Video Game: Kingdom Hearts SOS: The Road To Light

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Maybe they weren't as John and Ratcliffe said, Luna had a point with that. Maybe it was just the fact that Ratcliffe had compared them to said savages shortly after they had arrived or how he just didn't like him. Either way he didn't rule out the possibility of something being different about these savages. "Well they're not as aggressive as I thought they would be upon hearing the name. Maybe we just haven't gotten into their territory yet for them to act." As long as they weren't in their territory they had no reason to act which made sense on paper.

 

Ananta listened to Steel talk and she spoke up. "Oh,you mentioned this before. I think that'd be the perfect world to just sleep all day and read a good book." she said, thinking about rain and how she actually missed it right now. She never cared how wet she got from rain, she enjoyed the feeling on her skin whenever it rained. She would much rather walk without an umbrella and just enjoy the way it washed away her worries. Her eyes closed a second and she could remember her first time at the Mother Crystal. It was raining and she ended up getting into the pools of water, becoming absolutely drenched in the Crystal's water. She never quite dried off until a few days later and ever since, she craved water.

She came back to reality when she noticed Kaida talked about Density Isles or whatever. "Wherever that is, sounds pretty similar to here." she said, watching Kaida start to shrink away from the group. Ananta moved over and put an arm over Kaida's shoulder, pulling her into a half hug. "As much as I love water, we can't really go back to it anyway. After we get everything situated, we gotta find that dog thing anyway." she said, walking with Kaida still wrapped in her arm.

They finally found themselves on the opposite end of a boardwalk. There were people walking and talking all over, wearing all sorts of clothing. Many wore bathing suits, of course, but there were some who wore regular old clothes. Dotted along the boardwalk were shops of various types with the closest one just so happening to be a clothing store that had swimsuits in the shop windows. "You guys honestly match." Ananta said, looking at Kaida and Stratos. Steel was the exception, but there was nothing they could do there. "I mean, you guys match the world's clothing, so no need to change if you don't want to. Aux, you kinda don't match, so sorry to say, but you gotta at least get a tanktop...unless that's what you've got?" she didn't really pry much more. She shrugged and looked at everyone. "I'm going in." she said, letting go of Kaida and slipping away, heading into the shop.

Once inside, Ananta was greeted with odd looks from patrons and staff alike. Though she kept to herself, she still wanted to find something quickly and get back outside. First she found a small vest like thing to put on. It was cute, but she needed something to cover her chest under. So she found an orang bikini set and some short jeans. She also found bracelets that were cute and sandals to wear. Ananta hurried over to the changing rooms and magicked the clothing onto her body. She then used a small spell to make her look like she was still in the clothes she walked in. Those were tucked away into her bag she kept on her back.

Back outside, she was still appearing in her normal clothes before the magick wore off and revealed her new outfit. She adjusted her hair and put it into a ponytail to keep it off of her. She simply did that for style, of course. As usual, her crystal was around her neck, regardless of what was shown in her banner.

"There, I feel like I match this place a lot better now." she said, crossing her arms. She looked down and saw the sandals didn't exactly get put on right, so she knelt down and tied up the strings to just below her knee and made a cute bow out of the excess. Now she was complete.
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"Hey hey, he deserved it. He was being a prick" Beuce said in a mock defensive tone. She was right, they had a bit of time before the event actually went underway as most people would arrive early. "Well, I know AJ was joking about the royal inspector thing, but getting our hair done might actually not be a bad idea. If we're going to do it, might as well go all out with looking the part. Though you're more or less taken care of in the hair department. We should also talk over our plan beyond 'show up'. It doesn't hurt to be prepared." He'd mostly been thinking of ways to stay undetected, but that was mainly to get into the event. They'd need to discuss how to get closer to the two girls.

AJ: 6
Beuce: 5
Ignis: 6​

 

Kaida did not like Ananta getting all up in her business the second she began to back off. It was most definitely because Kaida was clearly intending to fade into the background again to be with her thoughts. Having an arm suddenly wrap around her making her feel like someone was forcing her to be at their speed angered her a lot more than words probably could have described, at least not in PG language. But she also was not in a fighting mood, so as soon as she had to chance to keep away from Ananta, which involved her going and trying on new clothes, she separated herself and got a good look around at what the deal was with this world and try to get a good idea on where they should perhaps look.

The shop was filled with knick knacks and t-shirts and it was at that moment she realized exactly what this place was: a tourist trap. Kaida shuddered a bit at the idea of it, but got a look at some of the postcards and got a nice look at some of the scenery and need-to-go locales. There were some mountains, volcanoes, lots of beaches. There were a lot of photographs of these dancers in leaf skirts and there seemed to be some sort of gimmick with what seemed to be tropical flowers. The girls in the leaf skirts were all over the place with head bobbles, calendars, t-shirts, mugs, key chains, snow globes (which to Kaida seemed rather ironic because of a tropical setting), license plates, there were even some dolls with the same design. It was frightening how much they were pushing this one thing that she wondered if it was someone who was famous on this world, or some sort of traditional clothing? Kaida picked up one of the bobbleheads playing a tiny guitar and watched it bobble back and forth as she realized the instrument was playing over the radio of the shop in order to set the mood. She giggled a bit in amusement at it. She kind of wished she could show Hikaru it, maybe he would have found the whole thing as amusing as she did.

As she placed down the bobblehead she moved around the shop to look at some more stuff and found a map of the island and decided to go and pick that up and she saw the clothing section of the area and decided to give it a look. It was that same floral deal. Kaida had no idea why this was a thing, but looking around at the other people walking around, it must have been what at least tourists wore. That's how they could pass off. Kaida took off the extra belts on her shorts to make them look like normal shorts in the store and she looked around for something else to wear. There was a pretty nice sundress type thing that was white with floral patterns. Kaida liked it very much and remembered how long it had been since she wore a dress and got a little excited at the idea of it. She tried it on, and it went just over her shorts, but if she jumped it rode up a bit and her shorts could be seen. So she went with that look and bought herself one of the flower necklaces and placed it on. She also got herself a couple of those flower necklaces for the others.

When she walked back over to the group she put the flower necklace on Ananta, then Stratos, then Steel, when she turned over to Aux she just kind of held the necklace out to him and then walked away again to look at other stuff. People probably thought she was snubbing him or something, which she totally was but the reason she ultimately did not try to put the flower necklace on Aux was because of how much taller he was than her. She would have had to have pulled him down and she was most certainly not in the mood for it. Kaida looked around for other stuff in the store to keep trying to figure out what was up with the place but it seemed a lot of the focus for this place was the beach and the ocean. She also began picking up on a few things, for one she was pretty sure most of the people here were not locals, they were also tourists. The locals were the ones they seemed to itemize with the leaf skirts, which Kaida finally found the item name to realize it was something called a "hula skirt" and that the flower necklaces she gave everyone were called "leis".

Kaida decided to go ahead and buy one of those bobbleheads out of amusement, maybe when this was all over she could have it around as a souvenir. It fascinated her enough. She walked up to the cashier on the other side of the store this time, to keep just the slightest bit more time from looking at Aux's face or being pulled into Ananta's unwelcome grasp, and once she checked out, the cashier said something about enjoying her honeymoon? Kaida had absolutely no idea what he meant by that, did she look like she was on a honeymoon or something? She barely even thought about the odd things people did in other homeworlds. Once Kaida was done shopping she indicated to everyone she was going to wait outside and she left to sit outside and look at the rest of the shops. It was more of less all of the same with a few other stores mixed in. Kaida noticed there was a farmer's market type thing across the street that was selling fresh fruit and vegetables and just looking at it made her stomach growl. She took a deep breath to control herself since she wanted to wait for the others, but she could not resist the growl for long and she walked her way across the road to get herself some fresh fruit. Particularly eyeing some apples, though she considered getting an orange instead. Food.

 

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Once Beuce and him had met back up with Ignis she said, 'Well, at least I didn't have to con my way to find some clothes to wear.' He just looked at her not really knowing what to say. He had nothing to do with that. In fact they could have found another shop with cheaper dress up clothes. Then Ignis said, 'So what do you think we should do now, huh Mr. "Royal Inspector"? It still seems pretty early, and I'd rather not deal with that crowd trying to get into the castle right now.' He asked one rhetorical question about going to get there hair done and Ignis took it seriously. She was right in a way tho. "You are right when we got to the castle there was a mad dash to get inside. If we want to get run over then we can go." Beuce then said, 'Hey hey, he deserved it. He was being a prick.' He was but what was done was done and there was nothing that could be done about it. 'Well, I know AJ was joking about the royal inspector thing, but getting our hair done might actually not be a bad idea.' He smiled at Beuce well someone got the rhetorical question. Beuce then said something about going over a plan which was not a bad idea. Just at the moment more people seemed to walk by mostly staring at them no it was not them as more and more people walked by it became clear they were looking at Ignis. In fact one man had just walked into a lamp pole. It was not just the men that were looking it was the women too. That said it looked like it was more men then women that were looking at Ignis. "So should we be on our way?" He asked the two.

AJ: 7
Beuce: 5
Ignis: 6

 

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As the trio continued to talk, apparently there were some people that were staring at Ignis that were both male and female. She figured they probably liked the dress she was in, since she couldn't think of any other way that people would stare. There was even one guy who she saw that walked right into a lamp pole. She couldn't help but laugh mischievously at it, doing absolutely nothing herself and still getting enjoyment. Now she understood what that old lady was saying when telling Ignis about her youth. It certainly gave Ignis a wanting to just walk around and mess with some people. Beuce had suggested getting their hair done, and Ignis didn't really need that done. She always kept her hair clean, and it was pretty much already styled, but if the boys wanted to get theirs done, who was she to stop them.

"Well," she looked around to see where exactly they would go in the village for something like that, then turned her head to Beuce "You're both free to spiffy yourselves up as much as you want, but are you sure you don't want that dress that was inside that store while you're at it? After all, I can't think of anyone but girls that try so hard to make themselves look good for events like this."

 

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Stratos followed alongside everyone else as they determined to go find the locals of the island they were on. Walking alongside everyone else, each one told something about the sun on their world and the different weather patterns they had on them. Despite the fact that they all had similar attributes to them and similar phenomena happening, the boy found it interesting to see how different they all ended up being. It was an obvious fact, but one that he hadn't put any real thought into until just now. While mulling over these thoughts, the group eventually found themselves in the middle of a town. Getting a good look at all the locals, Stratos figured that his outfit was indeed normal enough for this world and that he didn't need to go out and get something new. And while Ananta seemed to agree with this sentiment, he couldn't help but feel that he was still about out of place.

As everyone else went in, the boy figured he might as well, and looked around seeing what kind of clothing was around. As his pants were long and his footwear sneakers, he figured changing those up would be helpful. So, buying a pair of swim trunks and sandals, the boy changed his outfit around and stepped out, having put his old clothes in his seemingly bottomless pockets. Thinking his look wasn't quite fully blended in yet, the boy also bought a pair of sunglasses, which he placed over his head, and took off his shirt placing that in his pocket as well. Once that was off, he instead put his jacket back on, which didn't look strange as it was a short sleeved jacket. With his sunglasses resting on his forehead, he was then surprised as a flower necklace was draped over him as well, the boy looked over to see it was from Kaida in a new outfit of her own.

"Thanks," he said. With a smile, he extended his arms out, gesturing to himself saying, "really completes the look, don't you think?" With that, he looked over to the others saying, "well, I think we got the whole, local look thing down here. Though," he looked over to Aux saying, "I'm not sure if you standing out was just an outfit thing. Regardless, I'd rather keep looking around here myself, then go for a swim. I'm not in any real rush to go for one myself either." Stratos had a slightly nervous tone in his voice as he made note of that, wanting to avoid the topic of swimming himself.

As he tried to figure out where next to go, he saw Kaida walking over to an assortment of stalls and tables that all seemed to have different kind of fruits and stuff across them. Thinking it had been awhile since he had anything to eat himself, the boy followed after her. Looking through the different stalls, he had figured most of these things were fruits but hadn't the faintest idea of what they were. Staring in slight wonder at all of the different colorful foods, the boy eventually looked over to a redish one referred to as an "apple," and picked it out. With curiosity at it, he gave the man in charge of the stall the munny for it, grabbing one and biting into it as he continued to walk around, looking for more weird things to eat.

 

Beuce was silent for a moment, making a face of deep thought. Then, with the straightest face he could muster, looked to Ignis. "Nah, it's not my color." He said, turning down the offer of wearing that dress. "Oh, oh! But we could go shoe shopping, and get a makeover and..and...Oh! Manicuuuures~!" After that last one he couldn't help himself from starting to laugh. "Nah but seriously though I have some sand in my hair from the Island and haven't gotten a chance to wash it. I don't know if we can get a bath easily, and if i'm going to have someone else wash it, may as well get it done while I'm there. Come on lets get going."

AJ: 7
Beuce: 6
Ignis: 7​

 

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Beuce hadn't seemed to take to Ignis's joke as much as she had hoped, since he barely responded to it, but then he tried to tack on his own joke afterwards. Not only was it bad, but he actually managed to make himself laugh at it. It made Ignis cringe and scrunch up ever so slightly.

"Well, if that's really what you're into, I won't stop you." Turning around she made the gesture of writing something down just enough for Beuce to see, "Let's see, gotta remember to let the others know that Beuce prefers shoe shopping, makeovers, and manicures..."

While he did make a good point about getting sand out of his hair, luckily Ignis had remember to rinse out her hair before changing into the dress herself. She remember all the times she had fallen into the sand back on the island and the moments she got sand in her mouth. Thinking about it made it feel like there was actual sand in her mouth, and she tried her best to get her mind on something else. Looking around, she couldn't really see any way for them to wash out their hair, since there was no well or anything that was obvious. Outside of that, they would actually have to look for some kind of salon or something. She wondered if any of the buildings around where that kind of store to begin with, since this was such a small place.

As she looked around, she felt her stomach growl a little as well. "Don't suppose we can find something to fill ourselves with while we're at it?"

 

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He turned when Ignis she said, 'You're both free to spiffy yourselves up as much as you want, but are you sure you don't want that dress that was inside that store while you're at it? After all, I can't think of anyone but girls that try so hard to make themselves look good for events like this.' As Ignis had said this he ran his hand through his hair. It was starting to get long he could feel it. He had just got it cut right before everything hit the fan on his home world. That was what at least a few months ago. Beuce had said something about the dress not being his color. 'Oh, oh! But we could go shoe shopping, and get a makeover and..and...Oh! Manicuuuures~!' He could see that Beuce was trying to make light of the situation. Beuce was ready to go so there was nothing he could do but follow him. This was when Ignis said, 'Don't suppose we can find something to fill ourselves with while we're at it?' He shrugged for a moment. "I wish that I had packed some more food but food only last so long." He continued walked but there was something missing but he did not know what it was. Maybe it was his homeworld or something else he could not say. He continued to walk with the two not saying much else.



AJ: 8
Beuce: 6
Ignis: 8

 

Kaida bought herself an orange and began pealing it then and there and grabbed a couple of potential extras for later. As she got herself a couple of orange slices she walked back over towards Stratos and whispered, "I feel like Ananta is very clingy and I don't know why... did I miss or do something?" she went to grab another slice and eat it but paused midway and rolled her eye, "You know, besides being in mourning? It reminds me of when she was trying to calm down Karina and was failing." Kaida ate the slice finally and chewed for a bit as wondered if perhaps Ananta's crystal sun somehow made it so she could not understand that hugging and trying to include them in things when they needed space was a bad idea. She also just... didn't know Ananta well enough to fully feel comfortable with home friendly and familiar she acted. Wanting to change the subject before Ananta somehow heard her, she looked around the place at more of the fruit, "Also someone said something about 'enjoying my honeymoon'. I don't know what's up with this place but I think we're in a largely caluclated tourist trap with the intent on exploiting an icon of the indigenous population... or it's... just a vacation spot and I'm overthinking it. But there's a lot of this thing called "hula"."

The blonde then pulled out the bobblehead she bought from the store and showed it to Stratos while it looked like it was dancing, "It's fun. And kind of adorable."

 

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As the boy continued to bite into his apple, he looked curiously over to the fruit in Kaida's hand as she walked over to him. As she asked about Ananta, he simply shrugged, saying, "I'm pretty sure that's what she does." Stratos's mood became a bit more somber as he said, "well, I think she's just worried about you - I am too. But I think she's just," Stratos waved his hand around as he tried to think of how to phrase it. "Well, just bad at talking and reading people. Or the mood for that matter." The boy continued to eat his fruit, as Kaida then went on to explain her thoughts on the area they were in. His expression seemed more neutral now, her words seeming to go right over him before she finally showed him the little bobble she had. "Oh, that is pretty neat." He went to poke the head of the doll, only to be mildly amused as it bobbled back and forth. He looked directly at Kaida, seemingly still curious, before asking, "also uh...what's a honeymoon? Is it a kind of food? Oh, and a tourist trap for that matter?"

 

Kaida watched the had bobble a bit and listened to his questioning over what a honeymoon is and she shrugged, "It's something that was done on my homeworld, but apparently in some places two people who love each other get married. Some places have celebrations after the wedding where the two basically go on a trip alone together to celebrate their union." Kaida put the bobblehead back away in her bag and continued explaining, "A tourist trap is a place designed specifically to lure visitors in. They hike up prices of items because people will pay more when they've got all the energy around it. They're not... inherently bad. But one opened up on Central Haven for a little while and I gave up so much money to it because of the ice cream they imported in... mmm... ice cream..." she looked around to see if maybe there were ice cream stands nearby that she could buy some. Kaida had no idea what kind she would get, maybe this time she'd have pistachio. As she looked she commented, "It's such nice weather for it. You better at least know what ice cream is."

 

Beuce nodded in agreement as Ignis suggested they get food. "There'll probably be food at the coronation, but we should probably eat before just in case. None of us have eaten much since the boat ride." He said, looking for restaurants. That didn't appear to be particularly uncommon, but it was really just a matter of what they wanted to eat. He looked to Ignis, whose stomach was growling. The man subtracted 1000 munny from his pouch and tossed her the rest. "My treat. Think of it as payment for the bad jokes. I'm going to go get my hair washed, so take your time eating. I'll catch up." With that, he walked off to find somewhere to get something done with his hair. It would definitely look kind of odd if he was dressed well but his hair was filthy with dirt. He found a quiet shop and entered. There was only one other customer, who seemed to be getting a shave, so he simply sat down and waited for the hair dresser to finish their work.

AJ: 8
Beuce: 7
Ignis: 8​

 

Steel was honestly at a loss as all of his companions started going shopping as soon as they reached a populated area. While they all went in to browse merchandise, he could change into nothing, and essentially stuck out like a sore thumb whether he went in or not. As they filed out of the shop looking like something out of a surfer movie, Steel mourned the loss of any subtlety he once held.

"Maybe I should just try to stick to the shadows..." He muttered out his idea from earlier as Kaida and Stratos started discussing tourist traps and ice cream, really only figuring Ananta or Aux would hear him.

 

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Stratos seemed interested, nodding that he now understood as Kaida went on to explain to him the customs of a honeymoon and then the specifics of a tourist trap. Looking around the island, both with how exotic it seemed and how the people seemed to be moving about he could see how this place fit the bill. Looking more at the outfit he was wearing, he shuddered a bit as he muttered, "this really is a tourist trap." Looking over to Kaida as she began to ask him about ice cream, the boy quickly averted his eyes from her, hoping the name was as intuitive as it sounded, as he said, "well I uh, no what Ice is. And cream. So it's like...a mix of the two? That you use to really uh, beat the heat. Yeah."

 

Kaida stared at Stratos for quite a bit of time as she began to process that he did in fact, not know what ice cream was. It almost seemed strange that he didn't know, even her world for all it's shortcomings and what she would deem backwards lifestyle still had ice cream. Granted, it was usually a thing that was thrown out for birthday celebrations and things of the like. Realizing an opportunity for someone to try something new she was pretty sure they would like, Kaida's eyes found a person touring around with an ice cream cart and she grabbed Stratos' hand and began pulling him away saying, "Okay I know we should probably be looking for that alien but it has been a long boat ride with a lot of emotions and I want you to experience the joy of iced cream." when she got to the cart she let go of his hand and looked at the ice cream and was sad there was no pistachio and said, "I'll take the mint chocolate chip then. Um..." she looked over to Stratos and stared a long moment and said , "You seem like a vanilla kind of guy." she paused a minute after saying that and realized how that sounded and clarified, "L-Like the flavor I mean."

 

As the hairdresser finished with their other customer, the man stood up and looked in the mirror, rubbing his hand along his face. He turned and paid the rather shapely woman a bit of munny and thanked for a good job as always. The brown haired woman then turned to Beuce, having dealt with her only other customer. "What can I do for you?" She called out in a southern bell accent. Beuce stood up and walked over to speak to her more directly.

"I'm headed to the coronation today." He replied simply.

"Well I can see that." She said with a laugh. "Ya need your hair done, right? It's a mess." Beuce gave an agreeing chuckle and nod. "Well take off your jacket and sit in the chair, I'll fix you right up." The keyblade wielder did as he was instructed and sat down in the chair. She quickly wet his hair and began to rub shampoo in it, attempting to get out the dirt. "Boy what have you been doing? Rolling around in the dirt all day?"

"Something like that." He said, trying to dodge the question. She looked at him a little oddly, but pressed the issue no further and simply continued to wash his hair.

"You ain't from around here are ya?" She said, apparently clearly able to identify him as an outsider. Beuce, knowing there wasn't any point in hiding that he wasn't from around here, decided to just leave out the details.

"Do i stick out that badly?" He asked.

"The glass arm ain't exactly something that wouldn't get around quick." Beuce looked down and realized his right arm was uncovered since he'd taken off part of his suit to get his hair treated. "Don't worry, I dunno why it's such a big deal but I can tell ya don't want people finding out where you're from. I won't pry if it's personal business." Beuce gave a brief sigh of relief.

"Thanks, I appreciate it."

"But you do gotta tell me what you're doing at the ball. Did ya come to ask for one of the princesses hands in marriage? That would explain why you've got such a peacock-y suit." Beuce looked incredibly surprised. He hadn't even considered that was the message he gave off to people. She rinsed out his hair, and began to style it for him. "So tell me mister..."

"Beuce."

"Beuce? That's an uncommon name. Tell me Beuce, can ya dance?"

AJ: 8
Beuce: 8
Ignis: 8​