Chapter 3: Winds
of Fate
At the Mysterious Tower the old
sorcerer Yen Sid was deep in thought. He had sensed that the darkness seemed to
be growing stronger lately, but what could be the cause seemed to be eluding
him. The shift seemed familiar, yet Yen Sid could not put his finger on it.
Opening his eyes, Yen Sid said,
“Mickey, keep an eye on Sora and his friends.”
Meanwhile it was a nice sunny day on
the Destiny Islands. The smallest island in the archipelago was rich with joy
as the many friends played on the beaches. Silphie was playing a game of
Blitzball with Tidus and Wakka. The three of them had been surprised when Sora,
Riku, and Kairi, who had been missing for some time, had finally returned to
the islands. Their families had been overjoyed to see their children safe and
sound. Naturally the three of them had a lot to catch up on, but after all the
adventures they had been on school didn’t seem that much trouble.
In between some bushes a dark portal
opened up and the eight teens from Netokan arrived on the island. Nettie,
Ashley, Clair, and Stella all looked around the place as if surprised. Clearly
none of them had expected to see such a beautiful little island.
“When Xemnas said we were going to
an archipelago I kind of pictured something more like a resort.” Ashley said.
“You have to admit this would be a
nice place to spend the day at.” Netti said. “I didn’t think islands like this
still existed on Harthyn. I thought they had all been developed.” Harthyn was
the name of the world that Netokan was part of.
“It is strange. If this place
existed all this time why hasn’t anyone found it?” AJ asked.
“I’ve seen pictures in my books of
islands before they were made into resorts, but to see one with so little
construction is beautiful.” Clair said.
“If we’re done sightseeing can we
get back to what we came here to do?” Jason asked right as a ball hit him in
the face. “Hey! Who threw that?”
“Sorry, man.” Said a boy about their
age with sandy hair. A girl with brown hair and a muscular guy with a long
orange-reddish quish accompanied him. If you’re not familiar with the games you
should know that those were teenage versions of Wakka and Selphie from the
Final Fantasy game series, and the speaker was Tidus who also originally came
from those games. “Would you mind handing back the ball?”
Jason answered by chucking the ball
as hard as he could. Tidus caught it with no problem.
“Nice throw, man.” Tidus said as he
began to walk off with his friends.
“Wait, where are we?” Stella asked
them.
“Destiny Islands.” Wakka answered.
Everyone from Netokan stared at each
other. It was a location none of them were familiar with.
“I’ve got a feeling we’re not in
Bunom anymore.” Clair said. Bunom was the name of the province Netokan was the
capital of.
“I don’t think we’re on Harthyn
anymore.” AJ said.
“What are you saying? That we’re on
another planet?” Phil asked.
“That’s impossible!” Jason said.
“I don’t think so.” Netti said.
“Look, didn’t you see the way they were dressed? No one on Harthyn dresses like
that, not even on any of the islands. Also look at the plants. None of them
match the island flora we know of.”
“The places have been developed.”
Stella pointed out.
“It doesn’t matter. You know that
every single plant and animal species has to be documented before a place can
be developed. None of the plants here match what has been recorded for any of
the islands. And look at those birds. I’ve never seen them before, and seabirds
live near the ocean no matter what. Someone would’ve spotted them years ago.”
“Look, we can stand here arguing all
day about what planet we’re on or we can do what we came here to do.” Aurora
said.
“Did anyone remember to get the
guy’s name from Xemnas?” Netti asked.
Everyone looked at each other as
they realized they didn’t.
“Well that’s just great.” Jason said
with a lot of sarcasm. “Now how are we going to find this guy? Walk around
going, ‘Hey Mr. Keyblade guy! We need to talk to you!’”
“That never works.” Stella rolled
her eyes at them.
“Shhh! Listen.” Ashley said.
Everyone did as she said. Sure enough they heard the sound of clanging metal.
“Sounds like swords of some sort.”
Phil observed.
“We should check it out. Xemnas did
say the guy used a keyblade, and right now I’d bet my bottom quart that he’s in
that direction.” AJ said, using the Netokan equivalent of ‘I’d bet my bottom
dollar.’
On the other side of the island Sora
and Riku were practicing with their keyblades. Ever since they had gotten back
to the islands they trained with each other to improve their skills. Right now
they were evenly matched.
“Had enough Riku?” Sora asked his
best friend. Sora had brown spikey hair and a black jacket with shorts. Why
anyone would wear such an outfit at the beat is beyond me. All I know is that
Sora did not seem to mind.
“Giving up already? Come on, Sora. I
thought you were stronger than that.” Riku said. Riku was a year older than
Sora, and had long white hair. He wore jeans and a white and yellow jacket.
Unlike Sora, Riku’s hair was white and smooth. Not one strand stood up.
“Not when I’m about to win!” Sora
said as he pushed Riku back and swung his keyblade around. The Kingdom Key resembled
a long white pole with the teeth shaping a crown. The handle was black with a
golden guard around it. The keychain token attached at the end was a Mickey
Mouse shaped head.
Riku’s keyblade was of a different
make. The Way to Dawn mainly resembled a red and black dragon wing with an
angel wing for the teeth. The handle was also red and black while the guard was
a combination of the wings of an angel and a dragon. A blue eye was at the
connection between the wings. The keychain was a heart shape token similar to
the symbol some of the Heartless had without the X.
The keyblades clashed with each
other again. “Since when did I ever let you win?” Riku asked. The two continued
while their friend Kairi watched. Kairi was close to Sora’s age with dark
auburn hair and a pink dress. She had blue eyes similar to Sora. She too could
use a keyblade. However for right now she was content to watch her friends
practice with each other.
None of them had any idea that
further down the beach they were being watched by a group of interested
observers.
“Great. There are two of them.” Jason said.
“We can count just fine.” Aurora
said. Jason glared at her.
“Well, let’s get this over with.”
Phil said as he summoned his keyblade.
“Wait, I don’t feel good about
this.” Clair said.
“What?” Several people asked.
“Don’t any of you understand what
we’re being asked to do? We’re being sent on an assassination mission. We’re
being told to murder someone!” Clair pointed out.
“Yeah, and they don’t seem like
dangerous psychopaths to me. They just seem like guys having a good time.”
Netti observed. “If they were really a threat wouldn’t they be trying to kill
each other?”
“Good point.” Ashley said.
“That’s it. I’m going to take care
of this!” Jason said as he summoned his keyblade. His was called the Born
Fighter and the blade was a long black pole with a fist forming the teeth. The
handle was white with grey guards. The keychain token was a basic boxing glove.
Without waiting for anyone Jason charged down at the three surprised friends.
“Well there goes the element of
surprise.” Aurora said as she summoned her keyblade. The Fantasy Warrior had a
strong resemblance to a sword with the head of an open-mouthed dragon forming
the teeth. The handle was gold with silver dragon wings forming the handle. A
star was the keychain token here. Everyone else summoned their keyblades and
followed after Jason.
“What the…” Sora asked as Jason swung
his keyblade down between him and Riku.
“What do you want?” Riku asked.
Jason just swung his keyblade in response. Seeing he was not going to be able
to reason with this kid Riku began blocking his attacks. Riku was obviously
more skilled than Jason was because Jason was just swinging his keyblade around
like a madman. Riku kept calmly blocking and sending some Dark Firaga blasts at
him. AJ, Aurora, and Stella soon joined Jason in attacking Riku while everyone
else converged on Sora.
Both Sora and Riku worked to keep
their distance from these crazy kids. The students from Netokan kept rushing in
while Sora and Riku kept blocking and knocking them back. Kairi didn’t just
stand idly by. She summoned her keyblade, Destiny’s Embrace, and rushed in to
help her friends. Clair and Netti both silently agreed that they liked the
design of her keyblade. The blade was multi-colored with flowers forming the
teeth. The guards seemed to hold the theme of waves against the beach. The
handle was blue and the keychain token was some star-shaped thing they had
never seen before. Kairi’s initial attack was to knock some of the combatants
away from Sora and Riku. Soon Kairi was facing off against Clair, Netti, and
AJ.
“Hey there, good-looking.” AJ smiled
at her. Kairi shook it off and blocked an attack from Clair. Like the people
from Netokan Kairi mainly relied on her melee moves. She was more calm and
coordinated than her foes though. Still there were more of the Netokan students
than there were of her and her friends.
Then, seemingly out of nowhere a
pair of chakrams flew threw the air and knocked the keyblades of the Netokan
students to the ground. Everyone looked to see a person in a cloak similar to
Organization XIII grab the flying weapons. Someone else in a similar black
cloak accompanied him.
“Axel?” Sora asked. The figure with
the chakrams removed his hood to show a man with red hair and green eyes
underneath.
“Still got it memorized, I see.”
Axel said.
“But how?” I thought you were…” Sora
couldn’t finish his sentence.
“So did I. Unfortunately I can’t
answer how I’m not pushing up daisies right now.”
“We’re here to help your new
friends.” The second figure said. The voice identified this person as a woman.
“We’re not their friends!” Jason
snapped at them.
“You’re the traitors Xemnas
mentioned, aren’t you?” Ashley asked. Her comment earned gasps from Sora, Riku
and Kairi.
“Xemnas?” They asked in unison.
“So Xemnas is also back huh?” The
woman said. “I guess this makes things more complicated.”
“Listen, I don’t know who you think
you are, and frankly I don’t care. All I know is that you are in the way of us
getting back home!” Aurora said.
“Hey relax. We come in peace.” Axel
said.
“Just hear us out. Whatever Xemnas
promised you he won’t give it.” The woman said.
“Liars!” Jason said as he grabbed
the Born Fighter keyblade and charged towards them. The woman moved so fast she
vanished, only appearing right behind Jason. She then wacked him on the head
with an unseen weapon that caused Jason to fall to the ground unconscious.
Everyone except Axel gasped as they saw she too had a keyblade.
The woman’s keyblade was a heavy
white with an octagon for the teeth. Angel wings formed the guard with a pearl
in the middle. The handle was a greenish color and the keychain token was the
sun.
“I don’t think that’s the best way
to calm someone Mika,” Axel said to Mika.
“Well it worked.” She replied as she
took off her hood. Mika too had blonde hair, but her face was friendly and
inviting. Her brown eyes were just as warm as the expression on her face.
“That doesn’t score you points on
the trust board.” Clair said as she held her keyblade out in front of her. Clair’s
keyblade was a design that hinted at magic. The blade was an array of colors
intertwining with each other. A combination of a crescent moon and the sun made
up the teeth. The hilt was pure white with a dark guard around it. The keychain
token was a simple white orb.
“Wait. There’s a lot that doesn’t
make sense.” Kairi said.
“Like how did all of you come into
contact with Organization XIII?” Riku asked.
“And how are they even back?” Sora
asked.
“Here’s the thing. We don’t go
around telling our stories to strangers. However we will make a deal. If you
promise to be honest with us about everything we’ll spill the beans as to how
we crossed paths with the Organization.” AJ said.
“Sounds good to me.” Axel said.
“Yeah, that sounds fair.” Sora
agreed.
Everyone from Netokan took turns
explaining how they had been attacked at their school by Maleficent, with Riku
commenting that her doing such a thing didn’t surprise him, how the
Organization got them out of their, and what Xemnas promised to do for them if
they helped them out. Axel and Mika made corrections about the Heartless and
Nobodies from time to time, and gave them the names of the Organization
members. During this time Jason regained consciousness and was brought up to
speed. He sat glaring at Mika the whole time. Jason did not like getting bested
by anyone, especially if that someone was a girl. The fact that Mika was older
than he was didn’t help.
“So you agreed to help the
Organization and it never occurred to you to ask them to just send you home?”
Mika asked after the explanations were done.
“They made a reasonable agreement.
Besides we didn’t know if Maleficent would try again to attack us.
“Something just doesn’t seem right
about all this. The Organization invades your school while Maleficent is on the
attack, and it sounds like she might’ve been holding back on you. If she really
wanted to destroy you nothing would’ve been left. No one would’ve survived.”
Riku said.
“Are you suggesting the whole thing
was a setup?” Stella asked.
“It could be. Xemnas is clever that
way. Better memorize that.” Mika said.
“Why do you two insist that we
memorize everything?” Clair asked.
“It might come up on your final.”
Axel joked.
“Sora! Riku! Kairi!” A familiar
voice called out to them. Everyone looked to see a familiar face waving down
the beach.
“King Mickey!” Sora, Riku and Kairi
said in unison. They all stood up and began to race down the beach to greet
their old friend. However as fate would have it everyone was going to receive
an unexpected surprise. As soon as Sora and Kairi entered the shade of the
thick foliage cast by the setting sun they cried out in pain. Everyone watched
as they fell down while two shadowy rises appeared. What made it more
surprising was when the rises had grown enough that everyone could see
underneath them. They seemed to be roots of some sort, yet that didn’t seem to
fit. While rushing down to the aid of Sora nad Kairi everyone realized what it
was.
Those were fingers. Giant fingers of
some unknown being. Ashley was sure that the hand these fingers were connected
to could grasp all fourteen of them with no problem.
Sora and Kairi continued to cry out
in pain as the fingers dug in at their feet. From the way the fingers were
slowly dragging Netti thought that it looked as if they were pulling on
something. But what?
As soon as they caught up to Sora
and Kairi they began to assist Riku and King Mickey. The two of them had
summoned their keyblades and were attacking the fingers. Everyone else joined
in too. It wasn’t too long before the fingers receded back into the shadows
that they came from.
Of course that was only after Sora
and Kairi had stopped crying out in pain.
It didn’t take long for Riku to
check on his friends. “You two okay?” He asked them.
“Yeah, we’re fine.” Kairi said as
she stood up.
“But what was that all about?” Sora
asked.
“If you ever find out please let me
know.” Phil said.
“Uh guys? Where did they come from?”
Aurora asked as she pointed to something on the ground. Everyone looked down to
see two blond-haired kids lying not too far from where the fingers had stopped
pulling. One was a girl in a white slip, the other was a boy with a white
jacket with black blocks and beige pants. He almost looked like a walking
checkerboard.
Axel, Mika, Sora, Riku, Kairi, and
King Mickey all looked at each other knowingly.
“Could this day get any weirder?”
Phil asked.
