Words stuck together to make a big bunch of words.

As I said. Words stuck together to make a big bunch of words. Here, read this random fanfic I wrote. To tell the truth, I don't have any title for it. DX
Sorry if coding messed up. It might come out kinda weird.
My first fanfic.
All characters in this fanfic belong to Square Enix.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Darkness. The night outside was completely dark; only the light of Kingdom Hearts pierced the inky black. The light peeped softly into the dark room that lay far beneath the floors of the Castle That Never Was. All of the Organization members were asleep, except for one.
Vexen, Number Four of the Organization and known as the Chilly Alchemist, one of the six original apprentices of Ansem the Wise, leaned heavily over a metal desk. His tired green eyes, narrowed against the flickering light of the many candles grouped around his desk, were focused on what was within his two hands. The small metal plate was rather plain. White, like the many corridors and rooms of the Castle That Never Was, it had many different buttons and dials on it. It appeared plain, small, and not at all dangerous, but it held great power within it. It held the power of time.
Luxord would be scandalized to know what I did to get that power...
Gently placing a small wire into place, Vexen reached down and carefully turned the machine over. If it exploded, or anything that could damage it happened, the things that would happen were beyond Vexen’s meager imagination.
The sound of rustling brought him to attention of the time. Vexen looked over his shoulder, his left hand instinctively jerking up to cover his experiment with a white cloth. It was no one, just the soft flapping of a small square of cloth as it was blown from the table it had rested on. The Nobody sighed and walked over to pick it up. It was late and he had best be going to sleep like the rest of the Organization members. “Even mad scientists go to sleep, Vex,” Xigbar had said matter-of-factly when he had swung in earlier.
Sleep is not needed for Nobodies, Number Four thought in confusion as he started climbing the large staircase that spiralled up many floors to reach his private quarters, But the Organization sleeps, or rests, to make us feel closer to our Others. Although some of our Others should have not been dealing with what they did not understand. Mentally rebuking his Other was a pastime Vexen had picked up and turned to whenever he was pleased. But as he left his lab, he didn’t see his small experiment start blinking and beeping.
***
“Vexen wants all of us to come to the congregation chamber. Wake up, Axel. Wake up!” Demyx shouted in the pyromaniac’s ear. Still, Number Eight refused to wake up, even after Demyx’s constant shaking.
The musician stared with a troubled look. It was known in the Organization that Vexen was always cranky in the morning and wanted everyone to meet him on time and greet him. Lately he had been starting the month’s goal: greet everyone properly. Especially your elders.
“Go away, Demyx,” Number Eight mumbled. He dragged some blankets over his head, hiding his spiky red hair as he twisted in his sleep. Demyx privately wondered if Axel’s spiky hair would tear the sheets. He also added, Does Axel wear eyeliner even when he goes to sleep?
Demyx started pushing the Flurry of Dancing Flames again.
“Come on Axel! Just because fire melts ice that doesn’t mean you can just—”
“Buzz off, Mulletboy.”
“Mulletboy!?!” Demyx laughed. “Ha ha, Axel, you’re hilario— wait a minute, Mulletboy?! Arrgh, I’ll show you— I’ll— I’ll— I’ll smack you with my sitar!”
Axel scrunched up into a little ball under the blanket. “Mmf. Goerway.”
“Fine! You asked for it! DANCE, WATER, DANCE!”
A torrent of water shot out of the nearest sink and propelled itself towards Number Eight’s bed.
Number Two stuck his head in the doorway, watching a drenched and angry Axel wake up, his eyeliner smeared all over his face, and shout threats, claiming he wholeheartedly wished to break Demyx’s sitar in two (an ironic sort of threat, as he didn’t have a heart to begin with). Xigbar grinned with amusement, if that is even possible for a Nobody, and said, “Hurry up, you two. Vexen is starting to get angry.”
Demyx gave a watery smile and said, “I’m leaving.” He scurried meekly out of the room before Axel could shout any more threats— or carry any of them out. Axel fumed as Xigbar quickly withdrew from the room.
***
As an angry and fuming Axel stalked into the large congregation chamber, the room that held all of the large thrones, he saw that all of the Organization members had come except for Xemnas, no doubt already knowing of this odd and strange experiment that Vexen had made.
Sourly seating himself between Saïx and Demyx, he shot Demyx a glare that said “I will kill you.”
Reading the glare, Demyx scooted as far away from Axel as he could. Even though he controlled water, which could easily beat Axel’s fire element, he was afraid of him. There was a reason Demyx was Number Nine and Axel was Number Eight, after all.
After a while, Vexen cleared his throat importantly. “Now everyone, let’s all take care to mind this month’s theme: greet each other properly. Might I remind you all?” He glared at Axel, Demyx, Luxord, Marluxia, and Larxene individually and carefully.
As if on cue, Larxene launched forward from her chair and seized Vexen’s hand, shaking it up and down so energetically that his bones rattled. “Why, Vexen! How absolutely corking to see you, old man, it’s absolutely spiffing—”
Marluxia shoved Larxene aside. “Oh, Number Four! Didn’t see you there! Simply amazing—”
“Right,” said Vexen sardonically. “Go away.” Larxene and Marluxia, mockingly crestfallen, walked back to their thrones and teleported up to the top.
“As I was saying,” Vexen said, trying to sound important after the failure of his backfired plan, “I have created a new contraption that will....”
Most of the Organization was not listening. Demyx was drowning in his laughter, Axel was sending notes (Vexen has got to be the most boring person in the world. ~Luxord. I think his own acids sizzled away what was left of his brains a long time ago. ~Axel.) to Luxord by small paper airplanes, Luxord was taking bets on who would break the new contraption, and Larxene was still mockingly greeting Marluxia. Most of the higher ranks, like Numbers Three, Five, Six, and Seven were listening to Vexen, if only to demonstrate how exactly a proper Organization member should behave. Xigbar was listening to his iPod (One-Winged Angel: Final Fantasy VII Advent Children Version by Nobuo Uematsu).
Demyx suddenly shouted, “I bet you ONE BILLION MUNNY that Vexen will break the contraption himself!” At that exact second Vexen had pressed a button on the small plate like machine and the experiment exploded. Demyx gleefully collected together the munny that had been bet.
Vexen looked at the mass of ashes in his hands and let them fall to the ground. “This is bad,” he whispered. But the talk in the room was so loud that no one heard him. Saïx had warped down to the ground and brushed roughly beside Vexen to write a complaint to Xemnas at once, completely forgetting to say his farewell.
“Help meeee!” Demyx screamed as he darted away from an angry Axel who was intent on burning him to a fine ash. Xigbar was still listening to One-Winged Angel: FF7AC Version, Larxene and Marluxia were scheming in the corner of the room, and Zexion had buried himself in a book. Unseen to all, a small green flame had started out of the ashes.
“Meeting adjourn,” Vexen barked, watching the Organization starting to spread around the large room. He was instantly mowed over as the lower ranked Organization members flooded toward the door. In the chaos, the green flame leapt from its bed of ashes and sank without a trace into the ground.
***
Xemnas warped into the kitchen of The Castle That Never Was. Dragging out a chair at the head of the table, he sat down and looked at the empty white table. Normally the chairs that lined the table were filled with crying, sleeping, arguing, running-away-in-terror, etc. subordinates. Now, all of the chairs were empty. Strange, all of the upper ranks always seem to be at the table before he came, and Xaldin was always at the kitchen. Usually.
Drumming his fingers on the crystal table, Xemnas waited, and waited, and waited, and waited. What was going on? He should go and check on his subordinates.
He didn’t dare check Number Twelve’s room, because he would probably end up with no hair, or at least having short hair (Xemnas really did like his hair). Skipping Number Twelve he went to Number Eleven’s room. He rapped on the door loudly, but heard nothing.
“Number Eleven! Open up!”
The door opened tentatively.
“Number Eleven?” Xemnas asked. He peered in the dark room but drew back a little. The air in the room was very humid, similar to a rain forest or a greenhouse. In the darkness of the room he could pick out the shapes of many plants, mostly roses, orchids, or cherry trees that always seem in bloom. He couldn’t see the scythe wielding nobody. Interesting, that an Organization member who enjoys his resemblance to the Grim Reaper enjoys growing those sickly little pink roses of his.
“Down here.”
The voice that Xemnas heard was higher, less mature and definitely like a child’s. Following the command, he looked down and saw a small boy with pink hair and wearing a small trench coat.
“AH!” Leaping back, and accidentally smashing into the door behind him, Xemnas panted with surprise. Lucky nobodies don’t have hearts, he thought, Or else I would have had a heart attack.
“How did you get in there?” Xemnas asked the small about five year old boy, “And where is Number Eleven? I don’t know who you are or what you’re doing here, but I order you to leave at once, and tell me where is Number Eleven!”
“But I’m Marluxia!” the boy shouted. He seem distressed and looked on the edge of throwing a tantrum, “I’m Marluxia! I’m Marluxia!”
“Nonsense,” Xemnas snarled, “Marluxia was a grown man and definitely older then you, you immature little screamer.”
“But I am Marluxia, and I’m not a screamer!” the boy screamed. “I’m Marluxia, Xemmmna- Xemmmmnsss- oh, whatever!! I’m Marluxia! Hey, can I call you Xemmy?”
“Number One?”
Xemnas whirled around, light sabers out and tense. The voice he heard was a female’s, shy, but younger and as immature as the boy next to him. Looking around warily, he felt someone tugging his trench coat somewhere near his knee. When he looked down, he saw a miniature girl with short blond hair and startlingly sea-blue eyes, wearing another tiny black trench coat. Two small locks of hair dared to defy gravity as they hovered over her head like a pair of antennae.
“By Kingdom Hearts, did all my subordinates decide to play Adopt-a-Child while I was off?” asked Xemnas in exasperation. He turned and shouted down the hall: “Number Twelve, come and explain at once!”
“But I’m here,” said the tiny girl-child. Her eyes filled with tears.
“Wait a minute, don’t cry— don’t cry—”
Wailing filled the entire corridor, echoing out the opening windows and across the entire World That Never Was.
Xemnas grappled with conflicting needs: make the blond girl-child shut up, cover his ears, and find out what was going on. Meanwhile, the brown-haired kid who had been in Number Eleven’s room shouted something indistinct under the girl’s screams.
Luckily for Xemnas, someone did manage to drop in. But it wasn’t what he had expected.
Another child entered the scene. He had silver hair that already covered most of his face and was clutching a teddy bear close to him. Like the other two children, he wore a small trench coat.
“Xemnas? What’s goin’ on?”
Xemnas goggled. “Ienzo, is that you?”
The silver-haired child pouted. “It’s Zexion, you idiot.”
Xemnas stared down at Number Six. “But— what— why—?” It had needed someone he had known as a child to prove this to him. Now he believed.
Well, not really. Kinda. Not much. Maybe— no.
This is a really, really big prank. But it’s stupid. “There is no way—”
“Wanna bet?”
Xemnas looked down, searching past a now-quiet blond haired girl, a brown haired, a silver haired child (Zexion?), and finally saw a finally saw a pale blonde child. He might as well be looking down on a miniature Luxord. The small child looked just like Number Ten, except with no earrings. He was even holding a deck of cards patterned with the Organization’s symbol.
“I expect it was a simple backfiring of the exploding device—”
He knew that voice...
A child-form of Vexen intruded. Xemnas had seen this sight only once before, as a child himself as an apprentice under Ansem the Wise. Back then, his name had been Xehanort (he had not been able to pronounce it with his six-year-old tongue) and this boy before him had been called Even.
Vexen planted himself in front of Xemnas with little-kid certainty. He craned his neck in order to effectively look up at the Superior. “Look, Xem,” he began severely, though the effect was rather ruined by the fact his voice was ten times higher than normal, “I’m not exactly sure how it happened, but it appears as if that device I was trying to recreate for us— of course, the time one— exploded because of an overload of complicated energies battling each other. When it did, those energies were forced to scatter on its immediate surroundings: in other words, everyone who was in the chamber at the time. The time-energies, which I had set to ‘younger’ earlier, went wild during the night... and transformed everyone in the Castle back to their younger selves. You were spared its effects, since you weren’t present at the time.
“Why did you call me Xem?” Xemnas asked in fury, looking down on the boy. The boy (Vexen?) looked at Xemnas with cold fury, a look that Vexen had given him so many times before when he said or did something silly.
“I can reverse its effects, but that would take some time and its ingredients are rather hard to find... you’d need to find those for m—”
“You mean,” Xemnas interrupted, “That I am the leader of a organization of small children?” Vexen nodded.
“Hey, Xemmy.” Looking down again, Xemnas saw a small spiky red head. Green eyes outlined by eyeliner? Hair that cost Xemnas one thousand munny in hair gel every day to keep spiked? Xemnas was looking down on a small child form of Axel. “Do you want to see something totally coolio-?”
“Look! Xemmy!” Xemnas, turning around to see a small Xaldin with shoulder-length braided hair, saw what the black haired child was holding. A long, lethal, and dangerous lance.
“Hey! Look, Xemmy! I can jump high with this!” Xaldin shouted. He ran toward the group of children and Xemnas, lance point about to be stabbed into the ground.
“No! Don’t Xaldin! Not indoors!” It was too late. The small child stabbed the spear into the ground and sent himself flying. Xemnas watched, half amused and half worried for the small child. His yellow eyes tracked Xaldin. Up, up, SMACK! The small Xaldin had rammed into the ceiling.
“Xemmy?”
“WHY IS EVERYONE CALLING ME XEMMY!?” Xemnas shouted, grabbing his hair and pulling in frustration as a small little Saïx came out. His hair was even blue-er than usual and he lacked his X-shaped scar.
Xigbar stuck his head out of his room as Saïx walked down the steadily filling corridor. Like Saïx, when changed back to his youth he had lost his scars. Now, two yellow eyes stared out in wonder at Xemnas. No ugly scar on the side of his face, and he had pure black hair. Two ear phones were plugged into his ears, and his iPod had been booted up to FULL VOLUME.
“HEY EVERYONE!” he shouted. Xemnas winced at Xigbar’s loud child voice. “THIS MUSIC IS SOOO COOL!” Listening to the loud booming music, Xemnas managed to find out that the music was The 13th Dilemma by Yoko Shimomura.
The 13th Dilemma indeed.
“Saïx,” Xemnas said distractedly, “Can you get everyone under control?” For a moment he forgot that Saïx was a small seven year old toddler. The small blue haired child looked up at Xemnas and asked, “You expect me to quiet all these people?”
“Never mind,” Xemnas snapped and shouted, “Everyone! SILENCE!” Instantly, every Nobody in the corridor quieted.
For a few seconds everything was silent, then, in a few more seconds, there was the sound of someone crying.
“There goes Demyx again,” Axel said unsympathetically.
“Demyx?” Xemnas asked, and paled. Demyx, being the controller of water, often produced too much water himself— even as an adult. And if the young child was crying... then they would be swamped.
Hurrying to the door, he wrenched it open and saw a small boy. His hair had been cut in an odd pie crust shape and he was throwing a tantrum.
“Why is everyone being so loud!?” Number Nine screamed, hitting the bed he lay on and crying. Already, the floor was covered with a solid inch of water.
Xemnas felt as if he was swiftly losing his tan by going white so much. “Number Nine! Stop at ONCE, you’re wetting the bed!” Behind him, he heard several of the Organization... um... kids, saying, “Eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeewwwwwwwwwwwww!”
Demyx sniffed, cutting off his tears before saying, “Okay.... Xemmy.”
“WHY IS EVERYONE CALLING ME XEMMY!?” Xemnas shouted.
***

The next day, Xemnas walked into the InterWorld Newspaper Office of Twilight Town as what he thought was a carefully disguised gentleman. The man at the counter called him Setzer— whatever that meant— and let him post his ad in the next edition for a mere 10,000 munny.

BABYSITTER NEEDED

ELEVEN CHILDREN
LARGE, GIGANTIC CASTLE
PREFERABLY FEMALE
NOBODY, IF POSSIBLE
PAY WEEKLY

ANYONE!
(I’m desperate!)

***

“Hey, Sora. Oh, Sora, weren’t you listening?”
The brown haired keyblade wielder looked up from fencing with Riku, and his mistake cost him a heavy blow on the side of his head. Rubbing the bruise that Riku had given him he asked, “Can you repeat that, Kairi?”
“This is the third time, silly. Remember? I just finished explaining why I applied for the job—”
“You APPLIED FOR A JOB?” gasped Sora, scandalized and confused. “Why? Where?”
“You mean you weren’t listening at all? Sora... anyway, it’s at this big castle far away, and you needn’t look so worried, it’s just baby-sitting—”
“But why?” interrupted Riku innocently.
Kairi threw a paopu fruit at him and missed by a yard. “Because—”
Sora frowned. “—you want to get paid?”
Kairi looked up, smiled, and started scuffing her foot into the sand. “Well, since you bought all of that sea-salt ice cream last week I figured we are low on munny. Since when did you like sea-salt ice cream anyway?”
Sora looked confused. “Err.. I dunno. It is just a little inner part of me that longs for it.” Riku emitted a strangled sound of laughter behind Sora’s back.
“So I applied for a job!” Kairi said brightly. She smiled again and asked, “Can you help me, Sora?”
Sora pulled a face. Baby-sitting? That was for girls. Not for the powerful keyblade master, who just happened to also be the Hero of Worlds.
“Are you getting a big head again, Sora?” Riku asked jokingly. Sora glared at Riku.
Sora looked back at Kairi. “Well, where exactly is this ‘big castle’? And what’s the situation that they need a baby-sitter?”
Kairi stuck out her lower lip at him. “It’s not for you to pry into other people’s affairs, O Wondrous Keyblade Master.” But she pulled a roll of paper out from behind her back. “But it’s all on this paper right here—”
“Hey, what’re you waving around? Lemme see!” Riku’s hand darted forward as he grabbed it. “Eleven children? You can scarcely handle us two, how’re you going to— large, gigantic castle— err— preferably female— heh— Nobody? What in the worlds?— Well, technically part of you is Nobody... Namine... how’d that work out— pay weekly— he or she’d better— ANYONE! I’m desperate? Gee, this guy or girl sounds like he took one too many clunks to the head—”
Kairi pulled it back from him with a reproving tut. “As for the eleven kids part, that’s why I’m calling upon you two for help.”
“WHAT?!” shouted both boys at once. “Why us?” Riku folded his arms defiantly as Sora started into a series of, “Nowaynowaynowaynowaynowaynoway—”
Kairi looked up at Sora piteously. “Please, Sora, for me?”
“—nowaynoway— wait a minute, I’m in.”
***
“Sora, I think we are going in circles,” Kairi said as she looked over Sora’s shoulder. The gummi ship that Sora had been driving was doing continuous circles around a warp point.
“Excuse me, but I believe that I’m the experienced guy at gummi ships here...”
“Are you even reading the map right?” Riku accused, looking over Sora’s other shoulder as he tried grabbing the map out of Sora’s hands, “Or maybe you are trying to drive with your feet?”
Sora glared at Riku and said, “I’m using my hands, you idiot.”
“But you’re holding the map upside down.”
Sora blushed furiously, then burst out, “If you can call this child’s drawing a map!”
It was true. The map had been badly done in blue, green, orange, purple, red, and yellow crayon by what looked like a troop of seven year-olds. Another shaky hand had drawn a wobbly line starting from a green-blue world (apparently Destiny Islands) that connected to a silvery-blue circle that was supposed to represent their destination. In the corner, in child’s writing, said: “MAP IS NOT DRAWN TO SCALE.”
Kairi glanced at both boys before saying, “Look, why don’t we try using this gummi block that came in the envelope?”
“The person sent along a gummi block?” Sora asked, “Wow, they must know a lot about gummi ships. Great!” Snatching the small little black and white gummi block, he somehow jammed it into the gummi ship engine and let the controller out of his hands. As if on autopilot, the ship controlled itself as it maneuvered through several warp points and flew past worlds.
“I don’t feel safe on a ship that controls itself,” Kairi peeped nervously as she watched the controller spin around and do a sudden jerk to the left.
“Relax, Kairi,” Sora said cockily, “If anything happens, then I will protect you. Like I promised... ARGH!” The three people grabbed on to something as the ship suddenly dive- bombed towards a warp point. As soon as it entered it, everything was plunged into the utter darkness of midnight.
“It’s dark down here,” Riku couldn’t help but comment. He stood up, almost banging his head on the ceiling of the gummi ship. “OW! Stupid hair in my eyes!”
“Where are we?” Kairi asked. Riku bent down and helped her up. “Sora?”
“Mmph. Yeah?” came the answer from under the control panel. Sora stood up and started walking around the area, feeling the controls and other things. “I don’t believe it. The ship crashed itself. Oh, I found the door.”
There was the sound of something moving and suddenly, moonlight came out of the door way. Skirting some fallen equipment, Kairi emerged into the moonlight on. Looking down, she saw that she stood on a tall silver tower, underneath a heart-shaped moon.
Sora stared at the moon, muttering, “I don’t believe it. No, it can’t be. Nonononononononononononononono...”
“Hey! Look! It’s SSSSOOOOOOORRRRRAAA!” The three jerked around to see a small mob of children running toward them. All of them wearing trench coats.
“Oh-no.” At the front of the mob was a small mullet haired boy. Sora recognized him as the Organization XIII member, Demyx. But this Demyx was so much smaller, and even more immature then the older Demyx was. Seconds later, Sora had been knocked over by a mob of over-enthusiastic children ranging from ages five to seven.
Behind Demyx was a redhead, Axel. Of course Sora couldn’t forget him— especially the half of him that had been hit by chakrams repeatedly in Twilight Town. The person who had saved his life with his famous kamikaze attack. How could he and Demyx come back after he had seen both of them destroyed and fade into darkness?
Trailing behind Axel were two people. One of them was a small girl with short blonde hair and two locks of hair that dared to defy gravity and float above her head. Next to the girl was a small boy. With brown/ pink hair, his hair was rather roughly cut compared to the girl’s slick hairdo. The two seemed best friends because they always seemed to be together. Having no idea who these people were, Sora instinctively reached for his keyblade. Had he missed an Organization XIII member?
Well, if I did, PREPARE TO DIE.
Behind the girl and boy was another boy. Slick black hair, Sora was surprised to see Xigbar running toward him, shouting in glee. He lacked a missing eye and scars, not to mention he was more energetic. If that was possible for that “old dude?”
Last came Luxord, shuffling cards and muttering about playing Go Fish and perhaps an extra game of Rummy. His hair was still pale blond and he still had the annoying accent. Sora wondered if Luxord would finally admit that Sora did indeed know the rules.
Swarmed by these small children, Sora stumbled back as suddenly Demyx leapt up and hugged his neck, while Axel grabbed his legs and hugged. The pink haired boy was hopping around him along with the blond girl, Xigbar was running around in circles and Luxord was still taking his time to walk.
Riku and Sora were frozen with horror. Kingdom Hearts had come back, and so had Organization XIII. Kairi was covering giggles with her hand. At last she managed to say, “They like you, Sora. But— they seem like Organization XIII.”
“Because we are.” Sora, Riku, and Kairi gasped as they looked up. The voice they heard was mature and painfully slow. Prizing small children off of him, Sora looked up to face his worst enemy, Xemnas. The Superior himself. The cold golden gaze took in Sora’s disheveled hair and clothes and the smoking gummi ship behind him.
Looking down, Sora saw all of the upper ranked nobodies ringed around Xemnas’s feet, not counting Xigbar. Xaldin, Vexen, Lexeaus, Zexion, and Saïx. All who looked very sour and angry— like sulking little kids.
“But why are you going away?” Saïx asked Xemnas, looking up at his leader in confusion. “Don’t you like us?”
With a sigh Xemnas explained, “Saïx, I have business to attend to. While I’m gone these nice...” He forced this word through his teeth, “...people will take care of you.”
Looking up, Xemnas saw most of the Organization trying to hug the person who had destroyed them. “I see everything here is under control. Farewell, I have a world to destroy. Kairi, expect your pay by the end of— oh— when I get back. Now, if you will excuse me?” With that he warped away.
Feeling someone tugging at his pants leg, Riku looked down. The person, or nobody, was Demyx.
“What do you need, kid?”
“Unknown silver-haired person whom I don’t know, I’m hungry,” keened the small boy. Several nobodies around him agreed heartily.
“Yeah, Xemmy wouldn’t let us eat until you came!”
“Err... and why is that?” asked Sora, poking his spiky-haired head into the conversation now that Demyx had devoted his attention to Riku.
“He said he wanted to make your job more diffi—”
A miniature Xaldin leapt on top of Zexion, trying to clamp his hand over the smaller boy’s mouth and almost knocking him off his feet with his weight and bulk. “Sssh, Xemmy told us not to tell—”
“Oh... er... ‘kay,” said Sora uncomfortably. “Well...”
“—what do you guys eat around here?” asked Kairi kindly, while giving both Sora and Riku foreboding looks.
The children looked at each other, obviously trying to nonverbally decide on what to say.
“Um...”
“Pasta!” squealed Larxene.
“Lasagna!”
“Pizza!”
“Soda...” drooled Demyx.
“Broccoli!”
“Fruit salad!”
“Cookies! But I can’t reach the—” began Luxord.
“PASTRIES!”
“Shut up, Xigbar—”
“Cake!”
“Ice cream!”
“—cookie jar!”
“Sea-salt ice cream!” cried Saïx. The other eleven, plus Kairi, Sora, and Riku, stared at him. “What?” the blue-haired Organization member asked in response to their puzzled stares. “Can I help it if I like it?”
“...so was that why I saw you in Twilight Town...?” asked Sora slowly.
Saïx jumped up and down, indignant. “NO! I was spying on you! DUH!” he shouted defiantly. His hair began to rise. He blinked, and then the flash of berserk— or was it childish tantrum?— was gone. “...and buying sea-salt ice cream,” he muttered grudgingly.
“Why don’t we all go inside?” suggested Kairi helplessly. “Sora— Riku— stay outside— please? I have to talk with you for a minute.”
The children filed inside slowly, talking (and in Axel and Saïx’s case, arguing rather physically) over what they should choose to have for their meal. Meanwhile, Kairi faced Sora and Riku directly, reprimand in her blue eyes.
“What?” demanded Sora. “What’ve I done wrong, Kairi?”
“Stop it!” Kairi cried. “Just don’t do it, the both of you!”
“What’d we do?”
“Don’t hurt the kids!”
Sora and Riku exchanged looks. Finally, it was Riku who said, “Look, Kairi— these are the people who kidnapped you, dragged you halfway across the worlds, beat the living— well— out of Sora during those terribly hard boss fights of KH2, and not to mention made my head hurt when I was arguing with Xemnas during the ending scenes!”
Kairi pulled at a lock of auburn hair in exasperation. “But that’s not the point. They’re kids now, Riku!”
“So what?” chorused Sora and Riku together.
“So... oh, I don’t know, but it’s just plain wrong! They’re kids, you can’t hurt small children no matter what they have done in the last few years.” Kairi glared at the two older boys with all the authority of a mother. “And that’s that. I want you both to behave yourselves, and to not be lazy bums and actually help me out.”
Riku looked unconvinced (he was shaking his silver head sympathetically at Kairi’s soft heart) but Sora, of course, rose to the challenge.
“Don’t worry, Kairi,” he said confidently. “Everything’s going to go right. You’re going to get your munny, and if anything goes weird, I’ll protect you!”

As it turned out, Sora, Riku, and Kairi successfully took care of the Organization kids, got their rich, rewarding pay at the end of the short visit after the brief time Xemnas spent “destroying one of the worlds,” went back to Destiny Islands, and lived happily ever after. NOT.

“I don’t think that you’re supposed to put foil in the microwave–”
“Don’t be stupid, Riku, I know what I’m doing. I’m listening to my Keyblade master instincts, so I know that nothing can go wrong. OMG, THE MICROWAVE’S ON FIRE, THERE—!”
“Sora, I really don’t know if casting Blizzaga on it is going to do any goo—”
“Kairi, who’s had the Keyblade longer, me or you?”
Larxene watched her three baby-sitters bicker (and, in Sora’s case, explode the Organization microwave) with a bored expression, though she was enjoying it deep inside. Even as a child she enjoyed watching other people squirm, and right now Sora was squirming so much that he looked like Demyx after Xemnas had reprimanded him on wetting the bed. LOL.
“Honestly, Kairi, it’s not his fault we don’t have much machinery on the Islands, I mean, remember how well he did on Ansem’s computer...?”
“Excuse me, Riku? I did fine—”
“Well, maybe he could’ve looked at the microwave manual— which happened to be right on top of the microwave—”
“Not anymore.”
Sora put his hands behind his head— an old habit— and tried to hide his embarrassment. Riku poked at the blackened remains of the microwave. And Kairi hurried to comfort the now-crying Demyx that she would instead break into the fish and coconuts Sora had brought along with him on the journey (“HEY! Those are my private stores! Wait a minute, Kairi, don’t touch that, that’s my Orichalum— ach, Orichalum+, that’s rare— don’t touch—!”) and they would all have a bit of soda as well. At this Demyx stopped crying, though Riku slipped in the water on the floor a couple minutes after. Demyx really needed to work on water control.
Six broken dishes and a drawn tomahawk later, the children ran off for “playtime,” and Sora, Kairi, and Riku were left to clean up what was left of the kitchen table.
Some minutes later, Sora found himself waking up in the kitchen cupboard. He yawned sleepily, leaned back— and was face-to-face with Kairi.
“AAH! Uh... Kairi... fancy seeing you here.”
“Sora, you lazy bum, I knew that I’d find you snoozing in the kitchen cupboard.”
“No, seriously, Kairi, there was this HUGE black thing that swallowed me up, and then I was— ow!”
“Yeah, sure, as if I didn’t know you always try that big-black-thing-swallowed-me-up trick whenever I find you skipping out on work...”
“What are you two up to?” asked Riku, popping his head in. “Hey Kairi, I finished up. Now Larxene wants us to ‘play with her.’ You’d better get going before they all dogpile in here— as if Sora didn’t already take up a lot of space.”
“Right,” answered Kairi cheerfully, getting up off her knees. “Let’s go, Sora. And if you continue sleeping so much I recommend you join the little Organization for their afternoon nap.”
By the time Sora got to the “Evil Playroom,” Riku was discussing weapon-polishing tactics with Saïx and Kairi was talking with Larxene. He automatically veered towards Kairi.
“So, what do you do for entertainment, Larxene?” inquired Kairi.
Larxene smiled, ran off, and then returned with an armful of colorful, homemade dolls. She dumped them in a little heap at Kairi’s feet. She looked up, and grinned, holding up a doll clothed in pink with a brown braid.
“Wait a minute...” began Sora. “Isn’t that...?” It was true. Sprawled at Kairi’s feet were little replicas of all their acquaintances: Aerith, Cloud, Leon, Tifa, Sora, Riku, Sephiroth, Kairi, Yuffie, Cid, Roxas, Namine, and for some weird reason, Vexen. All looked rather the worse for wear; Vexen’s doll-equivalent had undergone so much “playing” that cotton was spilling from his eye sockets and his chest.
“How cute!” gushed Kairi. “They’re all exact, too... they’re so beautiful! So do you play with them?”
“I like to play with this one the most,” Larxene informed her, waving around the Aerith doll.
“What do you do with them? Play house?”
“No.” Larxene’s expression turned impish. “I maim them.” So saying, she took one of her kunais and stabbed it through Aerith.
Far away, in a parallel universe— yet another long, lethally sharp object stabbed through the real Aerith. (Author’s Note: I will bestow an imaginary cookie upon the person who guesses what that last sentence just meant, and what Larxene’s dolls really are.)
Sora and Kairi thought they were going to be sick.
Riku had taken the time to walk over. “What are you guys doing over her— UH.” Xaldin, using one of his lances to pole-vault, had just crashed into Riku’s head, rendering him mercifully unable to view what Larxene had just done to her “favorite” doll.
After an uncomfortable, horrified silence, Kairi recovered her senses and said, “Kids! Naptime! Yeah, that means you too, Sora.”
Laughing off his protests, Kairi shooed the kids back to their rooms while the three went to their own to recover (after, of course, Riku had agreed to read ‘The Three Little Pigletts’ to the children.)

Sora was hungry. Yes, very hungry. Did Kairi really expect his growing-boy stomach to be satisfied with an anchovy and half a coconut? He thought not. Hmm. Perhaps Saïx had a store of sea-salt ice cream in the fridge. Sora wouldn’t have put it past him.
But he couldn’t remember the way back to the fridge... darn the Castle’s eternally silver walls and identical-looking white hallways. But what was this? It was as if a long-forgotten memory was now brought back to life...
Roxas knows the way! I know the way!
The Roxas inside Sora made him sit up and walk to the door. Roxas opened the door.
Walk down three white hallways. Take a left. Turn right. Down five sets of stairways. Left. Left. Bear right. Make a U-turn. You are now at your destination.
Roxas blinked out, leaving Sora in front of the freezer containing Saïx’s hallowed store of sea-salt ice cream. Drooling ever so slightly, Sora slowly opened the door and reached out.
“What’re you doing?”
Sora jerked back and slammed the door. Behind it was Xigbar. He bore one of his guns with both hands and was staring with childish suspicion in both eyes.
“Nothing. Nothing that involves stealing from Saïx’s forbidden store of delicious sea-salt ice cream. Put that gun down,” said Sora crossly. “Don’t you have a nap to get to?”
“I’m not tired.”
“Yes you are.”
“No, I’m not.”
“Yes, you are.”
“NO, I’M NOT!” Xigbar fired a round of bullets at Sora, who simply deflected them with his Oathkeeper. Number Two looked down at his gun as it clicked uselessly. “Arrgh, reload.”
Sora was now rather annoyed. “Look, Xigbar, back to your bed if you don’t want a mouthful of Keyblade.”
Xigbar’s lower lip quivered.
Seconds later, Saïx was on the scene, along with a Zexion that had been roused from his bed when the adjacent door slammed and a furious tattletale of a Xigbar had pounded on that adjacent door. Sora had fled.
Sora was hiding under his bedsheets when furious knocking sounded on his door. Thank goodness nothing but a gigantic, spiked, and sharp object can break it down, he thought with relief.
Wait a minute...
“Sora!” came Saïx’s voice from the outside. “Open the door and let me in!”
“Not by the spiky hair on my heady head head!” came Sora’s muffled reply from under the blankets.
“Then I’ll HUFF, AND I’LL PUFF, AND I’LL BLOW YOUR DOOR DOWN!”
“That’s Xaldin’s skill, you idiot.”
“Shut up, Xigbar. Pfft.” There was a sound like a child unsuccessfully trying to blow out a candle. “Pfft, pfffft, pfffffffffffffft. *pant, pant, pant* Pfffffffffffffffffffffffft.”
“Done yet? Can I pick the lock now?” came Zexion’s bored voice.
More panting, and then: “Yeah, sure.”
Sora took the time to go through the door that connected his room to Riku’s.
“RIKU! HIDE ME!” he gasped, throwing himself under Riku’s bed.
Riku frowned at Sora, then went to lock all the doors but the one that led to Kairi’s chamber. “What have you done this time Sor—”
“KEYBLADE MASTERS!”
“I tried to steal from Saïx’s sea-salt ice cream supply.”
“You what?!”
“—open the door and let me in!”
“Not by these stupid silver bangs that for some reason Tetsuya Nomura never saw the sense to trim!” Riku replied. “C’mon, Sora, we gotta get you out of here—”
“THEN ZEXION WILL PICK, AND HE’LL PICK, AND HE’LL PICK AT YOUR DOORKNOB UNTIL IT—”
“Not even your Glide ability is going to help you land safely if you climb out of the window, Sora,” Riku informed him as Sora made to open it. “But we’ve got one more refuge.”
“Kairi will not be happy,” said Sora hopelessly. He glanced out of the window. “But you’re right about the Glide, at least.”
CRASH. The door came down, taken off its hinges by a round of Xigbar’s bullets. Framed by a cloud of smoke, Saïx, Zexion wielding one of Xemnas’s hairclips, and Xigbar marched into Riku’s now-empty room.
Kairi screamed when Sora and Riku bounded desperately into her room followed by the sounds of shouting children.
Yes, one more time.
“KEYBLADE WIELDERS! OPEN THE DOOR AND LET ME IN!”
“Sora, I have a feeling about what you just did, and I tell you, I really really hope it’s not true—”
“If it has anything to do with a fridge, sea-salt ice cream, Saïx, and me, you’ve got it right,” he replied, gasping for air. “Get that pathetically girly Keyblade of yours out, Kairi.”
“Excuse me, but it’s not pathetically girly no matter what you say— I mean, it’s Riku’s fault after all...”
“Hey, I was looking for something feminine—”
“Just because I’m a girl you don’t have to pick up the first flower-patterned thing you can find—! Oathkeeper would’ve been nice—”
“Well, if you haven’t noticed, you haven’t got an oath to keep—”
“If you don’t, Xigbar will shoot, and he’ll shoot, and he’ll shoot your door down!”
“Boy, they’re really obsessed with that Three Little Pigletts story you read them, Riku. They must like it a lot,” commented Sora.
Riku was nervously placing things in front of the door in case Xigbar did shoot the door down.
There was the sound of useless clicking and Xigbar’s childish voice. “Argh, reload!” A loud sigh.
“I think we’re safe,” announced Riku at last, wiping his brow and poking his eye yet again with a stray hair.
Kairi appeared to be thinking hard. “At least that door seems solid.”
Sora nodded vigorously. “Yeah. Only a gigantic, spiked, and very sharp object would be able to smash through it.”
Outside, the Organization seemed to be thinking along the same lines.
“Lock won’t be picked. I think those Keyblade masters sealed the keyhole already.”
“No more bullets.”
“Heh, who needs a keyhole? Help me pick this up— I never knew it was so heavy— okay, guys, on three— one, two, three— go!”
A huge claymore cracked through Kairi’s door and narrowly missed Sora, who had happened to be hiding in what would’ve been behind the door had it opened the regular way.

It took some time to pull Saïx out of berserk and send them off to their rooms. Kairi turned angrily on Sora after shooing the children out of her trashed room.
“What did I tell you?!” she demanded when they were out of earshot.
Riku stepped out of the scene. “I’m not here,” he said emphatically.
Sora hung his head. “I’m sorry, Kairi... I’m not sure what came over me, it was the need for sea-salt ice cre—”
“Having Namine inside me doesn’t cause me so much trouble, you and Roxas just have problems controlling yourselves—”
“Well, I noticed you did a regular Van Gogh on the walls of the Secret Place, that was something cool—”
Kairi sighed gustily, shaking her head. “Sora, please. Remember what you promised.” As Sora and Riku made to go back to their rooms, she also added, “And keep your Oathkeeper around for the rest of the visit. Just to remember.”
Inside his room, Sora pulled out both Oathkeeper and Oblivion. It was a good thing Roxas knew how to dual-wield.

“And then... and then.... I found Sora trying to steal Saïx’s sea-salt ice cream,” Xigbar said to all of the Organization members gathered around him. He paused to take a lick from a popsicle of sea-salt ice cream. “Then, I said ’As IF’, and shot him.”
“In which you failed.”
Organization XIII had pulled together a secret meeting in Lexeaus’s room during the remainder of their naptime. Lexeaus’s door had no keyhole to be opened, instead having a heavy metal latch on the inside of the door. Normally it wouldn’t hinder any of the Organization members, due to the fact that they could easily teleport, but the three new babysitters wouldn’t be able to get in because their keyblades only opened locks and not latches.
Zexion curled up sleepily on the ground as Xigbar continued the story, along with Saïx’s help. He had missed much of his naptime and was []tired. That is what you get for following around Saïx and Xigbar when you are suppose to be asleep,[/i] Zexion thought as he closed his eyes. He smiled slightly as he heard Saïx telling about his amazing lock picking skills. He had found the hairclip in Xemnas’s room. While he was snooping around Xemnas’s room he had also found a sewing box and what looked like a bottle of hair spray. Still tired, Zexion wandered out of Lexeaus’s room, down the corridor, into his own room, curled up on the bed, and went to sleep.

Riku was snooping around. Having repaired the hinges on his door, Riku was also very bored. What else could he do? Sora was trying to find a new lock, and Kairi was doing her own girl stuff.
Walking past a corner, he stopped when he saw one of the Organization children walking out of a room. Tracking the boy, Riku saw it was Zexion, the use-to-be grown man that had made his head hurt while arguing about darkness and had called him a hypocrite. But the boy was not so dangerous now. In fact, Zexion seemed more intent on going to sleep then causing trouble.
Watching the child enter his own room, Riku leaned on the door of the room he had exited. There was the sound of soft whispering inside. Leaning closer to listen, Riku heard Saïx’s excited voice as he explained the adventure he had with Xigbar and Zexion. Child stuff. But Riku hoped that they weren’t plotting against their new babysitters.
Creeping away, Riku climbed several stair cases. Despite the fact that Numbers Two through Thirteen dwelled on the lower floors, Riku couldn’t find Xemnas’s room. Not that he really wanted to. He had seen many of the other Organization member’s rooms. Xigbar’s room was pretty much a private shooting range, Xaldin’s room contained a large library, Vexen’s room had been revamped into a small laboratory, Lexeaus’s room had a built-in small gym, Zexion’s room was filled with different books on different subjects, Saïx’s room had an entire moon-gazing telescope, Axel’s room was always filled with smoke and scorch marks, Demyx’s room had been pasted with posters and painted blue, Luxord’s room had a small gambling table, Marluxia’s room was a greenhouse, and Larxene’s room remained unknown to him, for he had not dared to go into her room.
Finding a lonely door on the thirteenth floor, Riku hesitated before putting his hand on the doorknob and pushing. He entered a world of white and black.
It appeared that Xemnas was a worshipper of the violent contrast between light and darkness. Like the “dress” he had worn during his final struggle with Sora and Riku, his room was painted in whorls of white and black. He appeared to have been working on it for ages. An open sewing box was open on the white-and-black dressing table, bearing silver needles threaded with white and black thread. He appeared to have been patching up his white-and-black clothes, for a needle was neatly slid into the cloth of the dress on the chair, ready for his return.
Riku didn’t bother to hide a grin as he surveyed the rest of the desk. A box held hairspray, hairclips, a brush, a comb, and what could’ve been gallons of hair gel. Typical of an Organization member— the Orgies never seemed to not have totally gravity-defying hair. Xemnas was no exception, with his bangs that stuck up so. But who knew he had so many items to maintain that?
Riku moved the “dress” aside. Ooh, a notebook. It was thick and its yellowed pages spoke of great age. Xemnas’s diary? Or what? Heheheheheh... thought Riku.
But no, it was not Xemnas’s diary. The notebook turned out to be a nearly endless collection of reports: Xemnas’s reports, painstakingly detailing every bit of everything that was anything that had ever gone on in the Organization.
Well, I’ll be safe in here for a while. Thank Kingdom Hearts that Xemnas never encouraged anyone to come into his room, thought Riku. Now would be a good time to find out why exactly the Organization still existed despite the fact that the Keyblade wielders and one of their own had supposedly destroyed them. Riku flipped through the notebook until he found out what he was looking for.

Xemnas Report #198
Musing...

It appears that the Keyblade wielders are under the impression that one battle is enough to finish us off for good. Again, they are atrociously mistaken. We of the Organization did not manage to keep our human forms with our strong hearts for nothing. One or two battles is not enough to make us fade into darkness!
I saw it first with those that I had placed on our outpost of Castle Oblivion. One by one they were beaten— yes, I know what happens away from the Castle— but they were strong. After each battle they still managed to hold themselves together enough so that their bodies would be ejected from the darkness back into Twilight Town, the place where all Nobodies are dropped when the darkness finds their bodies unable to be taken. One by one I had my fellow subordinates go to collect them, to bring them back to the Castle to recover until they were strong enough again. And when the Keyblade master Sora went hunting down my Kingdom Hearts, I sent those subordinates out to try to stop him. I hoped that they would prove stronger than those at Castle Oblivion. As it turned out, I was wrong. But at least they too showed up again in Twilight Town, no matter how filthy Xigbar was when I found him at the bottom of a trash can. Axel showed up in a fireplace— a fitting place for him. The girl in the room at the time— I believe her name was Olette— was terrified when Saïx swooped in to collect him, I fear.
I’m not sure how exactly the darkness can tell how we are too strong to be dragged into it—

Xemnas Report #221
Preparation

Vexen has done it again. This time, he captured most of Luxord’s time powers inside a small machine he was working on duplicating for me. However, the power over time turned out to be too complicated for even machinery, for it imploded before it had a chance to work. However, the scattered time worked itself inside the Castle, transforming each of my subordinates into a child: the child of long ago. It is true. I see Braig, Dilan, Even, Eleaus, and Ienzo again.
If only I could go back to the true children of long ago, to warn them of the folly to come...
But enough of that. Vexen has written a list of the ingredients I need to transform them all back into the Organization I know—
What is that crying? I dearly hope that Number Nine has not wet his bed again.
Two babysitters applied. One was the girl Kairi, whom I dislike but not distrust. The other was one Sephiroth. I rejected him, lest I return to find all twelve subordinates with slit throats. But as Midgar— where Sephiroth is currently spending his time— is not connected to the InterWorld mail service as well as Destiny Islands, I fear he might not receive it. Or worse, ignore it entirely and come anyway.
I shall tell Kairi (and her friends, should they come) that I am off destroying worlds, not collecting ingredients like a common Moogle. They shan’t believe anything else, I’m afraid.
I hope that none of them decide to destroy the Organization while they are afflicted so. I also hope that none of them shall find this. I know! I shall hide it under my unfinished robe. Scarcely anyone ever enters my domain— I hope that these three are the same— and if they do, they always daren’t touch my clothing. Only an ignorant buffoon would do that, I’m sure. Oh, I hope...
I must stop writing. Demyx has begun singing to comfort himself.
From then on, the report went on to describe a series of extremely complicated, philosophical ideas that Riku found himself unable to make sense of. He closed the notebook and replaced the “dress.” He had found what he needed to know: why the Organization members still existed after being “terminated.”
He ran off to find Sora. It was time to permanently settle their curiosities over this issue (this is also our pathetically feeble explanation for how the entire Organization is alive even after the devastating events of KH2).

Sora woke up from his nap when he felt someone shaking him. Opening his eyes, he saw Riku’s face right above his.
“Riku,” he mumbled, “Wuzgoin’on...?” Turning over, Sora dragged the white blankets over his head, only to have them yanked off again by Riku.
“Riku,” Sora mumbled again, waving his right arm around as if to shoo him away. “Leave me in peace.” There was the sound of cross muttering and Riku’s footsteps as he walked off.
He’s finally stopped, Sora thought, relieved, as he started going back to sleep. But then he heard the sound of running water.
Riku stumbled back into the room, carrying something that seemed awfully heavy in his hands. Lifting it up, Sora had the impression of something coming out of the bucket, and suddenly he was soaking wet.
“What the—!” Sora tumbled out of the wet sheets and onto the feet of a pleased looking Riku. His clothes were wet, and so were the blankets of the bed. Xemnas was soo going to kill him.
After much persuasion, arguing, and shouting, Sora finally agreed to sit down and listen to what Riku was trying to tell him.
“I sneaked into Xemnas’s room,” Riku explained.
Sora grinned and asked, “What did he have?”
“Everything black and white. A black and white dress, sewing kit, many hair products, and a notebook.”
“Ooh, a secret diary?” Sora inquired.
“No,” Riku said firmly, wanting to squash the rumor of Xemnas having a “secret diary” before it got out. “He had written many reports in it. Here, listen.”
After explaining to Sora about the report, and the “coming back to life thing”, Sora shrugged and said, “So?”
“What I’m saying,” Riku said, trying to keep Sora’s mind to the topic before it wandered off, “is that perhaps we need to be more careful with these Organization members. They’re still alive, after all, and they’ve still got all their weapons, and they’ve got a measure of what we can do, and they remember what we did to them... so Sora, take care not to steal any sea-salt ice cream, will you?”
***

Kairi knew something was going on. Sora and Riku must’ve found something out that she didn’t know: it was obvious in the way they suddenly became quite quiet and took care not to make fun of the children too much. Instead, they helped with the chores with what Kairi viewed as absentminded speed.
But matters at hand distracted her from the subject. A loud bawling could be heard from Number Five’s room.
“Riku! Help me!” she cried, leaving Larxene in the middle of her breakfast things and running towards the source of the sound.
Lexaeus hadn’t meant to do it. He had thought he was as strong as he was when he had been an adult, and so had shinnied up one of the poles supporting one of the thick metal bars that he would do chin-ups on as a tall person. He had then hung on— eight feet in the air— and attempted to do a couple chin-ups. That had worked all right— he had always been a physically strong lad, if not particularly social— but then he had found himself unable to drop without breaking himself to pieces.
I want my height back, he had found himself sobbing. “I want my legs back, I want it all back! Stupid Vexen! Stupid him and his contraption! And now I can’t get down...” He trailed off into loud crying.
And then Kairi was there, along with that accursed Riku. But at least the silver-haired idiot had long legs.
And, to his embarrassment, he had found himself thanking them.
`“ThankyousomuchyouareallsogreatIcan’tbelieveIendedupthereitwassohighohthankyouoh
thankyouohthankyou!”
“You’re welcome,” said Riku stiffly.
“Silent Hero, indeed,” giggled Kairi.
Lexaeus wanted to spit on himself. Or at least barf.
Still giggling, Kairi led Lexaeus to the kitchen and managed to stop Saïx from almost cutting off Sora’s hand (Saïx had decided to come and collect what was due after Sora had nearly stolen his ice cream). Axel had decided to try cooking and the smoke detector had gone off. Demyx, in an attempt to quench the flames that had blown up from the stove, had butted in with his, “Dance, water, dance!” and had swept everything off the tabletop— including Marluxia’s flowerpot and Larxene’s breakfast. Marluxia had taken out his scythe, but then Larxene had sent out an electric bolt that had traveled through the water on the floor and shocked everyone but her into a dead faint. Which meant that Xigbar, Xaldin, Vexen (who had been reviewing a now-soaked list of the required ingredients for the age antidote), Zexion, Axel, Demyx, Luxord, and Marluxia were all lying on the floor, the backs of their trench coats soaked through.
“Sora!” Kairi called as she lifted up Marluxia and carried him elsewhere, “Come and help!”

But Sora was far away from the kitchen. He was running after Saïx. Somehow, Saïx had managed to sneak the container of sea-salt ice cream out of the fridge and was running away with it, clearly intent on eating the whole entire thing for breakfast. It was surprising how such a small child could carry something three times bigger then him.
“You can’t eat the whole entire thing for breakfast by yourself!” Sora called as he ran after the small child, really tracking him more by the tub of ice cream then the child himself, “You have to share some with me!” Saïx said nothing and quickly started running up a flight of stairs.
Following the blue haired Nobody, Sora found himself lost, again. Great, he thought grumpily, Kairi is calling you, Roxas is being quiet, and you are lost. Perhaps my Keyblade- master-instincts will help me. Closing his eyes, Sora thought of a tub of ice cream, willing his senses to find some information where it went. He did not notice Saïx stick his head over the rail of the stairs, smirk evilly, and drop the now empty sea-salt ice cream tub.
My keyblade-master-instincts say, Sora thought, that it is right above me! Looking up, the last thing Sora saw was a flash of blue hair before the heavy tub clunked down on his head.
***

“Ooooh! Boys!” Kairi said as she started scrubbing the food that had been thrown on the floor. After moving the children and draining the water, Kairi had asked Riku for help, but found that he had run off.
I shouldn’t have brought Sora and Riku, Kairi thought as she scrubbed at the floor, All they are doing is getting in the way. Jerking up when she heard a loud and very solid CLUNK!, Kairi dropped the rag and ran to find out what was going on. Had another one of the children gotten hurt?
Turning several corners and walking through many rooms, Kairi found Saïx kneeling beside Sora and poking him cautiously with the butt end of his claymore. Looking at Sora himself, Kairi saw that a very heavy ice-cream tub was near his head. Sora also had acquired a sizable lump under his largest spike of hair.
“What happened to Sora?” Kairi asked Saïx, coming down to kneel beside Sora. She removed the heavy tub to get a look at Sora. Nothing was wrong with him, but it looked like something had hit him.
Saïx looked up, grinned wickedly, and scampered off. Kairi had learned that this scampering meant that the person had done something they should have not.
Shaking her head in worry, Kairi tried pulling Sora up, but to no avail.
“RIKU!” Kairi screamed, but Riku didn’t come. Suddenly hearing the sound of gunfire, Kairi abandoned Sora to go and find who Xigbar was shooting.

Riku huddled at the back of the private shooting range Xigbar had in his room. He was cursing himself. Kairi! Help me!, Riku thought as Xigbar approached the edge of the shooting range. Expecting only one gun, Riku was surprised to see that Xigbar had placed his two guns together to create a sniper rifle, with several really big clips.
More clips, more bullets.
Deflecting the many bullets that were fired at him, Riku watched as Xigbar kept on sliding in more ammunition into his sniper rifle. And Riku saw, with a stab of horror, as Xigbar suddenly tossed his rifle at him!
Suddenly Kairi came in. With a flash of purple, Xigbar’s sniper gun disappeared and reappeared in Riku’s hand. Looking at the gun that was suddenly in his hand, Riku looked up hopelessly as Xigbar told a total sobstory to the dismayed-looking Kairi: “Riku came after me with his keyblade... So I ran and then he grabbed my gun and started shooting me.” Pah! Couldn’t Kairi see the bullets in the wall where Xigbar had almost shot him? Patterned in a clear profile of Riku, where he had deflected all the bullets using his Way to Dawn? But could Kairi really blame him if he was just walking around with his Keyblade? After all, Riku had more than enough evidence to conclude that the Nobodies were to be treated with caution...
Looking at Riku, Kairi gently brought Xigbar out of the room and told him to go and play. Turning back, Kairi closed the door and locked it. Walking over to Riku, she took the gun and placed it on the table.
“What happened?” she asked Riku. Riku was relieved at her relaxed and nice tone.
“Well,” Riku said, “I was walking around with my keyblade.... and I walked up behind Xigbar... and.. um.. he... uh... started to panic... and.... well... started to shoot me.”
Kairi sighed. “That’s not what I’m worried about, Riku. Sora started running around and... I think Saïx did something to him. A big tub came crashing down and hit him on the head. He’s knocked out for now. I need you to help me take him to his room to come around— why weren’t you there when I needed you?”
“I told you! Xigbar— uh— was detaining me. Sorry, Kairi.”
Suddenly Kairi seemed to see something else. “And why were you walking around with your Way to Dawn out?”
“You can never be too careful...”
“They’re just kids, Riku!”
“So? They were once very murderous nobodies. And they still are.”
“No they’re not!”
“Then what did Saïx do to Sora?”
“Um...” Kairi said, frowning, “I got to go. I have to help Sora.” Kairi unlocked the door and walked away.

Sora woke up to here soft scuffling. Blinking, he lifted his head to look around. Everything was somewhat dark, probably afternoon had passed and now it was evening. Had he been knocked out that long?
He heard faint crying. It sounded like Demyx... but... his Sora-instincts told him that it sounded rather artificial. And then there was Kairi and Riku, trying to comfort the child.
Scuffle. Scuffle. Scuffle scuffle scuffle.
“Five Orichalum+...” *clink* “...three Orichalum...” *clink* *clink* *clink* “...ten Power Crystals....” There was a brown haired kid tiptoeing around his room. Sora didn’t know him at first sight, but a Roxas memory stirred inside him, of a dotty old man hunched over in his throne, thinking hard. Vexen.
Vexen was carrying around a large bag, making him look like Santa Claus or something. Except he wasn’t bringing stuff, he was stealing stuff. From Sora’s private stores!
“Those are mine!” Sora shouted, leaping up.
Vexen looked up at Sora with an imperfect mimicry of innocence. “I’m-I’m sorry Sora.” Knowing how most of the Organization members behaved by now, Sora towered over Vexen. Larxene had tried the same trick on him: be cute and then make him give you what you wanted. He was not going to pretend to be nice to the Organization member without Kairi around.
Suddenly, Vexen dived between Sora’s legs and ran out the door, slamming it behind him. Sora shouted and ran outside.
Vexen led him on, running just ahead of him but never letting Sora catch him. Three hallways. Left— right!. Down five sets of stairways. Left! Left! Right, right.... but someone’s foot made him trip and slip down the somehow wet hallway until he slipped into the kitchen. Conveniently, there was Xaldin standing there, holding several Ginsus. Saïx stood behind him, struggling bravely to hold up the handle of his claymore. Two more trench-coated figures backed these two, but their hoods were pulled up— Sora would have difficulty recounting their names to Kairi later.
Sora was in trouble.
Or so the kids thought.
After the four children— two of them unknown to Sora— had attempted to “beat him up” to his content (meaning he pwned them all), they “decided to quit” (gave up) and threw him into a dark portal.
He sank through inky darkness... couldn’t breathe... where was he...? Ah yes, he knew where he was now. In the Castle attic.
How thoughtful of them to have left him in a door with no keyhole, only a great big bar keeping the door shut. From the outside.
Great.

Kairi was very aware that she had been trying to comfort Demyx for the past half hour. She had taken pretty stones from her side-pouch in an attempt to distract him, but he had continued to cry for no apparent reason into the eighteen tissues Riku had fetched for him (and covered the floor in two inches of his tears). But after a while, she simply grew way too exasperated and left him to cry. There were other children to attend to. Riku was no less relieved when the crying stopped abruptly once they closed Number Nine’s door.
“We should go check on Sora,” Kairi told him. “I left him in his room. But let’s go to the kitchen first; if Sora has woken up by now, that’s probably where he’ll be.”
They started towards the kitchen, but then a high sound of crying sounded to their right.
“Go check on that, will you?” requested Kairi as she jogged towards the kitchen.
Riku tried to hide his disappointment and exasperation as he found Larxene hunched up near the second door to the kitchen (which happened to be closed and locked securely, but he didn’t notice that). The girl had her hands over her face so that he couldn’t see her eyes.
...there wasn’t a trace of a tear...
“What’s wrong?” asked Riku with a sigh imbedded in his voice.
“... I-I-I... I lost... lost all my dooooooollllllllllls!” wailed Larxene. “All of them, down to my favorite pink one—”
“Where’d you leave them?”
“...I-I don’t know.... I-I-”
“Do you remember anywhere?”
“If I did remember then I wouldn’t have lost them, would I?!” Larxene shouted.
“Well,” Riku said, grabbing Larxene’s hand and steering her toward the kitchen. “Let’s check in the kitchen first. Your dolls might be in there.”
He ignored Larxene’s protesting cries as he placed his hand on the door knob.
“Riku,” Larxene said, yanking Riku’s free hand away, as if to lead him elsewhere, “I don’t remember hidin— losing any of my dolls in the kitchen.”
“Let’s check in there, just in case,” Riku said as he turned the doorknob. “Sora might be in there, and so might be your dolls.
Larxene’s eyebrows shot down and suddenly she screamed, “Riku! I have to go bathroom!”
“What?” Riku asked. His hand immediately left the door knob and he turned away. He did not hear the “Ow! That hurt!” that came from within the kitchen, as if shouted by a small child. Nor did he hear the “Ha! Yeah! Hwah! Take this, you miniature nuisances!”
“Well, then go!”
“I need to get to a bathroom!” Larxene wailed.
“Teleport there, that’s what the dark corridors are for,” Riku said, terror and alarm in his voice.
“But I need to remember where the bathroom is, and I don’t!”
Sighing with exasperation, Riku said, “You’ve lived in this castle far longer than I have! How can you forget where the bathroom is?!” But he grabbed Larxene’s hand and rushed her off to the nearest bathroom he could remember.

Kairi didn’t know where Riku was. Perhaps the crying child had taken longer to comfort then she thought. She was just going to go into the kitchen when suddenly, Marluxia let himself out of a doorway.
“Kairi,” he said, walking up to her, “Can you come with me to watch my flowers? We can watch them soak in the sunlight.”
“What sunlight?” asked Kairi, confused. “There’s only moonlight— how do you grow your flowers in a barren place like this?”
“I use an electric light, you silly child,” snapped Marluxia. But then, he asked, “But will you come?”
“I’m sorry, Marluxia,” Kairi sighed, “But I have to find Sora. Can you go and watch your flowers with someone else?”
“But I want to watch them with you!” Marluxia cried. He grabbed Kairi’s hand roughly and, with surprising strength for a child, dragged her away from the kitchen door.
Being dragged away from the kitchen by a small child was rather unnerving for Kairi, but she gave up looking for Sora as Marluxia practically dragged her throughout the entire castle. But something told Kairi that there was something wrong.
Breaking away from Marluxia as he just ran outside, Kairi heard something thud somewhere above her. Had Saïx dropped something else on someone?
Finding the stairs to the attic, Kairi walked up... and up... and up... and up.
Soon, she arrived on the topmost landing that contained the entrance to the attic. Her sharp eyes took in the remaining wisps of darkness that were often left behind after the immediate closing of a corridor of darkness. There had been Organization activity around here, and quite recently.
Perhaps the barred door, which had never been barred before, had something to do with it. It was too heavy for her to lift— she wondered if someone like Lexaeus had put it there, it was so heavy. However, it was easy to remove: one Firaga on it transformed the wooden bar into a pile of ashes. Feeling tired after the heavy use of her magic, Kairi opened the door.
“Sora!”
“Kairi! At last!” shouted Sora, leaping up. He had been lying on his back on top of a cloth-covered box of suspiciously sharp, long objects that looked a bit like the knives that topped Xaldin’s lances.
“Sora, were you up here on purpose trying to skip out on work again?”
“No, Kairi, seriously— the Organization members ambushed me, right, and then this big— black— thing swallowed me up. I couldn’t breathe, I couldn’t... I think it was a corridor of darkness, really, everything was black— OW!”
“Sora, you’ve already tried the big-black-thing-swallowed-me-up thing today, and it didn’t work...”
“I’m serious,” Sora complained, placing his hands behind his head.
Both Sora and Kairi jumped when they heard a loud knock came from the front door and Riku’s voice as he yelled, “I’ll get it!”
“We best go down there and see who it is,” Kairi said. She grabbed Sora’s arm, as if to make sure he didn’t run off, and led him down the stairs.

Riku opened the front door, looking around to see who it was. The first thing that caught his eyes was very long silver hair, dark clothing, and one large black wing.
The stranger surveyed him out of cold green eyes, hand moving ever so carefully to rest on his almost six-foot odachii. The movement made his silver bangs swing— like the Organization, his hair was also gravity-defying— and made the two black wings jutting from his hips rustle. The man had a threatening, dark, cold, and a trifle insane sort of aura.
Sephiroth, villain of FFVII and the One-Winged Angel himself, stood at the Castle That Never Was’s front door.
But Riku didn’t know who he was, never having faced him himself (luckily). Instead, he took in the silver bangs and simply said, “Welcome back, Xemnas!”
“Xemnas? Xemnas is back?” Kairi asked as she walked out from a doorway, dragging Sora along behind her. “I thought he would be gone longer. Oh well.”
Sora, on the other hand, knew Sephiroth, for he had faced him twice. Not fooled by the gravity-defying hair, he knew instantly it was the insane man who had tried destroying Cloud, and failed. And whom he had almost destroyed.
“Hey, Sephi—” Sora began to say absentmindedly, about to escape from Kairi’s grasp. Then he noticed the wing. “OMG, IT’S SEPHIROTH! I’m off now—” The next second, Sora had disappeared down the nearest hallway.
Sephiroth glared at Riku. “What made you call me Xemnas, boy?” His voice was as cold and expressionless as his eyes, but there was a strong sense of menace under it.
Riku was confused. “Silver hair? Gravity defying bangs? Dark clothing? Long weapon? Dangerous sort of personality? Dress? You look like Xemnas to me.”
“It’s not a dress,” Sephiroth growled, “It’s... well... (it looks like a skirt, true, but...)... it’s a coat. And if you continue to call it a dress you may be well assured that you will lose your tongue to my odachii. Now—” He raked Riku from head to toe with his intense gaze. “Who might you be? Why are you in this Castle, and why was the Keyblade master here, as well? Who’s she?” He nodded at Kairi, who took two steps back nervously. “I am Sephiroth. You have heard of me; good, I can see it in your face. No doubt you heard of my difficulty and incapability of being defeated from that Sora boy. I took on a childcare job for Xemnas, ruler of this Castle, a week ago.”
Kairi looked confused, but seem to not have the guts to tell Sephiroth that he was incorrect; Sora had boasted of Sephiroth’s predictableness and simplicity only the night before. Riku seem torn with what he could say; tell Sephiroth that he didn’t know who he was, tell Sephiroth that he was incorrect and that Kairi was the babysitter, or tell Sephiroth that he had girly hair— not that Riku could talk.
“You must be mistaken,” Riku said, “Xemnas hired Kairi to be the babysitter. Did he send you the rejection notice?”
Sephiroth glared witheringly at Riku and said, “I never received a rejection notice, and if I did then I might’ve been too busy to sort through my mailbox— there has been too much fan and hatemail lately. There was also the task of almost destroying one Cloud Strife and impaling his flower-obsessed love interest. Now let me in and allow me to talk to Xemnas.”
“But Xemnas isn’t here.” All three of the people looked down to see Larxene standing there. In her hand, she was holding two dolls. One was Cloud, and the other was Sephiroth. Toy Cloud had his sword pounded deep into toy Sephiroth’s heart. “He went off to destroy a world some time ago... or, at least, that was what he told us.”
Sephiroth looked down on Larxene, his lip curled in something like disgust at the small toys in her hand (he wouldn’t have shown such distaste if he knew what they depicted).
“Let me in,” he ordered again, and when Riku and Kairi did nothing, he shunted Riku aside rudely and stepped in. His muddy boots smeared the perfectly silver floors (which Kairi had been scrubbing an hour ago) with grime.
Kairi frowned at the now muddy floor. Riku could tell that that she was stressing out.
After a... discussion, Sephiroth agreed to spend the night at the Castle... and hopefully await Xemnas’s return the next day.

Sora was lounging in one of the many rooms of the Castle That Never Was. He was completely exhausted after a full day of running after twelve kids. Had his parents ever been this tired back on the Islands? Probably not; he had spent most of the day running outside with his friends. Briefly, he wondered if they had ever gotten worried about him when he had disappeared for a year, thanks to Marluxia and Namine. He closed his eyes, wanting so very much to go to sleep...
“Sora?”
“Huh?” He blinked and opened his eyes. “Whozere?” He looked down. Violently red spikes. Bright green eyes. “Oh. It’s you.”
Axel stared back. “So Roxas really is a part of you, now, huh?”
A brief memory arose, and for a moment Roxas shone through. “You said we’d meet again, in the ‘next’ life.”
Axel gave a shrill snort. “I remember. But that’s not why I woke you up, Roxa— Sora, whatever you are nowadays. Xemnas says to do the daily ash-blowing.”
“Ash blowing?” echoed Sora, clueless. Roxas sank back into the depths of his heart, but Sora could sense his other side listening and watching.
Vexen came in, holding a long list. Sora, craning his neck, just barely saw the ingredient “Mystery Goo” written on the paper in the scientist’s handwriting (very messy) before it disappeared into a trench coat pocket. “Ash-blowing,” Vexen repeated matter-of-factly. “Upon his arrival Marluxia–”
“You have to scatter ash into the air to cover the Castle,” explained Axel over Vexen’s longer explanation. “That’s what keeps it so silver-grey all the time... and it covers the color underneath.”
“What is the color underneath?” asked Sora.
Axel and Vexen exchanged embarrassed glances.
“Well,” said Vexen, “upon his arrival to the Organization, Marluxia decided that things needed some... brightening up. He went to Xemnas with the request to make things look a little nicer around the Castle. Number One happened to be... formulating evil plans at the time, and of course absentmindedly agreed to get the pink-haired menace away from him. He did not forsee that Number Eleven was going to repaint the Castle...” Vexen gritted his teeth. “...in his favorite color.”
“Pink,” said Axel enlighteningly.
“Due to... matters at hand, there never was any time to completely repaint the Castle,” finished Vexen. “So for the time being, we simply take ash from that massive mound over there and scatter it over the walls. Xaldin would usually do this, but because we are... incapacitated at the moment, and therefore have little control over our own powers, it’s your job.”
“So... if I scraped the ash off, I would make the Castle pink?” asked Sora curiously, but smothering his laughter.
Vexen noted the tears of laughter in the Keyblade Master’s eyes. “Yes,” he snapped, testy. “Now get to it!”
“What if I don’t want to?” asked Sora boldly. “I can do it tomorrow...”
Suddenly, something attached itself limpet-like to his right hand. It was Axel.
“Please, Roxas?” he begged, appealing to Sora’s other side. “For an old friend? I burned down the 100,000 Acre Woods when I was older, and made it the 100 Acre Woods... all that work to make the ash pile! It musn’t go to waste... please? It’s Axel, your buddy from the Org, remember?”
“Get off me, you overuse-of-hair-gel-freak,” said Sora, shaking his arm vigorously. But something inside him prodded him sharply.
Do it.
“Roxas, if you weren’t me, I’d kill you,” muttered Sora. But he walked outside anyway.

Sora was feeling skittish as he prepared to hurl ash on the walls using Aeroga. Kairi and Riku had come out to watch the show, and he even spotted a black wing and silvery hair in one of the windows. Xaldin had come out, as well, furious at having his job stolen from him.
Perfect. An audience to make a fool out of myself in front of.
He took a deep breath. It was nothing to hurl ash into the air. Just like playing around with Rare Truffles. Yeah, ash blowing was nothing. Just simply casting Aeroga on himself and running through the ash. Couldn’t be too hard.
Running toward the ash pile, Sora slammed himself into it. Ash flew up in the air, flying really high. It began to float down like a fine, gray rain, preparing to settle on the walls of the Castle That Never Was.
Sora was celebrating. “Yeah!” he shouted, doing his victory dance. “I did it! Again, the Keyblade Master succeeds!”
Xaldin frowned, and made a small, “Hmph.”
In the middle of his victory dance, Sora felt a strong wind blowing. Looking up, he saw the wind was pushing the ash back to him.
“Uh-oh.”
The ash splattered against him like bugs splattering against a windshield. Kairi and Riku, who were standing behind him, also got a faceful of ash.
Spitting out a mouthful of the foul substance, Sora shook off all the ash that had settled on his clothes, in his hair, and up his nose. Brushing himself off, he risked a look up at the window which Sephiroth stood in. All he saw was a quivering wing and hair. No doubt Sephiroth was laughing.
Vexen came out to see the commotion. He curled his lips in digust when he saw three ash covered forms.
“You haven’t done a good job,” he said, “Try again.” Behind him, Xaldin gave a satisfied chuckle.
It took five times for Sora to get it right— mostly because Xaldin was interfering. Once done, Sora stumbled back into his room and instantly fell asleep.

Kairi, somewhat crossly, slammed a pan down on the stove and quickly used Firaga to light the stove. Somewhat was a understatement. Already, she had had to cook lunch, clean the floor, chase after some kids, keep Sora and Riku out of trouble, and now cook Sephiroth’s lunch! Why couldn’t the all powerful One-Winged Angel cook his own lunch!?
Perhaps it was this that very strongly tempted her to add more than the recipe-suggested two pinches of salt and pepper. But her conscience stayed her hand.
After finishing Sephiroth’s lunch, Kairi turned around and almost collided with Vexen, who was just standing there. She was so surprised to see the miniature brown-haired scientist that she almost dropped the tray.
“What are you doing here?” Kairi asked suspiciously. Vexen gave her the biggest case of fake bambi eyes ever seen in Nobody-history.
“I just want to watch,” he said. “I’m bored, and I want to do something.”
Kairi sighed.
“If you want to do something,” she said, “Then here. Take this up to Sephiroth.” She pushed Sephiroth’s lunch into Vexen’s hands.
As Kairi turned away, Vexen chuckled as he walked out of the room. Girls. Ever so predictable.
The Princess of Heart’s heart was just too soft.

Vexen knocked tentatively on Sephiroth’s door. He was frightened of the large grown man, even if he had once been taller and many years older than the silver-haired freak. Him and his long silver hair and large black wings. How was he called the “One-Winged Angel” when he has three of them? Vexen wondered, frowning.
The door opened, and Vexen managed to see a room with nothing but the usual furniture and a very long sword. He felt the tray in his hands being snatched away, and the door snapped shut in front of his nose. Terribly impolite, that Sephiroth was. No greeting, no farewell. Did he ever learn how to respect his elders when he was little? In Vexen’s musing, he momentarily forgot that he was young.
Turning, Vexen almost collided with Zexion. The silver haired boy looked cross, tapping his foot against the ground and frowning. The boy was sniffing, as if trying to pick up a scent.
Sniff. Sniff. Sniff sniff sniff sniff.
“What?” Vexen asked, watching as Zexion followed the scent, going as far as standing a couple of inches away from Sephiroth’s door to follow the smell. He paused right before the door, sniffing around.
Sniff. Sniff. Sniff sniff sniff sniff.
Zexion wheeled around suddenly, crossing his arms and asking, “What did you put in his drink? I could smell the sneakiness all the way from my room.”
Vexen blinked innocently, but at his subordinate’s cross look he somewhat meekly submitted.
“A sleeping potion that will put him into a deep sleep for quite a few hours,” Vexen said, glancing at Sephiroth’s door. He heard the sound of footsteps, and the sound of moving furniture. Why didn’t Sephiroth eat his lunch already? “I found it in my room,” Vexen added after a small silence. “Ever since... the explosion, it’s been getting harder and harder to remember all the required ingredients for my potions. And my recipe book is too high up now.”

~Flashback~
Vexen glared up at the book, which balanced on the high mantel of his room’s fireplace. “Darn it!” he growled, tapping his nose with his finger. “Gotta get it down...”
He got the poker and stood up on Marquis de Sade— a book that he had long ago stolen from Larxene to pay her back for insulting him. The book’s spine was already in poor condition, and caused him to fall. The poker rattled inside the fireplace and immediately began to heat up.
Marquis de Sade was in bad condition, so Vexen took it and aimed carefully, trying to knock the recipe book off of the mantel. It hit his favorite bust of Archimedes. The bust hit him on the head. And the book, too, began to burn.
Vexen shot ice needles at the book. The needles punctured the previously perfect leather of the tome and stopped. They began to melt, and Vexen watched the patch of wetted parchment grow.
~End flashback~

Zexion was frowning— again. “You know those things ferment,” he commented. He didn’t add that the potion probably would’ve lost its effects over the time it spent inside its bottle— he hoped that Vexen would remember that on his own, and realize his mistake.
But Vexen merely shrugged and pressed his ear against the door. He saw Zexion do the same, and the two listened intently for any sign that the fermented sleeping potion would work. They both heard the sound of eating, and then the sound of someone standing up from a chair and yawning. There was then pacing.
Go to sleep! Vexen thought, listening as Sephiroth checked through the room, pulling out drawers and checking through bottles. There was also the sound of something sharp being drawn, and what sounded like someone sharpening their sword. Heh, the great One-Winged Angel actually bothered to do that. Well, Vexen supposed, He must be the only person who actually wants to touch the sword.
Eventually, Vexen and Zexion heard the sound of a creaking bed as Sephiroth finally went to sleep.
“That took a long time,” Zexion commented, drawing away from the door. “Remind me why you’re doing this again?”
“To see if Sephiroth as any ingredients for the aging potion,” Vexen said, carefully opening the door to check the room. He expected it to creak, but it swung open without a sound. All was silent and only the mound under the white blankets twitched slightly.
“Are you sure about this?” Zexion asked, turning his back on Vexen as the scientist went inside the dreaded room, inquisitive. “I mean... this is not exactly the safest plan.”
His only reply was Vexen’s dark chuckle and, “I wonder how Sephiroth would like it if I stole his odachii.”

Inside Sephiroth’s room, Vexen found that the room was rather bare. The usual furniture that was situated in many of the bedrooms in the Castle That Never Was was the room’s only furnishings. Vexen found nothing else but a very long sword leaning against the bedside cabinet, easily in arm’s reach.
Stepping across a mess of black feathers— did half-angels like Sephiroth molt? — Vexen carefully eased open a drawer. He sent a silent but reluctant thanks to Kairi, for she had been the one to oil all the hinges in Sephiroth’s room prior to his entrance.
Reaching inside, Vexen found the drawer was empty. Closing it, he moved onto the silver drawer that was to the right of the drawer. Opening it, he stuck his hand inside and found nothing. Did the One-Winged Angel ever carry anything around with him?
Searching through more of the drawers and such compartments, Vexen found nothing save a drawer full of (what must have been) loose feathers. Sephiroth seemed to carry around nothing, except for his odachii.
Turning around, Vexen looked at the long and lethal weapon. It must have taken many lives of both Heartless, humans, and probably a couple of Nobodies. But it must be powerful to be able to destroy heartless with one strike, as he had later learned.
Stealthily creeping toward it, Vexen looked at the blade. It wasn’t sheathed at the moment, just leaning against the cabinet and making a rather long gouge in the floor as it awaited use. A single long blade of reflected moonlight, it shone with an unearthly aura and made Vexen tremble.
Reaching out to touch the blade, Vexen ran one small finger down the flat side of the sword. It was cold, and to his horror, his skin rubbed against the steel to make a loud squeaking sound. He glanced towards the slumbering Sephiroth, but the One-Winged Angel only moved under the covers. Very stealthily, his hands found the hilt of the sword and he began to drag it out of the room. It’s even heavier than my shield! he thought with a silent curse. He had just managed to drag the hilt past a dumbstruck Zexion (quite a feat, for the hilt of Sephiroth’s Masamune is extremely long) when a deep, menacing voice came from the room.
“And where do you think you’re taking that?”
“Farewell, Number Four— or not so well!” Without a backwards glance, Zexion fled, the hem of his trench coat trailing after him.
Vexen hurried to copy his example, knowing that if Sephiroth caught him after an attempt to steal his odachii his remains would be sent back to Xemnas in a vial. He just barely had time to whip out his shield as—
Clang. The sword was grabbed up in a movement too fast for his vision to catch. WHEEEE– screamed the air as the odachii sliced towards Vexen’s head. CLING cried the shield as the sword met it and created a thin scratch down its exterior. And “AAAAAAAAAAH!!!!!!!” wailed Number Four as he copied Zexion’s example and ran pell-mell down the hallway, his shield echoing with CLANG’s as it repeatedly repelled Sephiroth’s frenziedly stabbing attacks.
“ABOMINATION! NO ONE ATTTEMPTS TO STEAL MY SWORD AND LIVES TO TELL THE TALE!” roared Sephiroth.
“I’m too young to die!” responded Vexen, momentarily disregarding his long history of being touchy about his age.
Somewhere far off, he heard a voice shout, “Run, little guy, run!”
“FAREWELL—” began Sephiroth.
At that moment, Vexen did a desperate act. He suddenly stopped dead in the middle of the hallway, scrunched up, and held his shield like a roof over his head. Sephiroth’s boot caught on the edge, and he—

Riku, Kairi, and Sora were playing Monopoly (Disney Edition) together when they heard a ruckus outside the doorway of the room they were playing in. At once they raced to the threshold—just in time to catch a screaming, crying brown-haired child with a massive blue shield run past, chased by a terrifyingly savage silver-haired half-angel. At once Kairi paled, Riku shook his head in sympathy, and Sora shouted the message previously mentioned. Then they all watched in shock as Vexen suddenly hit the ground and Sephiroth tripped to go flying through the air. He hit a wall and stopped raging, though he still clenched his hands around his sword as if ready to impale the unfortunate Organization member should Vexen so much as glance at him.
The crash that resounded through the hall when Sephiroth hit the wall prompted a flood of curious Organization children— everyone in the Castle at the time, exactly, except Zexion, who had probably taken refuge at the back of his closet (or at least barricaded himself in his room with his book).
“What the heck is going on?!” demanded Xigbar, scratching his head.
“Where’s the action?” asked Xaldin, pulling out one of his lances.
“Why’s the cranky girly-hair guy clanking around?”
“What’s the big idea?”
“Can I stab him with a dagger?”
“Look at him, he’s gone all red—”
“Number Four, not again...”
“What kind of sitters are you three if you can’t prevent interruptions like these?”
“They’re useless, duh.”
“Lookie, he’s goin’ pink!”
“Can you even fly with just one wing...? I’m pretty sure there’s no point—”
“Well, what’s the point of hanging upside down if you’re blinded by your reversed trench coat, eh, Xigbar?”
“Shut up, Number Ten.”
“Shut upside down, Number Two.”
“Ooooo, someone call the ambulance ‘cause Xigbar just got buuuurned,” snickered Axel.
Kairi hid her face in her hair and shook it slightly, while Riku turned around and walked back into the room. Sora, meanwhile, confidently walked up to Sephiroth and simply said, “Sephiroth, your sword might be almost twice my height and you might look even girlier than I do, but I can still kick your butt. So don’t mess around while we’re in the same Castle!”
Kairi gently prodded Sora in the back (prompting a “What?!”). “Sora... I don’t think that’s a good id—”
“What are you talking about, Kairi, I know what I’m doing. I’ve spent more time around these rough guys than you have—”
“—and they probably knocked half the brains out of you during that time—”
“—well,” finished Riku conversationally from inside the room, “that would be hard to judge, as it’s Sora, isn’t it?”
“Say that again!”
Meanwhile, Sephiroth seemed to have gotten up with all the indirect insults and had now gone as pink as ever. Sora scratched his head and looked at Sephiroth. Was it just him, or was more than Sephiroth’s face growing pink...?
Uh-oh.
Sephiroth floated several inches off the ground. As Sephiroth held out his right hand, Sora shielded himself with his arms as the terrible words resounded throughout the corridor: “DESCEND, HEARTLESS ANGEL....”
There was a loud squeal from under the shield, and several of the Organization members jumped when they heard it. It definitely sounded like Vexen. Sephiroth smirked cruelly and he stalked through the crowd, shoving small children and baby sitters out of his way with the butt end of his sword to get to the large blue shield, which covered the fearful Vexen.
Shoving the tip of his odachii under the shield, Sephiroth braced his legs on the floor and flicked it up. The shield flipped off the ground, along with a terrified, squeaking-with-terror Vexen. While the shield flew somewhere (meaning that it implanted itself in the ceiling), a scared and now sobbing Vexen was left to huddle on the ground, begging for mercy.
“I’m sorry!” he sobbed, on his knees. “I was curious. I never meant to steal it at all! I just wanted to study it! I’m sorry!” Vexen dissolved into another fit of tears. Sephiroth smirked and continued with the young organization member’s punishment.

As a smirking Sephiroth walked away from Vexen, Demyx promptly ran to help his superior. The young scientist was covered with many bruises, having acquired them when Sephiroth beat him with the flat side of his odachii. There were soft mutters of “Ouch, that looked like it hurt” and “Oooo, is he still alive?” and one “I put first dibs on being Number Four!”
“Number Four, are you okay?” Demyx asked, bending down to see if he could here Vexen’s breathing. Yes, there it was, shallow, but still there.
Kairi came up behind Demyx. Her blue eyes were wide with shock and horror.
“That was horrible!” she gasped, bending down to look at Vexen. “I can’t believe he actually did that!”
“Get used to it, Kairi,” Sora said, coming up behind Kairi, “Sephiroth is a very violent super-being.”
“Yeah, but beating a defenceless child!” Kairi lamented, kneeling down to look at Vexen’s ouches.
“Not defenceless,” Riku said, coming up on Kairi’s other side. He pointed toward the large spiked shield that was still implanted in the ceiling. Kairi shook her head. Boys, they never understood anything.
Despite the fact that Kairi used several Curagas on Vexen, and despite the fact that Sora and Riku helped Kairi, Vexen’s wounds didn’t heal.
“Well, Sephiroth was the one who attacked, Vexen,” Sora said, scratching his head and using an Ether to restore his magic. “So, that could be why Vexen’s wounds won’t heal.”
“But that is....” Kairi trailed off, searching for a word to describe what she was going to say.
“Possible,” Riku commented. He too used an Ether to restore and his magic, and then walked off. Kairi sighed and shook her head. She carried the now-moaning Vexen to his room and resolved to call on Aerith to ask for some kind of thing that could treat any wound.

As soon as Kairi left, Xaldin was the first one to enter Vexen’s room, just to make sure there was no unwanted loose experiments in the place. As soon as Xaldin told the other higher-ups that it was okay, they came in. Number Two through Seven stood around Vexen’s bed, waiting for Number Four to wake up.
“Heh, I guess he deserved that,” snickered Xigbar, smirking.
“He was trying to steal Sephiroth’s odachii,” Zexion explained calmly. He glared at Xigbar for a few seconds.
“Looks like we are going to have Organization XI soon,” Xaldin said gloomily.
“Grr... I’m awake you know,” was the muffled retort from under the sheets.
“So you really did try steal Sephiroth’s odachii, didn’t you?” Saïx said, leaning against a post on Vexen’s bed. “What possessed you to do so? It was a pathetic idea.”
“Curiosity,” Vexen muttered.
“Fool,” Saïx replied, shaking his head. “Honestly, if I had a heart, I’d actually feel sympathy... but as I don’t, I feel absolutely none for you.”
“You really hurt your pride and dignity back there,” Xigbar said conversationally. He cast a quick glance around the room and said, “And if you have any pride left then you might as well throw it in the trash.”
“Sephiroth made me hurt my pride,” Vexen said through gritted teeth.
“How?” all of the members asked, curious.
“He made me beg for mercy,” Vexen grumbled.
“Uh, dude, you did that yourself,” Xigbar commented, and ducked to avoid a rather messy, badly-aimed slap that aimed toward him. “So whatcha going to do about that?”
“Revenge,” Vexen hissed.
For the rest of the afternoon, the six members plotted. They ignored the call that told them that dinner was ready. Vexen wanted revenge, and they would find the perfect plan for it.

Of course Kairi, Sora, and Riku knew that something was going on. They knew plotting villains when they say them. The first seven members (not counting Number One) of the Organization spent more time with their heads together than playing, or at least watching Larxene maim her dolls.
So, on the next fine afternoon, everything quite happy and peaceful— well, everything nice, quiet, and dreadfully dark— Kairi was cooking lunch for the great One-Winged Angel, again, when she heard the loudest crash she ever heard in her life. There was a loud clatter of things falling— was that the chandelier?— and a loud bawl of pain. Instantly she knew it was Xaldin. The young boy was trying to pole-vault again.
“I could take Sephiroth’s lunch up,” someone said down by Kairi’s knee. If she knew who it was then she would have said no, but desperate to find the bawling Xaldin, she instantly said yes and rushed off.
“Heh, how pathetic,” Vexen chuckled; Xaldin had quite readily agreed to be the distraction this time after hearing what the outcome of their plot would be. After downing six of his self-concocted healing potions, Vexen was feeling much more lively... quite literally. Thank Kingdom Hearts he had remained alive to down those potions.
He looked up at the high counter and, stretching up as tall as he could, grabbed the tray. Today’s lunch was chicken, rice, some salad, and other things that a regular person would eat. Well.... it was said that chicken was best cold. Oh well. It would still sufficiently hide the taste of what he was about to add...
A couple of minutes later, Vexen struggled up the stairs of The Castle That Never Was. He was still recuperating from his beating, after all, and he wasn’t up to climbing several flights of stairs. But his revenge had been plotted and he wasn’t going to let exhaustion stop him!
“Maybe I should take the tray. You know, to avoid suspicion.”
Vexen looked over his shoulder to see Xigbar there, grinning lazily. Why did Number Two had to pop up now? For such a high-ranking member of the Organization, Xigbar was shockingly and absurdly overcasual.
“I can handle it,” Vexen said, walking past Xigbar and continued down the hallway to Sephiroth’s room. Xigbar tagged after him.
“But Sephiroth will suspect that you might have put something inside his food!” he whispered fiercely.
“He never knew in the first place,” Vexen argued.
“He might if I tell him,” Xigbar retorted, grinning as he watched Vexen glare at him.
“You wouldn’t dare,” Vexen hissed.
“Wanna bet?”
Vexen, rather sullenly, handed over the tray and watched as Xigbar ran off. The fool. Number Two would get the blame if Sephiroth actually did what Vexen calculated.

“Room service!” Xigbar shouted, banging on Sephiroth’s door. He didn’t know why, but he was excited to see what would happen to Sephiroth when he ate the food. Would the effects happen instantly? Would they take a long time? What would happen? Exhilaration made him almost dance.
The door quickly opened, a gloved hand reached out and grabbed the food, and the door snapped shut. This all happened so quickly that if Larxene was there then even she would have trouble seeing what had happened.
“Well, that was just plain rude,” Xigbar shouted at the closed door. So Sephiroth was as rude as Vexen had described him. Not even a sense of humor. Hmph, most powerful people had that problem. “I don’t even get a tip?!”
The door was silent.
Vexen peeked cautiously around the corner. “Did he take it?”
Xigbar turned and shrugged. “Quicker than a Larxene swipe, yeah. As far as I know, he didn’t even stop to check who was carrying up the tray—”
“—which means that your stealing the tray was pointless,” finished Vexen.
“Uh... yeah,” replied a uncaring Xigbar. “So.... how long will it take for it to work?”
“Hmm... sort of hard to judge, as it’ll be hard to notice the effects until Sephiroth himself realizes it and runs out to slay the first one he suspects of planting it. Let’s give it a night before we admit defeat,” said Vexen knowledgeably, rubbing his chin. “After that, we’ll see who’s cleverer!”

It would’ve been morning elsewhere, and Xemnas’s artificial Kingdom Hearts still shone as brightly as ever upon the otherwise dark World That Never Was.

Sephiroth woke up and looked around. The same silver furniture, as always. He was starting to get fed up with waiting for Xemnas. Why didn’t he just leave and have the baby sitters do the rest of the work?
Sitting up from the bed, Sephiroth slid out and walked to the window. He decided he would do another day of staring out of the window. Like most experienced, superior evildoers, majestic views spurred his mind into its greatest plans... and the sight of the Organization’s false Kingdom Hearts had to be one of the most majestic of them all...
His nose touched the window sill.
Looking down in surprise, Sephiroth looked where his nose had touched the window. Was this some sort of ridiculous prank played by one of the strange children? Why was his nose touching the window sill?
He poked his nose at the window to do another test. Yup, there, he felt it again. Silver material making contact with his nose. What was going on?!
Ramming his nose into the window sill again and again, as if the pain and damage to the cartilage would somehow yank him out of this surreal nightmare, Sephiroth grappled with the gigantic, overwhelming fact: he had transformed into a child.
His shout of mingled fury and dismay echoed throughout the entire Castle.

Kairi awoke with a start when she heard a very loud shout echo throughout the castle. It sounded masculine, angry and dismayed. The only person mature enough to have such a voice was Sephiroth. Now why was the great One-Winged Angel shouting? And for some reason, it was slightly shriller than usual.
I hope Vexen hasn’t pulled his hair again...
Putting on some suitable clothing, she went outside to investigate. Opening the door, she heard, for some strange and alien reason, a child screaming, the noise steadily growing louder.
Suddenly, Vexen zoomed pass her, holding his shield over his head and shouting incoherently. Kairi looked, amused. Vexen wasn’t so cocky when he was a child. Her amusement vanished at what she saw next.
An angry, silver haired, savage, and screaming-bloody-murder half angel with a bloody nose raced down the hallway after the screaming Vexen. The half angel had a long odachii, point pointed toward Vexen’s back, ready to skewer anyone in the way. And he was only 3’6” tall.
The angry child ripped past Kairi, intent on killing Vexen.
Oh dear.
It appeared Kairi had still more things to worry about.

“Run faster, Number Four!” mocked Axel as the young scientist sped past him, intent on not being Sephiroth fodder. Like Larxene and Marluxia, he still had a thing for teasing Vexen— especially since Vexen could hardly call himself an elder anymore. “Your running’s so pathetic you run like a girl!”
The sound of someone POOFing behind him made him turn around. It was Larxene, looking livid with daggers ready between her fingers. Her antennae crackled with ferocious static. “Wanna rephrase that, bub?”
Axel gulped.

Riku and Kairi helped with maintaining order within the Organization as Sora took his turn at preparing meals for the Castle. It was a first, at least, that Sora actually managed to bring about a consumable meal— what seemed like a miracle after all the time he spent cooking for ducks, random people from random worlds with random tastes, and strange... dog-looking... things. Yeah.
Keeping track of the Organization turned out to be a lot harder than they thought— especially with Sephiroth running amok.
Riku marveled at Number Four’s amazingly simple yet complex revenge. He had obviously subjected Sephiroth to the same event and/or substance that had transformed all of his fellow members into children. A plan that could be reached instantly... was easy to carry out... (unless you counted the fact that Sephiroth had an uncanny ability to tell who was behind it all) and would have a lasting effect. But as the day progressed, he gradually came to hope that despite Sephiroth’s power in his fully fledged form, the effects of whatever-Vexen-did would wear off. And soon.
It seemed that Sephiroth’s odachii had shrunk along with his height. That was something. But now he was faster, smaller, more prone to temper tantrums (“POWER....”), and to top it all off, more likely to go around attacking everyone at random. After leaving Vexen whimpering and hiding in his room, Sephiroth set out to ensure that everyone accepted his dominance in the Castle. Riku and Kairi had to save at least eight of the eleven present Organization members from certain stabby doom that morning: Lexaeus (taking refuge on top of his chin-ups bar and unable to come down), Axel (hiding in the chimney), Luxord (“WAAAAH! That’s not fair; don’t you know the rules?!”), Zexion (“What did I ever do?), Xigbar (who accidentally got himself hung upside down and couldn’t detach himself from the ceiling), Demyx (crying hysterically), Marluxia (“Let’s not fight here, you’ll ruin the flowers!”), and Larxene (“Sephiroth, if I ever get out of this closet I’m gonna GUT your doll!”). Kairi was barely any help, due to her lack of combat experience, but she was at least useful in persuading the Organization to take refuge in the kitchen, where Sora could then keep an eye on them. Riku, however, found himself the unlucky one who had to face up to Sephiroth.
“Sephiroth... let’s just calm down, alright? No more rampaging—”
“I AM NOT RAMPAGING!”
Riku groaned in exasperation and tightened his grip on his Way to Dawn, as if to reassure himself of its power. Behind him, Kairi fidgeted nervously, sensing the tension between her silver-haired friend and the silver-haired freakish kid.
“Can you please stop attacking everyone then?” Riku said, almost begged due to the fact he wanted all mayhem inside the castle to stop— not only was it personally endangering, it also was an uncomfortable reminder that the Organization members still had their powers and were out to get their babysitters. Sephiroth looked up from his sword sharpening and childishly stuck his tongue out.
“Why should I listen to you?!?” Sephiroth asked, eyes flashing with anger. Riku blinked, and, before he knew it, Sephiroth was flying toward him, sword ready to stab him.
Quickly swinging his keyblade up, Riku just barely blocked the sword as it flashed up toward his face. The sword skidded of the edge of the keyblade, shedding sparks. Riku stared at his prized weapon. Sephiroth was strong to do such a thing on a keyblade...
Riku jolted back to earth when he spotted a flash of silver speeding toward his head. He quickly ducked to avoid being decapitated. Sephiroth plunged almost gracefully to the ground beside him, yanked his sword out of the ground, and slashed again. Riku did a fancy backwards somersault in the air, leapt clear of the reaching blade, and swung at Sephiroth. The child ducked between Riku’s legs, rose high in the air on a swift wing, chopped down—
The doorbell rang. Both froze.
“I’ll get it!” Kairi said hastily, running off.
Sephiroth recovered faster than Riku. He kicked Riku’s legs out from under him and scrambled off.

Kairi opened the front door, with Sora at her side in case of any trouble. But the person on the front door caused more relief to wash over Sora then anything else.
“Cloud!” Sora shouted, and bounded to give the blonde a friendly shake, but stopped short when he saw that Cloud’s gigantic Buster Sword was unsheathed. Also, the blonde seemed to have been walking for a long time, due to the fact that his hair and clothing were somewhat sweat soaked.
Kairi, seeing everything was clear, ran off when she heard something crash and a loud scream; most likely Sephiroth had come to get revenge on Vexen (again)— or something along the lines of that. Sora, having paused to look in the direction of that scream, turned back to Cloud.
“What are you doing here?” he asked, a little too loudly. Cloud shot Sora a glare and placed a finger to his lips, signifying the fact that Sora had to be quiet.
“I was never here,” he ordered.
Sora nodded. “Right, you were never here. So, why are you here?” he asked.
“I sensed darkness here... I’ve been looking for him again... so can I come in?”
Sora leapt out of the way, allowing Cloud to enter the castle. Upon his first step inside, he stiffened, automatically turning his head to look at whatever he sensed.
“Sephiroth,” he muttered, “Sephiroth is here.”
“Yeah... about that,” said Sora, blushing as he rubbed the back of his head. “Kairi... kinda got us into a babysitting job for those bad guys we once defeated... and it turned out that Sephiroth had been competing for the job, too. But... Cloud... something’s happened—”
Cloud wasn’t listening. He had already taken three great strides inside. “If any of my friends come looking for me,” he threw over his shoulder. “tell them that I was never here. I don’t need them to risk themselves. Killing Sephiroth is something that I have to do.” It wasn’t a request.

Sephiroth cackled as he descended on a screaming mass of Nobodies in the kitchen. Silly Riku, silly Kairi. The boy had been so easily knocked out, and the Princess of Heart had all so foolishly run off to find her silver-haired cohort.
A crying Demyx ran past Sephiroth, and the One-Winged Angel grinned maliciously. Did the boy really think that he could get away from Sephiroth just by running? Heh, he was as foolish as everyone else.
Jumping over a shattered vase of crystal roses, Sephiroth ran to skewer Demyx on the point of his sword. He was going to make sure that everyone in this castle saw that he was going to dominate them all.
Leaping up to strike Demyx, Sephiroth suddenly snapped his head around, sensing something. Forgetting the screaming children around him, he dropped do the ground, letting Demyx escape. Someone, a certain someone, had arrived.
“SEPHIROTH!”
Cloud barged inside the kitchen, almost tripping over a wailing Xigbar (quite ironic, since Xigbar was on the roof at that time). The aspiring hero seemed to be ready for battle, his large Buster Sword already unsheathed and resting on the ground. When he saw Sephiroth, he abruptly stopped dead in his tracks, gazing with mingled horror and dismay at the now-child.
“Cloud,” Sephiroth said calmly, standing up to his full height: which meant he was only half of Cloud’s height. “You’ve been looking for me again. You never will let go of the darkness, will you? Why not just accept it instead of wasting all your energy chasing pointlessly after me?” Sephiroth went into a long monologue about how Cloud would never let go of the darkness and find his light, bla bla bla bla bla. It would have been a good speech, if it weren’t for the fact that it was said in a high squeaky voice and by a person who was only three feet and six inches tall. And with a slightly limited vocabulary. Luckily, Sephiroth remained blissfully oblivious of this fact.
“I’ll find my light,” Cloud shouted, recovering fairly quickly. He leapt at Sephiroth, swinging his sword to clear some scattered pots and pans. “Once I destroy you!” He swung his sword again, but Sephiroth easily leapt back to avoid the sword. Cloud was obviously unsure of whether to take advantage of Sephiroth’s reduced size.
“You fool,” Sephiroth sneered. “I will always come back. No matter how many times you destroy me, I will come back. I am your darkness, Cloud.”
“Shut up!” Cloud retorted. He swept his sword. Having been trapped in a corner, Sephiroth had no choice but to use his odachii to block the gigantic Buster Sword.
Sephiroth smirked and said, “How does it feel, Cloud? No matter what you do, you will always be weaker then me.” This, again, would’ve been another good taunt if it weren’t said by a squeaky voice and a boy half the size of his foe.
“Liar!” protested Cloud, though he took several steps back.
“Chocobo-head!” snapped back Sephiroth, quick as lightning. Behind him, several members of the Organization blinked at the unexpected response.

Sora sighed. He was bored. After hearing a squeaky voice and Cloud’s more adult voice, Sora saw that Cloud had it completely under control and left Cloud to his fighting. He did remain restless after a lack of action for so long, however. Yet he jumped with fright when he heard someone knocking on the door— AGAIN. Sora hadn’t known that the castle had so many visitors.
Trotting to the door, Sora winced as he heard metal against metal and a very distinct shout of “Chocobo-head!” The insult was childish, probably shouted by one of the Organization members. Hopefully.
Opening the front door, Sora saw that it was Tifa who was standing there.
“Whaa—? Tifa, what are you doing here?” Sora demanded. What are the odds I run up against so many friends on one babysitting trip? he thought. Maybe I should do this kind of thing more often.
“What do you think?” she answered. “Looking for Cloud. I... I tracked him here... Sora, have you seen him? I think he’s seeking his darkness again, even though he now has his light...”
Remembering Cloud’s words (“If any of my friends come looking for me, tell them that I was never here. I don’t need them to risk themselves. Killing Sephiroth is something that I have to do.”), Sora obediently replied, “No. Sorry, Tifa; I haven’t seen Cloud for a while. He was certainly never here.” Silently and inconspicuously, he crossed his fingers behind his back.
“Hmm.” Tifa didn’t look as if she entirely believed him, but thought a little while, as if chewing over his words. “Well, if you see him, tell him I’m looking for him. All right?” she said gently. She nodded to Sora, then turned around and walked back to the gigantic airship that awaited her. “Fire it up, again, Cid. Cloud’s not here!”
Sora let out a sigh of relief as he closed the door— just in time. Sephiroth ran by, closely pursued by Cloud. Both were shouting inarticulately and both hazarded swipes at each other with their swords, slashing apart off-white and graceful silver sculptures of the Nobody symbol.
At last, Sora pulled out Oblivion and Oathkeeper, relying on Roxas’s long-absorbed skills at dual-wielding. Time to join the fight.

Cloud was hot on Sephiroth’s heels as the silver-haired kid led him on a goose-chase throughout the Castle. He knew they were leaving a steady trail of rubble and destruction behind them, but couldn’t help it. This had to be settled now.
“Sephiroth, give it up!” he called to the leading party. By way of reply, Sephiroth stuck his tongue out over his shoulder, blew a loud raspberry, and kept running.
Soon they had reached the formal dining room: a long, low table seated for thirteen. With color-coded plates, impeccably set. Carved out of a beautiful silver-gray material, the official Organization dining table was a work of art.
But to Sephiroth, he only saw—
“REFUGE!” he shouted, diving underneath it. Cloud would never be able to get to him quickly under here! He would have to move away all the other tables to do that, and by the time he got under here, Sephiroth would be long gone... or have him in a place where he dictated the rules of the setting.
Smugly, Sephiroth thought, I am such a genius.
Cloud leapt up, sword point aimed at the ground.
Heh. Idiot.
He came down—
Cloud is half blind if he can’t tell I’m UNDER the table.
Cloud slammed the blade into the ground. As soon as he did so, three long streaks of pure energy slammed out in the table’s direction, riving the table into several pieces. Luckily for Sephiroth, the bolts of energy just missed him, by the skin of his teeth— pretty much literally. They took the tips of his luxuriant growth of silver hair and burned them to a crisp.
Sephiroth gulped, then launched himself away as Cloud’s sword chopped into the remainders of the formerly perfect table. Tableware clattered, clanged, and was chopped in two as Cloud made several more desperate swipes at the half-angel.
“Can’t— catch— me!” taunted Sephiroth, each word punctuated by a dodge. After the “me”, Cloud almost got his nose— Sephiroth took that as a signal to stop the taunting and start the running. Especially since the Keyblade(s) Master had just arrived on the scene.
“I’ll help you, Cloud!” shouted Sora.
“Stay out of this, Sora!” responded Cloud, though he didn’t protest the boy’s help too much.
They followed Sephiroth’s trail (marked by a trail of blue-black feathers) deeper into the Castle, up floors and through rooms. Half-curious, half-excited, the Organization followed them as well. Riku and Kairi, fortunately, remained absent.
At last the trail ended right before a large closet.
“Show yourself, Sephiroth!” ordered Cloud, hefting his sword. Sora pointed both his Keyblades at the closet. “Open up those doors NOW!”
“... Sora...” Something tugged at Sora’s knee. Xaldin. “I...”
“Not now, kid,” muttered Sora, detaching Number Three. “I’m busy. If you got to go potty then go yourself.”
“I don’t have to—”
“Go away.”
Glowering, Xaldin walked away to rejoin the other Organization members. Meanwhile, Cloud marched bodily forwards and yanked open the door.
A rack of eighteen storm-colored lances, an extra sitar, thirty large claymores, two tomahawks, a cardboard box full of backup daggers, two extra pairs of chakrams, a scythe, eight extra boxed decks, and five guns fell over to land on top of the unlucky Cloud and Sora.
“Ooooooo....” was the chorus that went up from the Organization members... which quickly turned to “AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!” when they saw who was responsible for their backup weapons to fall down so.
Smirking, Sephiroth released an evil laugh of pure, unrestrained triumph. But due to the fact that he was young, his evil laugh was high and completely wrong. (heh, sorta like Demyx’s supposedly ‘evil’ laugh in Hollow Bastion: First Visit). He watched with triumph as Cloud and Sora struggled underneath the load of metal. Looking down at the weapons, Sephiroth sneered, and readied himself to face Cloud.

Organization XIII was meeting in Lexeaus’s room, again. They chose Number Five’s room due to the fact that he was too silent to contradict, and that the door was latched closed— therefore Keyblade-proof. Still, it was not safe now because any second now a gigantic Buster Sword or odachii might cut the door off its hinges.
Larxene now stood on top of the ruined “Marquis de Sade”, the thing they used as the basic speaking podium. Everything was silent, for the last person who spoke while Larxene was speaking— the former Number Thirteen— was never seen again.
“I think we should help Sephiroth!” Larxene called over the silent heads. “I mean, what would be a better way to get rid of our new baby-sitters?” Larxene’s sadistic personality had led her to this proposition mainly because she wished to see 1) what Sephiroth would do to the babysitters 2) what Xemnas would do to them when he found out what the babysitters did to them. (Anyone follow me?)
“But he is dangerous!” Vexen protested, sputtering. “Look at what he did to me!”
“That is because you tried stealing his sword,” Larxene argued. She turned back to the Organization members. “We are going to try no such thing, now that you have proven that you should never try to jack Sephiroth’s sword.
“Who votes that we should help Sephiroth?!?” Ten hands rose.
“Who votes that we shouldn’t help Sephiroth?!?” One hand rose— predictably, Vexen, the old grudge still rankling him. Larxene smiled, seeing that (almost) all the other members agreed with her.
“Ha, old man. Ten to one! We win!” Larxene shouted triumphantly in Vexen’s face, making spit fly everywhere. The scientist moodily wiped the saliva off his face with the back of his sleeve.
“How do we tell Sephiroth that we are helping him?” Demyx asked. He didn’t exactly look forward to talking to Sephiroth. After all, the silver-haired menance had almost killed him.
“Weeeell,” Larxene said, tapping her chin in a over exaggerated, mocking way. “I suppose we have to send someone to tell him. Who votes who?”
Instantly, everyone’s head snapped around (some of them almost turning in a 180 degrees angle) to look at Luxord and Marluxia. Of all of them, those two had been the least involved in their recent evil plots.
“Them,” Demyx said, not bothering to hide his sigh of relief. Everyone else agreed.

“Why do we have to be the one to do this?” Luxord complained. “This sucks.”
“Because everyone else were too scared to go and tell Sephiroth,” Marluxia drawled. He pulled out his scythe, warily watching around him.
The easiest part about the job was trying to find Sephiroth. All they had to do was follow the trail of black feathers and debris.
As the neared their destination, they heard the sounds of metal screeching on metal, and the occasional blast of magic. Once, they heard several loud shattering sounds, and then the sound of running.
“Five thousand munny that we die... again... before the day’s over,” remarked Luxord gloomily.
“You’re on,” replied Marluxia, his spirits lifting a little. Everyone knew that Luxord often made bets that ended up forcing him to gamble away what was left of his fortune— perhaps Luxord’s grim bet on this outcome would prove to be wrong as well. He crossed his fingers as he thought this, hoping desperately. If he... left (he tried not to think of that end) there would be no one to care for his beloved plants.
No one to prevent Axel from adding them to the colossal ash pile. No one to prevent Larxene from slicing them to ribbons...
At last they saw a silver-haired kid roughly their own size run past. “SEPHIROTH! Hey, SEPHIROTH! OI! You with the grey hair!” shouted Luxord desperately, keen to attract his attention before he dashed away.
The final part caught his attention, all right. Sephiroth advanced on them, his sword extended.
“It’s not grey!” he snarled. Luxord had never noticed it before, but Sephiroth looked a lot like Saïx when Number Seven happened to be Berserking. “It’s silver. Or platinum. Got it memorized?” Marluxia groaned. Obviously, Sephiroth had fallen to the rank of stealing other people’s catchphrases.
Luxord tried to think of a way to carry it off gracefully— except thinking with a blade of reflected Kingdom Hearts-light at your throat (aka Sephiroth’s sword) isn’t exactly simple. “I’m not exactly ready to lose my head right now,” he said, swallowing convulsively and praying to each of his individual lucky stars by name (“Destiny Islands, Disney Castle, Agrabah, the Radiant Garden, Halloween Town, Port Royal...”). “And I think you can put me down. Really. Now. We’ve got some to talk to you about.”
Sephiroth unwillingly lowered Number Ten so that his boots touched the silver floor again— even in childhood, Sephiroth was extremely strong. “You are a part of an Organization known for its stupidity and foolhardy ambition throughout the entire InterWorld Union. Hardly worthy subjects of attention,” he sniffed.
Behind him, Luxord could sense Number Eleven on his toes, ready to cowardishly flee at the slightest sign of danger— probably to grab as many flowerpots as he could carry and flee the World That Never Was, to boot.
“Rubbish,” retorted Luxord. “We’re plenty worthy. I’m not as stupid as Xemnas or idiotic as Xigbar, at least— and I’m definitely not as stupid and scientifically smart yet naive as Number Four. I’ll bet you ten munny I could whoop all of them if they gave me the chance.” Briefly, he envisioned the scene: a Xigbar die, a Xemnas die, and a Vexen die, with he standing before them and laughing. “Ha ha!” he chortled. “You can’t hurt me!”
The three dice surged toward him, faces alight with rage...
The scene melted when another memory arose: that of a dice-Sora awesomely beating him up.
Er... maybe not such a good idea.
“Err... anyway,” Luxord stammered, rubbing the back of his head and throwing a beseeching glance at Marluxia to help him word this correctly— after all, Number Eleven had had an entire game dedicated to himself, and not Luxord, and therefore was much more experienced. “I... er... we of Organization XIII.... we....”
“Spit it out,” said Sephiroth impatiently, glancing behind him. “I think the Chocobo-heads are coming.”
“Whatever Chocobos are...” muttered Luxord.
“Well,” began Marluxia, taking charge of the situation, “we of Organization XIII realize that we share a common enemy: Sora.”
“My enemy is not that nincompoop you call Sora. I am only interested in the fall of Cloud Strife,” amended the latter testily.
“The point is that in any case, you’re fighting against Sora, too, and he’s... um... interfering with your... er... attempt at slaying Cloud,” retorted Marluxia.
“He is not interfering...” defended Sephiroth. “He’s... just... a nuisance...”
Luxord and Marluxia traded glances. “Then why are you running away from them?” Number Ten had the courage to ask. He immediantly wished he hadn’t.
“I AM NOT RUNNING AWAY!” shouted Sephiroth.
Luxord, in some extremely calm, removed part of him, idly noticed that Sephiroth’s incisors were especially prominent when he snarled.
Then, without another word, Sephiroth made his last statement an oxymoron as he leapt up and ran as fast as his youthfully-shrunk legs could carry him, Cloud and Sora right on his tail. Apparently his shout had clued them in on his current location.
Marluxia sighed. “I appreciate a bit of exercise every now and then, but honestly... somehow I think imposing a full, uninterrupted conversation upon Sephiroth is going to be a chore.”

Riku held a packet of ice to his head as Kairi worriedly peered through the doorways every few seconds to check for incoming angels and “Chocobo-heads.” “Riku, do you think Sora’s going to be okay?”
“Sora can take care of himself. He’s proven that already, Kairi. Don’t worry,” said Riku, trying to ignore his pounding headache where his head had made heavy contact with the floor. “Besides, if he gets in trouble Cloud’s always there to back him up.”
“Hmm.”
“He’s good— almost as good as Sora thinks he is. Don’t stress out too much.”
“I should never have taken this job,” muttered Kairi into her hands miserably. “All stabbing, nothing nonsavage about it at all...”
Riku searched for a way to express his mutual agreement without too much self-pity, but failed. But another interruption saved him from having to reply. Kairi, looking extremely nervous, quickly glanced out to see whose pattering feet could be heard coming down the corridor.
“It’s that funny brown-haired kid Sephiroth likes stabbing so much,” she informed Riku. “But he doesn’t have a sword-wielding maniac at his back, at least.”
Riku stood up, with only the faintest bit of relief at the last part of the sentence— the movement intensified his headache and turned the dull ache into a sort of pounding inside his skull. All the same, he was wary as Vexen stumbled into the room, clutching a stitch in his chest and panting heavily.
“Riku— Kairi— got— to— come—”
“What’s going on?” exclaimed Kairi.
Vexen gasped for air some more and then continued speaking. “Organization— about— to band together— with Sephiroth. I— refuse— not join in— plan. Gotta— come— and help— if Organization is— to remain Organization XIII (well— technically Organization XII now, but—) — and not Organization— II.”
Good! screamed Riku’s instincts. But Kairi again thought differently.
“Riku, we can’t let Sephiroth rampage around the Castle anymore! He might hurt the children!” she cried.
Even better!
“All the more reason to let Cloud and Sora finish him off quickly,” he offered reasonably.
“A-hem,” came the impatient reply from somewhere around his waist area. “I’m still here.”
Riku looked down on Vexen and asked, “And why do we care if you are still here?”
Vexen slapped his forehead in exasperation. “Just come and help!” he whined. Before Riku could answer, he was towed away by the trench-coated kid, Kairi bobbing apologetically behind him, apparently undecided as to what her reaction should be. Needless to say, this did nothing to benefit his temper; on the contrary, it made his headache worse.
“Let go, Vexen!” he muttered to the thing latched to his hand, which had the strength of three oxen. Not unpredictably, Vexen ignored him. Typical Organization member.
As Vexen, Riku, and Kairi passed the dining room, a large cyclone of black and white streaks appeared from the center of what remained of the Organization XIII formal dining table. Riku, Kairi, and Vexen jerked to a stop, knowing perfectly well that the only person who used an element riddled with black and white was Xemnas.
As the black streaks cleared, a scroll tumbled down into the ruins of the table. Both Riku and Kairi shared a glance. Why was Xemnas sending a letter to them?
“Vexen, why don’t you go ahead and take care of the other Organization members?” Kairi said, prying Vexen’s hand off Riku’s.
Ha! Kairi is sending Vexen to his doom! Riku thought as Kairi gently shoved Vexen down the corridor. But I shouldn’t tell her that.
After Kairi fetched the scroll, both Riku and she read it. Yes, the scroll was definitely from Xemnas, giving them some guidelines on what to do and what he expected the castle to be like when he came back.

Greetings babysitters,

I am sending this letter to inform you that I shall be staying away from The Castle That Never Was for a little longer. I am also sending this letter to set down my standards on what what I expect when I get back from my trip. Firstly, I expect to find a castle that is still intact.
Behind them, both Riku and Kairi heard the sounds of shattering glass as Sephiroth decided that breaking the Castle’s windows would be an enjoyable act. Next...
...an obedient and still partially existent Organization.
The sound of Vexen’s slightly slurred speech reached them. “Woah, is that you, Number Seven?” Then a dull clunk, like the base of a claymore meeting a head.
...and lastly, I dearly hope that you aren’t letting any strangers enter the Castle That Never Was, as in recent times we’ve been finding that this has been a blatant problem...
“TAKE THAT, SEPHIROTH!”
“You will never defeat me, Clou—oOf!”
“Get him, Cloud!”
“This isn’t fair! Two on one!”
From~
The Superior
“Wait, where did Vexen go?” Kairi asked, looking up after she read the letter. She had heard his shout, but now had no idea about the location of its source.
Riku sighed and said, “Kairi, why not you go and find Vexen? I’ll go and check on Sora on my own. He shouldn’t be too hard to find.” Kairi nodded and darted off, clearly scared on what would happen to Vexen if what she had surmised from the noise was true.
The dull throbbing in Riku’s head strengthened as he started to walk down the hallway. Now it felt like a very loud drum was beating in his head. Riku winced in pain, but kept on walking. He had a Sora to find, and a Sephiroth to help defeat.

Riku, after walking through out the entire castle, finally entered the Organization’s throne room. A strange sight met his eyes.
Every single throne had been either razed, or was dangerously close to falling apart. Each of them either had been sliced in half, no doubt by a Masamune or a over-sized butchery tool, or just beaten by a certain key shaped weapon. As usual, the small Organization children had been drawn to all the fighting, and now were perched on top of the remains of their own thrones. Every single one of them was assembled, save for Xemnas, Vexen, and Saîx.
In the center of the fallen thrones was Sephiroth, Cloud, and Sora. The three of them were ricocheting off the walls or anything they could use as a foot hold, continously avoiding sharp blades and Keyblades. It seemed that Sora had used Roxas’s natural dual-wielding instincts to use both Oathkeeper and Oblivion, which made him stronger.
“Sora!” Riku shouted, drawing out his own Way to Dawn to help his friend. Not that Sora and Cloud really needed any help. Sephiroth was doing more running then fighting back, hiding under fallen rubble or using the ruins of the thrones as shields. It amused Riku to think that Sephiroth used to be referred to as a great god, and now was running away like a screaming little schoolgirl.
I shouldn’t say that to Kairi— she’d pull her Keyblade on me...
Luxord and Marluxia suddenly ran by Riku, leaping to avoid Cloud’s Buster Sword and Sora’s two Keyblades. They were shouting something over the din of swords clacking and Keyblade whacking. Riku could just pick out, “Sephiroth! Oi! You with the grey hair!”
Obviously, Sephiroth had heard the last remark. He instantly took flight and carved a complete and perfect circle in the center of the ceiling. After finishing it, he quickly flew out of the way, and snapped his fingers.
The circle detached itself from the ceiling. Ironically, the ceiling didn’t collapse, but just stayed the way it had always been— just with a gigantic circle cut into it. The circle tumbled, and squashed both Luxord and Marluxia flat to the ground, as flat as paper. Little spurts of darkness underneath the silver round said that the two had teleported out of the way just in time.
As Sephiroth, Cloud, and Sora ran out of the room to continue their battle elsewhere, Riku watched as the Organization members slid off their thrones. They all glanced at Larxene, who nodded. Xaldin smirked evilly as they followed the three fighting people, as silent and quick as Shadows.
Left alone, Riku sighed and went to help Luxord and Marluxia, praying to Kingdom Hearts that the weight of the ceiling had not destroyed them. Who knew what Xemnas would do when he found out that two of his Organization subordinates were wandering around in Twilight Town as little children. But seconds later, Marluxia and Luxord appeared in the doorway, looking windblown and frightened but otherwise unharmed. When Riku started towards them, they turned and followed their fellows.
Nobodies don’t know when to quit, do they?

“Sora, you go that way to find Sephiroth. I’ll go this way.”
“Got it.”
Even though Cloud had said he didn’t want help, he was requesting Sora to help him anyway, apparently.
Sora found himself wandering down endless corridors, peering into closets and checking under tables to try and find Sephiroth. Who ever thought that a small winged being could hide so well? Sephiroth had evidently found that his feathers were giving him away and collected them all.
“Dude, you’re never going to find him under there.”
Sora straightened up and turned around, Keyblades out, glancing around suspiciously. After a few seconds he looked up, and saw a Xigbar hanging upside-down on the ceiling.
“And why is that?” Sora demanded. He hated the sneaky grin that Xigbar gave to him, and the way he suddenly teleported to the end of the corridor with an air of oh-I-am-SO-clever.
“Because he is in there,” Xigbar answered, pointing to the door at the end of the corridor. It was, for some reason, locked. But then again, wouldn’t Sephiroth lock the dor if he was hiding behind it? Heh, like that would stop the great Keyblade master.
Sora walked up to the door and pointed his Oathkeeper at it. Instantly, the lock was unlocked and the door slid open.
“See ya later,” Xigbar said with a roguish wink. He teleported elsewhere. Sora frowned, but tossed his head disregardedly and entered anyway with Keyblades drawn.
Too late, he wondered how Sephiroth had managed to lock the door from the outside.
As soon as Sora entered, the door slammed closed, and locked. Inside it was all dark; nothing was lit (duh). Sora stepped forwards... and then was suddenly blinded by a sudden surge of bright ELECTRIC light exuding from a single person. The light, however, made the shadows of several more persons leap against the wall.
“So you decided to help Cloud to destroy Sephiroth,” said a voice. Xaldin.
“You went from goody-goody to goody-goody two shoes,” Xigbar said with a sniff of disdain.
“Well, guess what, Roxas,” Axel said. For the first time in Sora’s memory, Axel actually sounded angry (notice I used the word memory). “We’re the bad guys.”
“That means we do bad things,” Demyx piped up.
“Let’s skip the formalities!” Larxene suddenly shouted. She stepped into the circle of light, kunais winking in the bright electric spark that leaped between her antennae. “We’re here to keep Sora busy so that Sephiroth can destroy Cloud (and for reasons of personal revenge). So let’s get on with it.” There were mutters of agreement.
“Wait a minute!” Sora stuttered, frightened. True, he had beaten up the Organization before, but that was with his friends, and at least he was battling one Organization member, and not ten at a time— even if they were all... chibified. “You can’t kill me! I’m your babysitter! Kairi and Riku will PUNISH you! Badly! And they’ve got Keyblades, too!”
“Why not just write ‘fear’ all over his face?” remarked Lexeaus to no one in particular.
“We won’t kill you, we’ll just permanently maim you!” Saîx sneered. More nods of agreement, and Sora was able to see the Organization summon their weapons by Larxene’s hairlight. Two guns, six lances, a tomahawk, a book, a claymore, two chakrams, a sitar, cards, a sythe, and kunais.
He gulped.

“Where is Sora?” Cloud fumed. He stomped down a corridor, slamming doors open and close. There was the sound of snapping wind and doors banging against walls as Cloud ripped doors of their hinges and basically destroyed castle corridors. What did it matter if what was his name? Xemnas. What did it matter if Xemnas punished Sora, Kairi, and Riku for a destroyed castle. He had to find Sephiroth and destroy his darkness.
“Sephiroth! Where are you!” Cloud shouted out in frustration, knowing perfectly well that his shouting would alert his nemesis. To his surprise, Sephiroth answered him.
“Cloud, I am where you think I am. Perhaps you would come to find me,” said a disembodied voice. This struck a very odd thought in Cloud’s head.
“If you are where I think you are,” he said, grinning wickedly, “Then you must be... on the roof!”
After several minutes of climbing up staircases and Shiva-knows-what-else, Cloud emerged on the roof. A new sight met his eyes.
A tall towering figure stood with his back to Cloud, facing Kingdom Hearts. Long silver hair flapped in the wind, and three large wings were extended to give the figure a more dangerous demeanor. A long six and one half foot Masamune was held in one hand, and Cloud instantly knew that the child effects had worn off.
“Cloud,” Sephiroth said, finally back to his colder and more mature voice. “Is it not a fairer fight, now that I’m back to my full height?”
“I doubt it,” Cloud said, and watched as Sephiroth slowly turned around. Cold, maniacal aquamarine eyes glared at Cloud.
“We will fight, and this fight will determine who is the stronger of us,” Sephiroth said, and lunged at Cloud. Two swords slammed together as both Sephiroth and Cloud strived to kill each other.
“Admit it,” Sephiroth sneered. “You will never be able to defeat me.”
Cloud gritted his teeth and answered, “I’ll never admit that.” The two warriors sprang apart and went on with their fight.

“Vexen! Where are you!” Kairi wailed as she ran down the hallways. She was starting to get nervous. Saîx probably wouldn’t terminate one of his own Organization members, but Kairi wasn’t sure.
“Vexen! Answer me!” Kairi shouted, and was answered by someone asking, “Is he gone?”
“Vexen?” Kairi walked down the remainder of the hallway and opened a room door. It led down into the basement, somewhere where she had never ventured before.
Testing the old and creaky stairs, Kairi descended. As she went lower, it occurred to her that perhaps if she went too low, that she would fall right out of the bottom of the floating castle. This also drew her thoughts to the still broken Gummi Ship at the top of one of the thousand towers.
Reaching the bottom of the stairs, Kairi found a bruised Vexen curled up at the bottom of the stairs. By the look of it, the small scientist had been battered, then thrown down the long flight of stairs that led to the bottom of the basement. It was a miracle that he hadn’t broken any bones yet.
“What happened?” Kairi said, bending down. A Curagas instantly healed the scientist, allowing him to sit up and stretch.
“The Organization members? How are they?” Vexen asked, standing up and stretching a little more. Kairi smiled.
“Always worrying about the Organization’s order- even when they aren’t half as thoughtful,” she sighed, but stopped when she heard some sort of clanging. Was it swords? Or was it something else... something that sounded like a lot of squealing and different types of weapons smacking something over and over and over.
“Vexen, can you get to the top of the staircase?” Kairi asked, frowning. Vexen nodded, and Kairi said, “Good. I have to go. Go up to the top of the staircase and find a safe place. I don’t know where Sephiroth, Cloud, or anyone else is, and I’m not sure if Saîx will come back to get his revenge.”
Without waiting for an answer, Kairi stood up and charged back up the staircase. As soon as she reached the top and yanked open the door, Riku ran past her.
“Sephiroth and Cloud are fighting on the roof. Sora disappeared along with the Organization kids. Go and find Sora; I have to find Cloud and help him,” he shouted over his shoulder. In a few seconds he had turned the corner and disappeared from view. Kairi sighed and trotted off to find Sora. She didn’t fancy what she would find, especially if all of the Organization members and Sora had disappeared at the same time.

Riku ran out on the roof, and nearly toppled over the edge. He had forgotten that the roof had no rails. It was probably another miracle that neither Cloud or Sephiroth had fallen off the roof. Then again, they both seem to do more gliding then actual running.
Riku leapt out of the way when Sephiroth swung his sword, as if to clear a troublesome bug. He had a quick glance of a full grown Sephiroth before the half angel was up in the air again, battling Cloud.
“I’m coming, Cloud!” Riku shouted. Sora was not there at the moment, and Riku had taken it in mind that it was his job to fill in Sora’s place.
“Stay out of this!” Cloud shouted back, and pushed off the wall to avoid a livid looking Sephiroth. There was the sound of clashing swords, and Sephiroth interjected a quick comment.
“Still weak as ever, Cloud,” he said, smirking. Now fully grown, he didn’t have to worry about his head being clipped off or anything.
“Why don’t you drop your sword and fight me without a weapon?” Cloud shot back. Of course, this gave Sephiroth a bad idea.
Rising up in the air, Sephiroth didn’t bother to go into his dreaded three-word attack. It took too long to activate the attack, and knowing Cloud’s speed, he would be interrupted in the middle of it. Instead, he summoned his meteorites.
The familiar pink aura surrounded him, and meteorites immediantly started to rain down. Cloud, with his large over-sized butchery tool, easily deflected them. Riku of course was not so lucky.
Tall, and with barely any defense, the sixteen-year old boy resorted to do what Sora usually did, jumping from side to side and hopping... well, like a kid on hot coals. But unlike Sora, he didn’t have a Glide ability, which left him somewhat at a disadvantage.
“Ow! Ouch! Ooh! Ow! Why are you aiming at me!?” Riku protested after getting hit by several small meteorites three times in a row. It appeared that Sephiroth wanted to destroy all those who challenged his dominance.
“Sephiroth! Stop hurting those that aren’t involved and FIGHT ME!!” Cloud shouted, and leapt up. The meteorites instantly stopped as Sephiroth interrupted his attack to follow Cloud.
“He IS involved! He’s fighting with you!”
There was a flash of blinding white light as the two flew toward Kingdom Hearts, and then the two disappeared. It could have been they were never there, if you ignored all the broken castle windows, the destroyed dining table, the destructed throne room, the bruised Organization members, large holes in both walls and ceilings, the blackened places where meteorites had collided with the castle, doors ripped off their hinges, scattered weapons, sliced walls, etc.
Great, more work for us, Riku thought glumly. But at least, I think, the worst part’s over. Oh well. Might as well go and find Sora.

As one might expect, Kairi’s woman’s intuition led her unerringly towards Sora. She probably would’ve found him even if she had blindfolded herself and walked through the Castle banging off the walls- there wouldn’t have been any difference. As soon as she glimpsed the locked door and the many shouts of pain coming from within– from both Sora and the Organization— she knew something was up. Years of looking out for her friends- plus her former, long-lived yearning to find Sora and protect him, wherever he was- made her whip out her Keyblade and throw open the door.
If Kairi had entered one second earlier, she would’ve found Larxene hanging around Sora’s neck about to cut off his spiky head of hair, Demyx whacking Sora repeatedly with his sitar (and hitting everyone else half the time), Saïx snarling with his Berserk Bar fully charged, and Lexaeus silently but effectively plying his tomahawk. But when she entered, all of the Organization were sprawled on the floor, crying/sobbing/throwing tantrums very convincingly— and Sora was at the center, panting and with his Keyblades drawn.
“SORA! What did you DO?!” Kairi shouted. To her, it looked like Sora had beat every single Organization member with his Keyblades. That was not fun, especially if your before life self had been beat with a Keyblade(s).
Sora glanced up, and instantly faltered.
“No no no. Kairi, this is not what it looks l—”
“Not what it looks like!” Kairi exploded. For the first time in a long time she actually felt angry at Sora. Real burning hot rage. “NOT WHAT IT LOOKS LIKE! It looks like you just beat every single Organization member with your Keyblades. You probably did that to Vexen too and made it look like Saîx did it! This was all for a petty revenge!”
“But the Organization kidnapped you...” Sora said weakly, trying to find a source of defence against Kairi’s sympathy for the crying/sobbing/throwing tantrums Organization. He of course, lost. Kairi had more experience with arguing.
“You get to your room right now!” Kairi shouted. “I’ll deal with you later.” Sora scurried off, trying to make himself as small and inconspicuous as possible, with just one last mutinous mutter of, “Kairi’s finally cracked.”
Kairi sighed and bent down to look at the nearest Organization member; Zexion. The child seemed to have tried defending himself with his weapon, a book, and the pages were now scattered all over the place.
“Curaga,” Kairi said, pointing her keyblade at the boy. In a few seconds his wounds were healed and he was able to get up and collect his book pages.
Kairi went on with this tedious job. Using several Ethers to keep her magic up, she soon had all the Organization members back on their feet. They all requested on news on the fight of Cloud and Sephiroth, and cheered (rather convincingly) when they heard from a passing Riku that the two fighters were gone.

Later that day, when Sora was awaiting judgement miserably in his room, a sound outside his door made him look up from his oversized shoes. His expression darkened: they were passing Organization members. Specifically, the younger crew: Axel, Marluxia, and Larxene. And it didn’t alleviate when Marluxia paused, stuck out his tongue at the Keyblade bearer, and said, “Sucker.”

It was Riku who brought the message, and not Kairi.
Leaning awkwardly against the door frame, he frowned when he saw Sora kicking one of his bedposts over and over again. Normally Sora wouldn’t have done this, but after the little episode in the World That Never Was (aka, joining with Roxas) he had become more liable to throw a temper tantrum.
“Sora,” Riku said, walking in. Sora glanced up, and went back to pummeling the bed post.
Then, in a rush: “Kairi said that she forgives you but is keeping an eye on you and won’t speak to you again until you admit that you did wrong and apologize to every single Organization member and take care of them,” Riku told Sora. He said all of this very quickly, probably not wanting to like Sora’s reaction, especially when he was all steamed up.
“You can’t be serious!” Sora shouted, making Riku wince as his headache started again. “I can barely take one of them on by myself... it wasn’t even me who started the fight—!”
“Oh, c’mon Sora,” Riku said, trying to make his friend calm down. “Kairi never stays angry that long.” He stopped when Sora gave him the nasty oh-stop-joking-around-Riku glare. “Oh, fine. She can stay angry for some time, but just give her paper and a pencil and she will cool off. No big deal,” Riku said.

“Hey Kairi!” Sora said, throwing an arm around Kairi’s shoulder affectionately. “Hey, why not we color a bit. While you calm down and all...”
“Hmph.” Kairi slipped out from Sora’s grip and walked away, nose held high. It was clear that Kairi wasn’t going to talk to Sora until he took care of the Organization members. That would be a problem.

A little later....

Kairi scrubbed a silver/ grey pan, frowning. The pan was already shiny enough, but that wasn’t what troubled her. It was that Sora was not following what she told him; don’t attack the Organization Members. He had disobeyed that order, and that irked Kairi.
Riku was standing over at the silverware cabinet, doing something to the forks, spoons, and knives that were spread out across the table top. Kairi had the distinct impression that he was carving Heartless insignias into the handle of the utensils.
“Where is Sora?” Kairi asked, still rubbing away at the pot, which was so clean that it could have been a mirror. “I thought that he was suppose to be caring for the Organization.”
“I think he is taking care of them,” Riku answered, still absent-mindedly carving symbols into the silverware with the end of his Way To Dawn. “But then again, with Sora, you can’t really tell.”
Kairi simply sighed and said, “At least it’s quiet...”

“Okay. So, Sora always walks around the Proof of Existence,” Saîx said, tracing Sora’s walking path with his finger. He, and several other small Organization members, were planning to ambush Sora, for who knows why. Supposedly, it was something to do with lack of fun. Though, on Organization terms, the word fun meant complete violence and gore.
“We’re going to leap out at him, and attack him?” Zexion inquired, frowning. “That doesn’t sound very well... planned. Sora has acquired Roxas’s dual-wielding abilities, meaning he can use two Keyblades instead of one. He already defeated us all with one Keyblade... not counting his Drives.”
“He was facing one of us,” Xaldin answered. “With the four of us, and possibly more, we should be able to take him down. Remind me why we are doing this?”
“’Cause I wanna see some bloodshed,” said Larxene, tugging at her cowlicks. “It’s been to boring since Seph left, and I want some fun.”
“Lets get going,” Saîx hissed. Instantly, the Organization members pulled out their weapons. Xaldin with one spear, Saîx dragging along his claymore, Larxene with her kunais, and Zexion with his book and illusions. Perhaps not the best team, but a powerful one, even though they were kids.
“CHARGE!” Saîx howled, and barged into the Proof of Existence. HIs little minions followed, and they descended on Sora in a mound of screaming children. The Keyblade Wielder didn’t even have time to react. Once second he was pacing, and the next he was on the ground, with four little kids attacking him.
I’m really, REALLY lucky that the technology hasn’t caught up with me yet, he thought. Otherwise I’d be bleeding... and yet all I’m doing is losing a LOT of HP...
“OMGOMGOMGOMGOMGOMGOMGOMG!!!!!!!!!!1111111111ONEONEONEONE!!!!! SHIFTSHIFTSHIFTSHIFT!!!!!!!1111111111111!!!!11ELEVENELEVENELEVENELEVENELEVEN!!!!11111111111111111111111111BBQPORKCHOPS! I’M GONNA DIE!” Sora screamed, and took off running, waving his arms crazily, and screaming. <------------------------------ (really no duh)

“Sora, where are you going?” Demyx asked, walking out of his room, just in time to see Sora race by, screaming something about barbecues and pork chops at the top of his lungs. Sora’s eyes were practically bulging out of his head, his mouth was open, his tongue lolling out, and a high pitched scream coming from what Demyx thought was weak vocal chords.
“I’MGONNADIE!KINGDOMHEARTS!SAVEMEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!11<<insert other chatspeak language here>>,” Sora screamed, waving his arms around. He raced right past Demyx, mowed down Axel, and rammed Marluxia into the wall, before he raced around the corner, and vanished from sight.
“Roxas! Come on out and take your beating like a TRUE Nobody!” Saîx shouted, racing after Sora, with Xaldin, Larxene, and Zexion on his heels. (Xaldin, Saîx, and Larxene are the Trio of D00M!)
Ironically, a ghost Roxas poked his head from around the corner in which Sora rounded to hide.
“You called, Number Seven?” he asked, walking —or drifting— toward the Trio of D00M and Zexion. Suddenly, light sparkled, and he summoned his Oathkeeper and Oblivion. “You said to take my beating like a Nobody.”
Saîx gulped audibly, clearly afraid of the now tall Roxas, with his Keyblades of D00M! (Okay, I’ll stop with the doom stuff.)

Sora just rounded the corner, when something inside of himself got detached. Glancing over his shoulder, he saw the ghostly form of Roxas (dressed in his Organization trench coat) drifting toward Saîx’s angry voice. Sora smirked, and use Quick Run to put more distance in-between himself, and the angry Trio of D00M! Roxas-himself- whatever would handle them until Sora found some kind of way to escape their wrath.
“OUCH! HEY! CUT IT OUT!” Sora heard Larxene squeal, and there was the sound of lances and claymores slicing through air.
“No fair! You’re see-through!” he heard Xaldin complain, and Saîx roared with anger. He heard Zexion mutter something about using a spell to get rid of ghost, but Sora didn’t care. The only thing that echoed in his mind was, RUN FOR YOUR PITIFUL LITTLE LIFE, YOU ALL POWERFUL KEYBLADE WIELDER! Sora had a big head, and a bigger ego to boot.
“Oh, look, a Gummi Ship!” Sora shouted to no one in particular. It was the large silver dragon that Riku and Sora had to explode before battling Xemnas battles #3 and #4. Perhaps to the Organization members it was a battle ship, but to Sora, it was freedom, and a chance to live for thirty more seconds.
“Wooterz!” Sora shouted, as he entered the dragon. He ran to the controls, and banged his fist on them. “So, how do ya control this? Usually there is a control, and the player has to press X to fire, and O to dodge roll, and they use the left analogue stick to manuever the Gummi Ship; but I see nothing of that here.”
If Sora wasn’t so concentrated on the controls, he might have seen the small forms of children slip into the Gummi Ship and hide. But he was Sora; naive, ignorant, and bordering on the edge of Goofy-stupidness.
“HA!” he shouted, banging his fist on the controls. Instantly, the dragon’s wings opened, and he was suddenly gently coasting above the World That Never Was, seeing the thousands of notice boards, neon lights, and the gold glowing eyes of Heartless as the dragon circled once, twice, and finally three times before lifting off.

“Ouch!”
“Hey!”
“Stop kicking!”
“Wasn’t me!”
“No duh, Zexion. You’re the smallest kid in here.”
“You shouldn’t be talking, Larxene.”
“Shush.”
“Hey! I’m higher rank then you, so I have a right to be as loud as I want, Number Seven!”
“But Xemnas made me second-in-command if he is away, or unable to act in the current situation. That leaves me in charge.”
“So... how are we suppose to ambush Sora? After all, we did leave our weapons back at the castle.”
“...................................”
“Xaldin does speak the truth, Saîx. We are missing our weapons.”
“I guess we will just have to improvise.”
“With Kingdom Hearts knows what? We have no plan! The most we can do is a suicide ambush. Four weaponless Organization members against the Keyblade Master.”
“..................................”
“Have you forgotten that we control certain elements of power, Zexion?”
“Oh.”
“So, we attack when I say so. On three. One— two— three!”
Sora screamed with fear when four Organization members burst out of a box underneath he control counter. A Berserking Berserker, etc. etc. ((Author too lazy to write all four members popping out of the box.))
“WHERE DID YOU COME FROM!” Sora shouted, but was suddenly zapped by a bit of electricity. Xaldin smashed him against the wall with a strong gust of wind, Zexion summoned an illusion Keyblade and started to whack Sora with it, and Saîx... well... Sora wouldn’t even go to what Saîx was doing.
“Huh! Wah! Stop it!” Sora shouted, flailing uselessly. Larxene was zapping him from afar, Xaldin was contentedly standing on the control panel and sending large rushes of wind at him, stepping back and forth and triggering who knew what, Zexion was whacking him with an illusion Keyblade, and Saîx had latched himself onto Sora’s right index finger, holding it in his mouth, and refusing to let go. “Hey! Guys! Someone needs to drive the ship! Oh, never mind! Firaga!”
In a burst of fire, all the Organization members were sent flying, and the four of them were smashed into the walls. Saîx scowled, sitting back up. His fall had been cushioned by both Larxene and Zexion, making him the least hurt of all.
“Time for Plan B,” he muttered. A confused Sora scratched his head. Plan B?
Wait a second. Don’t Plan Bs always work better?
“Ha!” Saîx shouted, and grabbed a handful of braids from Xaldin’s hair. Lunging forward, he dragged the braids across Sora’s neck, thoroughly starting to choke him.
“No Sa— kuguhadkhgkahgkahgkadknvkmancgbmabrgtuoaihgkvnvkahsdgakndknv!” wailed Xaldin. Meanwhile, Sora’s shouts were cut off by the mass of braids, at which he clawed at them, choking and making little wheezing sounds. Saîx cruelly twisted the braids, laughing maniacally. Summoning his claymore from the weapon’s closet, he lifted it up to deliver the final blow when—
“AAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGH!”
The dragon ship went spinning out of control, spiralling downwards into a nose dive. Saîx was thrown from his perch on the control panel, and was flipped head over heels. Smacking the ground, he saw Sora grab a handhold as the Gummi Ship slammed —nose first— into the ground. There was a two second span of complete silence, before a gigantic BOOM ripped throughout the entire area, and the Gummi Ship detonated.

“That sucked,” Zexion hissed, standing up and brushing himself off. Like his fellow Nobodies, he had been smart enough to run before the detonation. Yes, the Organization used their teleporting skills to do other things then to just rush to the bathroom before their bladders exploded. “I mean, the entire Gummi Ship exploded.”
“Saîx’s plan were never the greatest,” Xaldin spat. He was rubbing his sore scalp. Obviously, the Sora strangling technique had hurt him a lot.
“You think?” Larxene answered. She held her kunais in one hand, glaring menacingly at Saîx. Saîx himself was staring at something over all three of their shoulders. To boot, he was blushing.
“Superior, sorry to intrude on your privacy,” Saîx stammered. The other three Organization members wheeled around, and they saw who Saîx was talking to.
Xemnas was standing a few feet away, holding a Moogle upside-down. A bunch of synthesis materials were littered at his feet, along with several other strange items. It appeared that the Gummi Ship had crashed in Twilight Town, and conveniently, Xemnas had been in the exact area were the Gummi Ship had crashed.
“Uh... this is... awkward,” Sora said, scratching the back of his head. He —with his Nomura powers and all— had been able to live through the explosion. He was not marked with any signs of the explosion, if you didn’t see his HP bar, which was flashing red with the ambulance sound echoing. ((Okay. Enough with the game play jokes.))
“What is the meaning of this?!” Xemnas demanded. He quickly hid the mound of items at his feet, and stomped toward the group. Fake anger boiled off of him in waves.
“Uh, hey, Xemnas,” Sora said, holding up a hand, as if greeting the Superior of the Organization. “Y’know, I just wanted to take the dragon for a spin, and... well... it kinda didn’t turn out so well. With the different stuff and all...”
“Leave,” Xemnas said coldly, glaring at Sora with glowing orange eyes. “I shall send Kairi and Riku back to Destiny Islands after you. Expect your payment by the end of this week.” Xemnas swept out his arm impressively, and a Corridor of Darkness opened. Before Sora could argue, the Trio of D00M pushed him in.

So, as fate decided it, Sora, Kairi, and Riku were able to get back to Destiny Islands with all of their limbs intact. By the end of the week, they received a letter from Xemnas.

Dear Baby-sitters,

After accounting all the damage done on the castle, I have taken the fee out of your paycheck. Rest assured, you do NOT owe any munny to the Organization. (We have taken that fine from Shinra, but you need not know of that.) Please except our offerings of gratitude.
From,
~The Superior

Days afterwards, a black and white package arrived. When opened, the three babysitters found two munny and a stabbed Aerith doll at the bottom of the box. Their payment, and a present.
“Well, that was nice,” Kairi said, trying to cheer her two friends up. “Perhaps we can try it again some time in the future.”

~Fin.

 

That was awesome! So great! So funny and so creative! I loved it.
There was only one problem: my parents got very annoyed because of my constant (and loud) laughing.
I really enjoyed this one! Thank you!
That was all I have to say... I'm speechless.

 

Thanks. I'm glad you liked it. ^_^
Wow, someone REALLY hated it. 0.0
Heh, whatever.

 

AWESOMELY FUNNY... and awesomely random. Lolz

You might want to consider putting it up in parts so that you don't terrify people with the massive amount of scrolling we readers have to do ^_^

Your ending's kinda smashed together.

 

Thanks Wavewhisper. I'll think about putting my fanfictions up in parts next time.