Video Game: Kingdom Hearts SOS: The Road To Light

Kaida continued to stand in front of Rapunzel for as long as she could, even know she knew she was well past defeat she wasn't going to let this man pass her and get to Rapunzel. She was a member of the order, this was her job, this was what she needed to do and she couldn't lose. Kaida looked at others almost in pain and kept looking at Rapunzel to make sure nothing sneaked up on her.

There was a point where Vanitas stood directly in front of her and she refused to move for him, staring into his mask and knowing she couldn't fight back. She was getting a serious heartache from staring into the mask because rather than seeing Vanitas' face, all she could see was how beaten up she was in the reflection of the mask. Kaida continued heavily breathing before she spoke, "D-don't think you've... you've won this whole thing. I'll be back to save her, and I will beat you then. I'll see you later." she felt herself grow faint and fall to the ground because she couldn't keep herself standing anymore and she was out like a light.

 

Cat looked on at Vanitas, both terrified and in awe. He was so powerful, and it only made her feel weaker than ever. In what seemed like no time at all she felt a sharp pain run right through her. She gripped her key as tight as she could, despite what she knew was inevitable. Her vision began to blur and the ringing in her ears nearly drowned out everything else. Nearly. She heard Kaida mention coming back to save Rapunzel and fell to her knees before her comrade collapsed completely. She kept fighting as hard as she could to stay conscious because something he'd said still bugged her. He wasn't whole, and he said they'd be lucky to keep their bodies. What did that say about him? Was his body lost? Before she could think anything more, she was shoved onto the ground by the boy. Her key dissipated as she crashed into a wall on the other side of the room. She couldn't take the hit, and almost immediately she blacked out.

 

Steel collapsed as his comrades directed a few more hits at the enemy. The dark thorn retaliated by grabbing beast. As it died, the castle's master wound up on the balcony. He was vaguely aware of D'daear nudging him, but he was using his senses to figure out what was happening on the balcony. He stiffened as the boy ran away. "No!" He whispered. "Something isn't right." He shifted ever so slightly, causing his eye to briefly become uncovered. Rain began to pour down hard as his eye was covered once more. Upon realizing he had unwittingly completed the scene, Steel sighed and relaxed his body. His shadow began to seep with dark smoke, and became a small pool through which he began to slowly fall. Before long he was submerged, and the shadows vanished without a trace.

 

It seemed his attack did a great deal of damage to the Dark Thorn. Though it recovered and even went so far as to grab the beast and jump out. His honey brown eyes widened and he reached out, fixing to call out to the Beast when he saw the Beast fall, slamming into the balcony. He saw Luna run for the balcony and he saw Gaston climbing over it, preparing his knife to slay the prince. He saw Luna run and yell at Gaston to let the Beast go. He grit his teeth and he ran forward, sliding to a stop beside and reached out his arm infront of Luna."Wait, don't interfere.."He said, glancing over to the two, his eyes moving to observe the situation in silence. He didn't move. He would only move when the situation called for it.

 

Glen braced himself as Vanitas started talking. He had a feeling it was going to be a tough fight, and one he should take seriously. Gripping his keyblade a little tighter, Glen was as prepared as he could bee. The next few moments went by so quickly it was like one big blur, yet Glen would remember it for a very long time regardless. One minute Vanitas was standing there and the next he wasn't, seemingly gone because of the sheer speed he moved at. Glen began turning on the spot, trying to find him. Where is he? he thought to himself. He got his answer only seconds later as he felt searing pain coming from his right side. Vanitas had hit, and he had hit hard.

Collapsing onto one knee from that single hit, his pride was hurt far more than his body. Despite everything, he had been taken down with one single hit. Not a string of hits, not any ridiculously big attack either, a single, simple hit from Vanitas. He could hear Kaida faintly, hearing her yelling about coming back. "You got lucky..this time, but next time..I'm going to tear...you apart" Glen said between breaths. His keyblade fell to the ground and vanished in a small amount of light, let go by Glen, and the keyslinger's body fell shortly afterwards, the last fighting spark within him vanishing directly after his weapon did.

 

Gaston stopped mid-lunge when Luna interrupted his kill. He sneered at the distraction, but chuckled when he turned to see only a little girl.

"Trust me, you'll admire what I do. Everybody does." He said with no lack of self-esteem and a toothy grin. But as the others came to her aid, Gaston began to lose his signature confidence. "Have you all gone mad? It's a beast! It doesn't have feelings." He bit darkly and spit on the Beast's ripped cape. "Oh, but Belle "loved" you, didn't she? HA!" Gaston chastised and laughed at the weakened Beast. "Tell me, Beast, were you in love with her? Do you really think she'd want someone like you...when she could have someone like me?" He knelt down by the apparent monster and dug his knife deep into the animal-like ribcage.

Beast roared with pain and anguish as he regained his strength just enough to grab Gaston by the throat and held the helpless and presently afraid hunter over the edge; a ravine lay below, and a terrible drop.

"Please, let me go, I'll do anything." Gaston pleaded. Though Beast snarled and looked at the killer with the intent to kill, the mere memory of Belle brought him back to who he truly was. And who was the Beast and who was the Man was more evident in the air than what was visual.

"Get out..." Beast growled and threw Gaston back onto the safety of the balcony. As Gaston crawled away, Beast caught sight of Belle far below at the bridge. "Belle!" He said aloud, happily. His mood soon changed as a headless rider grabbed hold of her and rode off into the Black Forest with her. "No!" Beast roared again in pain and in anguish as the knife of the incident and Gaston's dagger sunk into his back at the same instant. Blind with pain, Beast thrashed about, and accidentally threw the cowardly Gaston and his dagger to the ravine below. Gaston's cry died out as he fell out of sight, but Beast was far too gone to realize what had happened. His monstrous feet staggered, and his heavy ankles quivered. With a grunt, the Beast fell, and in much worse shape than before.

 

Ananta stood and watched helplessly as Nequa took both Mizu and Excalibur away from this world. Tears formed in her eyes as she realized how helpless she was. The pain of helplessness and a jaw that's quite sore assisted in the tears. Falling to her knees, Ananta's hands gripped the fabric of her shorts as tears fell from her eyes. "This isn't fair...we're supposed to help people. We're supposed to protect people. And all we did was fail. We couldn't even keep an important sword from being stolen, let alone a girl." she said, wiping tears from her eyes. In a beam of light, her keyblade appeared. It was still in it's Lady Luck form. So far, she was beginning to like this keyblade. It was pretty and also had some decent stat boosts. Her eyebrows furrowed as she stood up, holding the keyblade in her hand still. "What good is a weapon of light if it can't even help me save the important things?" she said below her breath. Staring at a tree in the distance, Ananta chucked her keyblade at it. The weapon stuck into the tree, making a loud THUNK as it hit. Moments later, it dematerialized into light as it reappeared in her hand. Ananta stared at the ground, lost in thought. Ever since she got her keyblade, she's been through nothing but sorrow. How could she get over this?

 

Etrius was thrown to the wall with no second to react. He fell to the ground hard. As his Keyblade disappeared Etrius struggled to look up at Vanitas' mask, then looking back to his fallen comrades.
"You won't get away with this," Etrius struggled, "I can't allow you to do what you did to my parents. I swear we will hunt you to the end the worlds."
Reality started to cut out. Etrius' eyes rolled back into his head as it hit the ground.
during the last split seconds before he truly fell unconscious, he had one last thought.

"I have to help stop Vanitas. I can't let him do what he did to my friends...."

***

 

As he slowly got himself of of his keyblade crutch, he quickly casted blizzard on the burning Stratos. Going off the logic that the melted ice would take care of the flames, he figured that he'd get up eventually get up and not be a charred keyblade wielder. When Gilgamesh had gifted them before vanishing to the void, he looked to his keyblade. He could that something had changed in what he could do, but he would just have wait and see. Then there was a loud thunk, which prompted Kel to glance over to Ananta, who was yet again sulking. Seriously, didn't they already have a cheer up session. "So now what?"

 

Stratos woke up to the feeling of a large chunk of ice hitting his unconscious body. Ow. Thankfully as the fire had successfully done its super effective damage against the large shard of ice, the ice turned into water and put him out. Still horrendously sore, Stratos picked himself up and gave himself a quick glance over. Aside from a few burn marks, there seemed to be no permanent damage to himself or his clothing. Man these were impressive articles of clothing. Regardless, they were basically in the worst situation one could imagine to be in. The sword was taken and the loli mahou shoujo was apprehended by the Masked Keyblade Wielder (which he just knew despite being passed out, for convenience sake of course,) and heard what Kel said. "Well, for now I suppose all we can do is admit we lost and try to win the next time. Sure, the defeat was pretty bad, actually like, totally one sided. However, we know what we're getting into now, and know what we're facing. So next time we'll just have to be prepared for it."

 

Stratos looked as his keyblade, which seemed to have changed from the unbound form into a new one. The new keyblade seemed to be reacting with the keyhole of light Merlin had just summoned. He was absolutely astounded and confused by it. Just what exactly was this thing? Without even inquiring about the hole, Stratos's body felt as if it had switched to auto pilot. Pointing the keyblade straight at the keyhole, the keyblade fired a beam of light straight into the hole, causing it to erupt with light until finally making a locking sound and dissipating away. Saluting the wizard with his keyblade, he said, "thanks for the gift Merlin. Don't worry, we'll be sure to get back everything we lost here. After all, we're not going to let a little setback like this stop us." Stratos had now idea how he could sound so confident after getting so thoroughly thrashed. Did he believe in his own words? He wasn't quite sure. However, he knew that if he continued to doubt himself and let this defeat haunt him, then he would always be haunted by it and become unable to surpass himself as he was now. Stratos had no idea how to become stronger, though he continued to feel as if his skill set was continually expanding. Hopefully the others would come to sort of similar conclusion. Though there was one thing that was extremely pressing to him. Turning back to the other group members, with a curious look on his face, he said, "so what exactly did I just do?"

 

Kel wasn't expecting to be gifted with two separate things from this place, not that he was complaining. Still looking at his newly gained keyblade, it truly didn't seemed to be made for him, but that didn't bother him. A new weapon was the perfect starting point for his idea on how to improve himself. While he had zero intentions on giving up on getting stronger, he was just going to apply that mentality to other more neglected aspect of himself. Next what had occurred was and wasn't a shock to him. She wasn't surprised that Merlin knew where the keyhole was, but he wasn't expecting it to be in the anvil where the sword was. "I'm sure your help will be beneficial." Kel said, just as Stratos had finished up with the keyhole. Hearing the question, he went ahead and answered. "Basically you just sealed this world's keyhole and if my understanding is correct, doing so should help protect this world." That was the best explanation that he could give since there was still things he didn't quite know either.

 

Ananta held the keychain in her hand for the new keyblade that Merlin gave to the group. She attached it to her keyblade and watched it transform into a new form and smiled at the tiny difference between the keyblade she had from before. Sending her keyblade away, she turned in time to see Stratos had sealed the keyhole. Her eyes widened in disbelief as she stood there, wanting to cry and possibly get angry at everyone, Ananta clenched her fists. Closing her eyes and trying her hardest not to cry, she opened them again and clapped her hands. "Good job, Stratos, you've sealed your first keyhole thing. I don't know much about them myself, but doing this means the worlds will be safe for a little while." she smiled. Looking at everyone, she scratched her chin while she thought. "I think we're pretty much done here, what about you guys?" she asked.

 

Glen was still unconscious, his mind playing through the events that happened to him shortly before he left his homeworld. He remembered his father's death, he remembered his grieving over it, he remembered attempting to fight the heartless, and he remembered the slimy tongue in his ear.

...wait a minute.

There had been no tongue in his ear! With a start, Glen opened his eyes and had a hunch of what was happening. Either Vanitas had some very strange interests indeed, or that lizard was trying to lick his brain again. Opening his eyes, Glen lashed out with his right hand, and swatted Pascal away from him. The small creature went flying into the wall nearby, but Glen had successfully gotten him away from himself. Getting up rather slowly, his body ached all over, but upon seeing what was going on, his pride hurt far more than anything. While they had all been obliterated by Vanitas, here was a simple horse fending off Vanitas. Four keyblade wielders had failed to so much as scratch him, but now they were being saved by a horse?

Doing his best to move on from that, the keyblade wielder quietly summoned his keyblade. He was ready to go in to attack Vanitas, to go for round 2, but despite everything people seemed to think, he wasn't stupid. He knew he wouldn't win. Turning his attention to his fallen comrades, he pointed his keyblade at Kaida first and quietly said "heal". The magic flowed from the end of his keyblade to the body of Kaida, the person he had decided to cast cure on. As soon as the magic vanished and had been completed, Glen raced over and began shaking Kaida. "Kaida, get up! We're being saved! By a horse! We can't lay down and let this embarrassment take place, we'll never hear the end of it!" he said, trying to wake her up now.

 

Spoiler: Flashback 2

After what could have been hours sitting down and whittling away at a small piece of wood, Kaida had finished up what she was working on. With a smile she placed it back in her pocket and slipped her whittling knife back and looked up at her two friends who were still going at it. One was clearly getting tired while the other didn't seem to be having any problems. Kaida stood up and walked over to them smiling, "Alright guys, I think you two have sparred enough for now, take a little break. Even if you don't think you need one."

The one that was tired was panting like crazy and replied, "At least I'm getting better, right?"
The other one stood towering over the two and spoke with much tediousness, "You still aren't strong enough."
"You know for some one with lost memories, you sure stay on that topic a lot..."

Kaida shrugged at the comment and spoke, "Well I mean, if it's the one thing he can remember, I can't blame him for clinging to that topic." she looked back over at the taller of the two, "Any progress at all with the memories though?"
"My efforts are... insufficient. The more I try to recall, the less sense I can make of it. As if there was forcibly removed from my mind."
"Well that's a problem... hm... maybe... the less you try to awaken your memories, the more memories you'll find? I wish I could help you out more..."

The tall one crossed their arms and said his thoughts without sugarcoating it, "The help I need can't be found among peers. They can only be reached through higher powers... and to do that, I need to be stronger. To prove I can best whatever challenge I need to reclaim what is rightfully mine. Meaning better opponents then the cannon-fodder that is Hikaru."
"Hey!"
Kaida snickered a little bit, "Hey that isn't nice..." but she couldn't hold back her laughter anymore and let out a large laugh, "Cannon-fodder packs more of a punch then Hikaru."

The tall one turned towards Hikaru and still stuck to the older topic, "Whatever miraculous conclusion did you come to that made you sign up into the Guardian class. You're more quick than sturdy. Should have joined with Kaida in the Hunter program."
Hikaru seemed to have finally recovered from the panting and stated his reasons,"Because no matter how weak I seem, I want to be able to protect what's important to me." He smiled happily and looked at the two of them with enthusiasm, "Like you guys"
"Well it's a good thing that people can train to get stronger huh?" Kaida turned back to the tall one, "Not all of us happen to be gifted with as much strength as you have you know?"

Kaida walked closer to the tall man and went back to her earlier subject, "I mean... okay... I looked up other places where people can train and no one matched your data... so if you trained anywhere it's not at a formal place of training... unless you're home schooled... that makes only a thousand more possible worlds..."
"Then it looks like I've failed my teacher. My next mentor I will not fail. Whatever apprenticeship I take on will build me into a more competent version of myself. The next person I follow will have my undying loyalty and will to fight."
"Whatever helps me regain my true identity. And until that day comes, this mask will forever seal my face."
"You sure you can commit to that?"
"Who would want to see themselves as half whole. It's all or nothing."
"Well you know what, good for you. If that mentor helps you to find your place I'll be happy for you because I know you'll be one step closer to figuring it out."

Kaida's eyes opened in realization and she searched through her pockets, "Oh that's right. I almost forgot." she pulled out two whittled charms and held them up smiling, "I finished making your presents finally. It took me forever to get the detail on it, but I hope you two like them." She handed a whittled out lion to the taller one, and a wolf to Hikaru.
"Cool!"
"Why animals?"
"Why not animals?"

Kaida seemed a little angry at the question and pointed at the tall one, "Besides, your's is a lion. You know why I would pick a lion rather than any other animal? Because lions, male lions usually, are always trying to get stronger no matter what, to find what their meaning is and what they really are inside. They fight whatever comes their way to protect what is their's and they won't budge to anyone, even their own brothers."
She calmed down and shrugged with a smile, "It just seemed to fit best for you in my eyes."
"So why a I a wolf then?"
"Check and see if 'Omega' is scribbled somewhere!"
"You're why I can't enjoy nice things!"

Kaida laughed and walked over to Hikaru and place a hand on his shoulder, "Alright alright. I picked a wolf because wolves protect their packs no matter what. Whether they are the leader, the runt... it doesn't matter they are there for them." her face looked kind of embarrassed and she scratched the back of her head, "Er um... I kind of accidentally... made a runt..."

There was a silence within the group but Hikaru looked over to the taller one, "Stop it."
"I didn't say anything."
"I can hear you snickering in your head."
"Oh so you can read minds now? You know they say people who can read minds have hands larger than their face."

The taller man looked at his hand and Hikaru went over to try and push it to his face, but the tall one knocked him over and Kaida let out a laugh, "Wow Aux, did you really think I was serious there?"
"Quite devious, would that make you the fox?"
"I don't know..."​

I don't know
"Kaida, get up!"
What are you saying, I'm standing right here...
"We're being saved! By a horse!"
What horse there's no horse here... are you saying that?
"We can't lay down and let this embarrassment take place, we'll never hear the end of it!"

Kaida opened her eyes and finally realized that what was being said was not in her head. She quickly sat up and looked at Glen, then looked at Maximus, then back at Vanitas. She stood up with the energy she could muster up and ran over to attempt to attack but her main problem was that... she could not find a place to attack without the possibility of hurting Rapunzel. She looked at Glen for a moment before she summoned her keyblade and threw it towards Vanitas' legs hoping to knock him down.