The Second War
A Heartfelt Adventure Fan-fiction
Inspired and based on the world of Kingdom Hearts
James and Michelle had settled down to their new life together as a married couple. Their wedding hadn't been more than just a few days ago, and already they had moved into an apartment together. For the first couple of days, everything seemed just fine, though they were busy getting everything situated. If only they knew that this was the start of not just their marriage, a journey in and of itself, but also the beginning of a completely different adventure.
James sighed as he walked down the steps that led into their one bedroom apartment, already he could hear the loud bass of the annoying neighbors who lived in the apartment above. He shook his head as he usually did, he couldn't stand all of the noise that they made, both with the loud music and all of the yelling they did. He opened the door and smiled at his wife as he saw her sitting in her large purple chair in the corner of the room.
"Hey Love." He greeted with a smile as he made his way into the room, sliding his feet out of his work shoes.
"Hey Jeimuzu, welcome home." Michelle greeted in response, using the Japanese pronunciation of his name as she usually did.
"Thanks." He replied as he walked into their bedroom and got out of his uniform, changing into his usual, a pair of blue jeans and a t-shirt.
He came back into the living room with a coke from the kitchen and sat down in his desk chair, opening the can with the usual popping sound. Rather than facing the desk though he turned his chair around to face the small circular table that his Macbook sat on. He lifted the lid up and immediately the screen lit up, showing the wallpaper of the Aurora that looked kind of like a dragon.
"Time to see what's going on in the guild." James said to himself as he started up his web browser Safari and started up Skype.
The all too familiar sound of Skype starting up, the sound of someone breathing, increasing in pitch as the sound ended and then the screen with all of the different chats popped up. Immediately James heard the sound of someone sending him a private message, it read:
Kyle: James post nao!
He couldn't help but sigh, more often than not this was a typical "greeting" from the Captain of the guild, Kyle. He wouldn't let it bug him though and quickly typed back a reply that read:
Kuro: Give me a break, I just got home from work. I'll get to work on a post as soon as I can.
He didn't bother to wait for a reply before he turned his attention back to his web browser, activating the tab that he almost regularly kept open to the guild on Gaiaonline. He read through the posts that had been made recently, some from the night before, others while he was at work. Though he was relieved to see that he hadn't missed too much. It took him about 30 minutes to make the necessary replies that he needed to, both in the roleplays as well as in the other threads of the forum. James was also a moderator of this guild which primarily hosted text based roleplays inspired by the game series Kingdom Hearts.
"There, that's all taken care of, I think I'm going to go take a bit of a nap now, work really wore me out." He told Michelle as he stood up and made his way to their room.
He let his body fall onto the bed with a distinct "phwump" sound and pulled the covers over his long and skinny body. James was not built by any means, though his muscles were defined at least. He had always been skinny, never really able to put on any weight, not that he really wanted to. He removed his glasses and set them down on the wide plastic two drawer cart that served as his nightstand, his uniform laying on top of it as well. As he turned onto his side, laying his head on his pillow, his shoulder length brown hair fell into his eyes as they closed. He focused simply on steadying his breathing and trying to empty his head of thoughts as much as possible as he relaxed. Slowly but surely, rest came and along with it a rather strange dream.
James' eyes opened and at first he saw nothing but darkness, looking around though, he realized he was standing on a stained glass mural of none other than King Mickey.
"So much to do so little time…" A voice came from nowhere, and yet seemingly everywhere at the same time.
James looked around the platform, searching for the source of the voice. This was all too familiar to him, he had seen Michelle play through this exact scene as Sora just a few days before. It was almost exactly the same as he walked through the exact same situation Sora had to at the beginning of his journey. There were only a few differences, the most obvious being that it was James himself instead of Sora that wielded the sword and defeated the Heartless and instead of being on Destiny Island to answer the questions, he was taken to a secret glade that his friend Bobbi had showed to him, the people who asked him the questions were Michelle, as well as a few of his other friends. The dream ended in the same darkness that it started in and James' eyes opened as he sat up.
"Oy, I must have had Kingdom Hearts on the brain or something, that was just like what happened to Sora… only it was me, it seemed so real." He muttered to himself as he got out of bed.
He made his way back into the living room to see that Michelle had nodded off in her chair in the corner of the room. He walked over to her and placed his hand gently on her shoulder causing her to slowly wake up.
"Hey love, you alright? You fell asleep too looks like it." He said with a smile as she looked at him. He then gently kissed her on the cheek.
"Mmm… Yeah, I'm alright, guess I was tired too that was a very strange dream though…" Michelle replied, clearly not fully awake yet, her voice drowsy.
'You and me both…' James thought at the mentioning of strange dreams, "Oh really? What about this time?" He inquired.
"I was on this stained glass mural, just like in Kingdom Hearts…." Michelle began.
"Wait! You too!?" James interrupted her right in her explanation.
"Yes, that's really weird." Michelle replied, she couldn't recall a time in which they had had the exact same dream, normally that shouldn't even have been possible.
"Yeah, it is, guess we both had Kingdom Hearts on the brain, anyway continue." James urged her on, despite having a feeling something wasn't right.
He listened to her continued explanation of the dream and confirmed that aside from it being her and not him, in her dream it was exactly the same. The chances of two people having such similar dreams at the exact same time were slim to none, especially since the details were all the same with the exception of the people.
"That's just too weird. It doesn't make any sense…" James replied, falling silent as he fell deep into thought.
James was a sensible young man, one who focused intently on logic, reasoning, and common sense. The idea of magic, keyblades, other worlds and Kingdom Hearts actually existing, though it made for a very neat fantasy, that was all that it was. Kingdom Hearts in his mind would be nothing more than a video game series that had resulted in such a fan-base that he was friends with a group of fans that liked to write stories together. That was the entire purpose of the guild he was a moderator of. As often as Kingdom Hearts and it's plots and potential loopholes were brought up though in the Skype chats, sometimes the lines between reality and fantasy seemed to blur.
"It has to be a coincidence… though a very strange one to say the least." James finally said, in his mind setting his resolve that it was just that, a coincidence.
"Yeah…" Michelle replied, though seemingly not so sure, she could be just as logical and realistic as James could be, so she was assured that he was right.
They didn't bring it up again, though the two of them could not shake the feeling it had left them. James turned his attention back to the extremely cluttered desk that his desktop computer was on and his eyes narrowed curiously as he saw something which he had never noticed before, pulling it out of a pile of miscellaneous papers he saw that it was a sealed envelope. The interesting thing about it was that it was entirely blank on the address side and was sealed with the symbol that represented Mickey Mouse. James quickly tore open the letter and began to read it.
"Is this supposed to be some kind of joke!?" James exclaimed, clearly agitated, setting down the note before he even read through it all.
"What is it love?" Michelle asked, moving to his side and placing a hand on her shoulder.
"The note says that we're in danger, that darkness is coming and that we have been chosen to help fight it. Sounds like someone is playing some kind of joke, this definitely didn't arrive in the regular mail." James replied, clearly aggravated now, "This isn't funny at all."
James sat back down, and spun his rotating desk chair to face his macbook which he had left open, He woke it up by pressing the space bar key a couple of times and waited for it to reconnect to the internet. When Skype had reloaded he typed in the main guild chat:
Kuro: Anyone know anything about a letter with Mickey's Seal on it?
He waited for awhile and began to ponder deleting it, even if one of them did do it, he still didn't see how. A letter like that would not have gotten through the regular mail. Based upon Michelle's reaction she didn't know anything about it, the only other friends they had that were part of the guild were Mizu and Amy. He didn't see either of them doing anything like this though. His attention turned back to the screen, still no reply showed up, despite it being mid-afternoon, so he decided to delete it.
"Well, that proved absolutely useless." He said with a sigh, turning his attention back to his wife.
"So what do we do now?" She asked, trying to figure out what should or could be done about the entire strange situation.
James seemed deep in thought for a moment before finally responding. "I suggest we just try and forget about it. Let's just relax and enjoy some anime." He finished with a smile.
The two of them did just that, deciding to watch Rurouni Kenshin, a personal favorite for both of them until they had gotten tired enough that they decided it was time to get some sleep. They prepared and settled down into their bed. Rest did not come easy for either of them, Michelle eventually fell asleep and James was still awake, deep in thought at the bizarre events of the day. No matter how much he just wanted to let it go, he couldn't. Eventually though, a restless sleep did come.
"This world has been connected."
James' eyes opened and he bolted upright with a start. He looked around into the darkness of their room, searching for the source of the voice. He could see nothing though, especially without his glasses. A streak of light flashing outside their window illuminated the darkness long enough for him to see though, that there was no one there, he pulled on his glasses though to get a better look.
'I could of sworn I heard a voice… must have been part of a dream.' He thought, trying to rationalize it so he could get back to sleep.
James reached over to the side of the bed for his cell phone which also served as his alarm clock and turned it on. The clock read that it was just a little after midnight, he sighed, very thankful that he didn't have to work in the morning. Especially with the little amount of sleep that he had gotten so far. He slowly got out of bed and made his way into the kitchen, feeling along the wall to get there. He turned on the light. He grabbed a cup from the cabinet and poured himself a glass of apple juice. He looked out the kitchen window up at the sky as the lightning cracked time and again. He couldn't help but notice that he couldn't hear any thunder, but he thought that the storm was just too far away for now.
"Sure looks like a mean one though…" He muttered as he took a drink, his back now leaning against the sink.
His attention suddenly shifted to the corner of the kitchen where he thought he had seen slight movement, his eyes narrowed at the sight of what almost looked like a black puddle on the floor. He set his mug down and took a few steps closer to get a better look at it. As he approached though suddenly two bright yellow orbs appeared and the black mass began to take on a familiar form as antennae, head, body, arms and legs formed and it began to take a few steps toward James.
"No way! This can't be possible! A Shadow Heartless!?" James exclaimed in shock as the creature approached him, crawling on all fours.
Suddenly, the Heartless leaped up into the air trying to come down upon James, the young man saw it coming though and quickly grabbed for the closest thing he could find, a skillet. He swung it, flat side facing the heartless, to smack it away. The sheer force enough to knock the heartless back to the ground, though it had little to no effect in terms of damaging it.
"This cannot be good!" He yelled, running out of the kitchen and into the small, narrow hallway between it and their bedroom, slamming the door, "Love get up and get dressed now!"
Michelle was already sitting upright in the bed, hyperventilating due to the slam. "What is going on!?" She demanded, though she complied, getting up and starting to pull on the clothing that was next to her bed.
James was in the process of pulling on his jeans and t-shirt as he reached into his closet and pulled out of the long box they had stored in there, a katana with dragon wings for a guard and his reverse-blade katana. He handed the bokken to Michelle and unsheathed the blade before finally answering her.
"Heartless! Real Heartless are here, and they're after us! Here they come!" He yelled, his attention turning toward the door as four Shadows formed out of the darkness.
James who had finished getting dressed aside from the boots which were by the door that led out of their apartment, charged forward and began to swing at the Heartless. The katana didn't do a great deal more than the skillet had though as they either quickly dodged around the swings, the attacks that did hit, did little more than knock them back slightly.
"We have to get out of here!" James yelled, his attention shifting back to Michelle for only a second.
He could tell that she was still panic-stricken, her moves shaky as she finished getting dressed and moved to stand behind him, her katana held in a slightly defensive position. It seemed that their weapons would have just as much effect on the Heartless as Sora's wooden sword did, which was exactly why he hadn't chosen a bokken instead. He grabbed onto Michelle's free hand and pulled her along out of their bedroom and back into the living room. They had to make it to the backdoor of the building, it was the fastest way outside.
"James!" She shrieked from behind, as one of the Heartless came after her.
"No you don't!" James yelled, moving in the path of the Heartless and raising his reverse-blade katana, blade side facing to block the Heartless.
The blade and the Heartless collided and there was a sudden flash of light, forcing James to shut his eyes. When he opened them again, the Heartless that was struck was gone, the katana was gone. What was left, was a long key shaped blade, black metal made up the hilt guard and a long silver shaft led up to teeth that were shaped like snake fangs. The keychain was an aquamarine pendant.
"A keyblade…" James said, looking at it in awe, his attention turning to the Heartless, a sinister looking sneer on his face, "Now they're in for it."
His attention turned to Michelle who now held a keyblade of her own, her's was similar in style as well only the teeth looked more like a crescent moon connected by two bars. The hilt was a forest green while the shaft and teeth were more a lime green color. The keychain resembled the shape of a rabbit.
"Interesting, we both got keyblades?" He asked, turning back to the Shadows just in time to block an attack and knock it back with his keyblade.
"Seems that way, what does this all mean though?" She asked, doing her best to fend of the Heartless as well.
When it seemed they had been able to clear the room of Heartless, James turned to Michelle.
"It means that the letter was true… The world is in danger, we need to keep moving." James said, grabbing her hand again and pausing only briefly to pull on his boots, "Grab your shoes and say good bye, I don't think we'll be coming back here anytime soon."
James kept an eye out on Michelle as she finished getting ready, he had pulled on his leather jacket, primarily because it was good for cover against wind, but also because it granted him a bit of padding. When the two of them were ready they left the apartment and exited the building.
"Where are we going to go?" Michelle asked as James led the way toward the garage where their car was parked, "Here come more!" She said, breaking James' grip on her hand as she turned to face more shadows, keyblade at the ready.
James attention shifted to the Heartless as well, focusing on the ones that were in their path mostly. There were too many, and they would never stop coming, this much the young man knew, especially now that they held the keyblades.
"They're endless love, fighting them all is useless, we'll cut through." He said, driving back the Shadows with a fury of slashes.
"Right." Michelle replied with a nod as she joined him, making sure his back was covered as he pressed forward.
After about five more minutes of fighting, pressing the Heartless back to the best of their abilities they both were a bit beat up, a few cuts, bumps and bruises, this wasn't getting any easier, that much was certain. James had noticed the lightning that continued to streak across the sky, thunder rumbling constantly, now clearly audible. James was rather surprised that Michelle wasn't panicking about the thunder and lightning, though he figured she was just too busy trying to stay alive to really notice it.
At last the two of them reached the garage and after clearing any Heartless out of the way they both got in and James fired up the engine of their Honda Civic. James quickly pulled out of the parking slot, mowing over any Heartless that appeared in their path, their keyblades had vanished due to the relative safety. He was forced to brake as the door opened and then they drove into the parking lot of the complex, as they drove along the side of a line of buildings that led to the main road they saw Bobbi running away from her apartment, a keyblade in her hand as well, her's with a blue guard and white shaft. James rolled down the window to try and get her attention.
"Mizu! Get in!" He yelled, stepping on the brake long enough to stop.
Bobbi didn't hesitate to run over and climb into the back seat, buckling up for safety reasons as she looked up at the darkening sky before turning her attention to James, the keyblade which had been laying across her lap also vanished.
"Kuro, thanks for the lift." She said with a sigh of relief as she relaxed for the ride, "Where are we going?" She asked, focusing on the surprisingly empty road.
"To my parents, I have to make sure they're alright." James said, resolve as strong as steel evident in his voice, his attention focused on his driving as it should be.
"Ah." Bobbi replied, clearly her thoughts going to her parents and brother too.
They drove on, the three of them silent, intense as they headed west toward the subdivision where James' parents lived. Their speed would normally be enough to get them pulled over. However, there seemed to be no opposition at all.
"James… you're bleeding." Michelle said finally breaking the silence, clearly worried as she placed her hand on his shoulder, noting the blood staining denim of his jeans below a cut that had clearly gone through to his flesh.
"It's nothing…" He replied, still focused on his driving, he knew it wasn't the only place he had been cut, "You've gotten a few nicks yourself."
Michelle simply nodded her head, doing her best to clean up her wounds with a few tissues and napkins that had been stored in the car. James was never too worried about cuts and scrapes, they were common place at his job, though he knew this one was definitely a bit worse than his usual cardboard cuts and scrapes.
He pulled into the driveway and parked the car, not bothering to kill the engine, if they were still here, he wanted to be able to get away quick.
"You two wait here!" He said, as he got out his keyblade reappeared in his hand and he cut through a few more shadows as he unlocked the door and entered.
The house was eerily silent, not a good sign as James looked around in the darkness as best he could. He knew the chances were slim by now, but he had to check.
"Mom! Dad! Alex!" He yelled out, trying to get their attention as he made his way up the stairs, taking the steps at least three at a time.
There was no response, so the first place that he checked was his parent's room. Immediately he was forced to fight off at least five more shadows as he scanned the room. There was no sign of them, so he ran back out to the stair landing and over to his brothers room. He immediately opened the door to the sight of his brother, a dagger in his hand as he tried to fight off a swarm of shadows.
"Alex! No!" James yelled as he tried to make his way through the clutter that was in his brothers room to get to him to aid his brother.
By the time he had reached his side though it was too late. The Shadows had taken his heart. James shook, first in sadness and then in rage, his grip on his keyblade tightening as he unleashed a fury of swings upon the Shadows that had just taken his brother away from him. A blood curdling yell escaped from his mouth as he killed each and every Shadow that appeared in the room, not caring how many injuries he sustained in the process until they were finally gone. When they were all gone, the young man finally collapsed to his knees.
"I can't believe it… they're gone…" He said with shaky breath as he looked down at the floor.
His body tensed and he almost brought his keyblade back up in defense as he felt a hand on his shoulder. He relaxed when he realized it was Michelle and brought up his left hand to place on top of her's.
"I told you to wait in the car…" He said with a heavy heart as he slowly rose to his feet, clearly becoming difficult from all of his injuries, tears clearly falling down his face, "They're gone, I couldn't save them, not even Alex who was still fighting…"
"I'm sorry love… at least you tried." She replied as she helped him toward the stairs to leave, "Mizu is still waiting, come on."
"Right." He said, with a simple nod as he made his way down the stairs, using the handrail for support.
The two finally made it back out to the car and they were back on the road, as they drove Mizu asked the question that they didn't want to answer.
"You sure were gone for a long time, what happened in there?" She asked, though it was pretty obvious that she knew she was going to regret asking.
"My parents were already gone… and I witnessed my brother's heart being taken, despite how hard I tried, I couldn't save him." He said, clearly still shaken by what he had witnessed.
"Sorry Kuro…" Bobbi replied, trying her best to comfort him, though deep down inside she was being forced to come to the same realization that the same had probably happened to her family as well.
"What's going on over there?" James asked all of a sudden as they were driving past the old park where he used to go from time to time to launch model rockets years ago.
As they drove closer, they all realized that it seemed to be the epicenter for the dark clouds, and they could see through the clouds, that a massive orb of darkness was forming, acting like a vacuum and sucking everything into it.
"The end is coming, We can't let it happen!" James yelled as he pulled into the parking lot and parked the car, shutting it off. "We have the keyblades, we have to do something!"
Before either of them could say anything else he was already gone, running toward the sphere of darkness, the two had no real choice but to follow. Bobbi at the very least knew just as well as James did that their toughest fight yet was right in front of them. As the three of them came to a stop right beneath the massive orb above the ground beneath them turned pitch black. In front of them a gigantic figure was emerging, first a head with dark tentacle like hair followed by long arms and a large body that had a large heart shaped hole in the center of it's chest. Last to emerge were the legs, causing this particular Heartless to tower over the three keyblade wielders.
"Darkside!" James and Bobbi exclaimed together, both of them had anticipated it, but clearly neither of them had anticipated just how large it would be in real life.
"It's huge! How are we supposed to defeat it!?" Michelle exclaimed, looking up at it's head.
"Hit whatever it gives us!" James replied, quickly jumping out of the way of a number of dark blasts that were unleashed from Darkside's left hend.
Michelle simply nodded her head in understanding, being forced to show her more agile side as she too dodged out of the way of several dark blasts. She saw briefly that Bobbi was forced to do the same thing. James' eyes narrowing, focusing on one certain point which he remembered from the fight. Darkside's right hand became surrounded by darkness and it plunged down into the ground. causing black tendrils to erupt from the earth. James knew that this was their opening, their best bet to hit the massive Heartless and charged forward, beginning to attack the exposed hand. Mizu realized it as well and followed suit. As they attacked the hand, Michelle noted that Shadow Heartless were beginning to spawn from the darkness.
"Watch out guys!" She yelled, charging in and beginning to attack the Shadows, finishing them off with relative ease.
"Don't worry about them so much, focus on Darkside!" James yelled back, continuing his attack.
The young man had expected Darkside to act as he did in the game, to keep stationary as his hand was embedded into the earth. Apparently, that didn't equate to the real life deal. Darkside's massive left hand came down in a sweeping motion, knocking both James and Mizu away with a strong hit, sending them both down to the ground. While Mizu was quick to recover, James was a bit slower due to all of the injuries he had sustained thus far. Michelle was soon at his side, helping him get back to his feet.
"I'm fine… watch out!" James yelled, shoving Michelle out of the way as more dark blasts came down upon them. James himself, barely having enough time to dive back down to the ground to evade one, going into a series of somersaults to continue dodging them.
He finally managed to get to his feet and charge forward right as Darkside began to embed his hand into the ground once again. His eyes focused slightly on the large orb of darkness above, seeing it expand the longer Darkside kept it's hand in the ground.
'So that's why it does that…' James thought as he charged forward to begin the attack again.
The three keyblade wielders attacked in unison, focusing on the hand as much as possible. They weren't going to be caught off guard again from the sweeping left hand, They would jump back just in time to avoid it. However, they knew their chances of winning were very slim regardless. As the battle continued the lightning and thunder grew more intense, the world tearing apart around them, houses being torn from their foundations, trees uprooted and sucked into the abyssal orb. Darkside more than less, still seemed unfazed by their attacks.
Darkside then did something completely unexpected, while his right hand still remained embedded in the earth, his left hand grabbed James, his massive hand crushing him in a vice like grip, lifting him in the air.
"Aaaaaahhh!" James yelled out in pain from the crushing force of Darkside's hand before the hand came back down, slamming James into the hard ground.
"James!" Michelle yelled, running to her husband's side, "Are you alright? Can you move?" She asked, trying to help him get to him to rise once again.
"Yeah… Help Mizu, she's getting swarmed." James said as he slowly rose to his feet, nudging her toward their friend with a slight shove.
Michelle nodded and ran back in to assist Mizu, who was having to deal with, not only dodging Darkside's attacks but also the Shadow Heartless that continued to spawn from the ground.
"We can't do this… we're not strong enough…" James thought as he raised his keyblade, once again giving it all he had to charge forward.
The ground beneath them was shaking intensely now, objects closer and closer to where they stood were being pulled up from the ground and getting sucked into the sphere of darkness, before long, the three of them would be swallowed up as well, then it would all be over. The three of them would be lost to the darkness. Darkside pulled it's hand out of the ground and was now raising both arms up towards the orb above it's head, as if it was preparing to throw it at what remained of the Earth.
"Is this the end?" James asked out loud, not caring if anyone heard him or not.
Suddenly, in front of Darkside, a beam of light rose up from the ground and then changed shape forming what looked like a doorway, as it opened, they saw nothing but light.
"Into the Door! It's our only chance!" Both Bobbi and James yelled together as James charged toward it.
James stopped in front of the doorway, making sure both Bobbi and Michelle got in before he himself dived in at the last second as the ground beneath their feet was finally torn asunder and sucked into the abyss. As he entered the door slammed shut and vanished.
Little did the the three of them know, that the exact same event had happened to not only them, but many other people in the world as well. A new adventure was about to begin, and they would join forces with some very familiar, yet unexpected Earthlings. If James had actually read the entirety of the letter he would have known exactly what was going to happen. The end of the letter read:
The gateway will open, only when the end is at hand.
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