your help.’

‘You didn’t have to ask,’ said Riku, who had defeated a Shadow Heartless. Kairi was fighting, too. Sora flashed Leon a thumbs-up and received a smile as a reply.

The party continued to fight for a few minutes, but more and more enemies keep appearing.

‘Kairi, behind you!’ Sora shouted during an interval of switching targets. Two unsuspecting Dusk Nobody had crept up to Kairi and was about to attack her. As she turned around, the two enemies were defeated with a slash of a man’s blade. Standing by his side was a brown haired girl with a gentle smile.

‘Cloud, Aerith!’ Sora smiled. With their help, the group of Heartless and Nobodies were defeated.

‘It’s great to see you again Sora!’ said the ninja named Yuffie immediately after the enemies were dispatched.

‘Same here,’ said Sora with a smile.

Yuffie bent sideways as she took a peek at Riku and Kairi. ‘Mind introducing?’ she asked.

‘Oh, yeah,’ Sora nodded as he turned around. ‘These are the friends I’ve always been talking about. This is Riku, and this is Kairi.’

Sora waved his hand at Riku, then to Kairi. ‘Hello there,’ said Riku. Kairi smiled and answered happily.

‘I’m Kairi. Nice to meet you!’

‘Oh! Hey there!’ Yuffie piped. ‘It’s great to finally meet you guys! I’m Yuffie. And that’s Leon, Aerith, Cloud and Tifa.’

All four of them responded upon introduced

‘Before we start talking, let’s get in first, shall we?’ said Aerith as she ushered them into Merlin’s House.

They entered Merlin’s House in an orderly manner. Cloud closed the door as he was the last one to enter.

‘Hey Sora,’ said a middle aged man as he spun around on his chair.

‘Hi Cid, good to see you,’ Sora waved his hand casually.

‘I think we should start telling him what he needs to know,’ Cloud interrupted suddenly.

‘Right,’ Leon nodded. ‘I’m sure you’ve already received the letter from the King.’

‘Yeah,’ said Sora. ‘And we’re told that you’d tell us what’s going on.’

‘So, what sort of trouble is brewing this time?’ asked Riku curiously.

‘That’s what we’re trying to find out,’ said Leon as he sighed. ‘But we have a few leads. If the number and types of Heartless is increasing, it can only mean that a Heartless user is acting. And the King reckons its Maleficent.’

‘Maleficent?’ Sora exclaimed in surprise. ‘But isn’t she – oh… She’s still alive huh? We last saw her at The World That Never Was.’

Leon nodded. ‘We think she might have taken over the castle there after Organization XII left it. The vale beyond the Dark Depths has been empty since then.’

‘And since it took her three months to act, she’s definitely got something planned out,’ Yuffie explained.

‘Did you check the Heartless Manufactory?’ Sora asked. ‘Maybe something went wrong in the Space Paranoids.’

Aerith shook her head and frowned. ‘We’ve checked it. The manufactory has been silent since that time. There’s no problem with Tron, too.’

‘And with the Nobodies popping up everywhere, there must be a bigger Nobody commanding them,’ said Yuffie. ‘We don’t think Maleficent is able to control Nobodies.

‘But if they’re attacking together, does that mean that this Maleficent is working with the person controlling the Nobodies?’ Kairi suggested.

‘Hmm… That’s a possibility,’ Leon nodded in agreement. ‘Yeah, I think that is it. But we’ll never know until we investigate the situation.’

‘So that’s what the King is doing?’ Riku asked.

‘Ahyuck! That’s right!’

Sora turned his head so fast he swore his neck almost snapped off. Right before his eyes were his two trusted partners.

‘Donald! Goofy!’

Sora leapt off the ground and extended his arms as wide as possible as he hugged them both. The two responded by returning the hug excitedly.

‘Aww! We missed you!’ said Donald with his squeaky voice.

‘I missed you guys too!’ Sora grinned from ear to ear.

‘We came as soon as we could when we heard you were coming,’ said Goofy steadily, despite having his neck squeezed by Sora.

‘Oh? Where have you guys been?’ Sora asked.

Current Word Count: 2,938

Labels: NaNoMadness