Skeleton Keys, Chapter 15.4

Even with all five of them chasing after the Heartless, they lost track of it after the first fork in the corridors.  The Heartless had intentionally fooled them, hiding in the shadows of the poorly-lit higher corridors.  It was afraid of the pursuers, afraid of what they’d do to it, especially that flying swordsman with the huge sword.  When all five of the pursuers passed into the adjacent corridor, the Heartless slid silently the opposite way, into an even darker section of the castle’s corridors.

As the light faded around it, a faint but noticeable sound filled the senses of the Heartless.  It was the sound of someone playing music.  The Heartless traced the tantalizing tune, always following its increasing volume.  It soon realized that the instrument being played was an electric sitar.  The Heartless kept approaching the sound until it reached a door at the far end of the corridor where it was the darkest.  The Heartless stood at the door, laid a hand on the doorknob, and entered.

The room the Heartless wandered into was a poorly-lit one.  Candles glowed in the corners of the room, their dancing blue flames casting strange shadows onto the litany of instruments scattered all over the room.

Despite the number of instruments, there was only one person in the room.  The person was wearing the black garments customary to this castle as well as a pair of sunglasses that hid his eyes.  His hair was done up in a sandy-tan mullet.  This person, a young man roughly in his early twenties, had stopped playing the electric-blue sitar in his lap and was eying the Heartless curiously.  “Well, haven’t seen one of you in a while,” he said.  “Were you attracted here by my sitar?”

The Heartless nodded sheepishly.

The musician nodded to himself in acknowledgement.  Thinking about the circumstances, he asked, “I know this may be a strange thing to ask, but can you play an instrument?”

The Heartless nodded again, this time slightly more enthusiastically.  The Heartless looked around the blue-lit room, its eyes traveling along the walls.  Suddenly its eyes stopped, resting on a piano seated in the center of the left wall (It was more of a keyboard, actually).  The Heartless meandered over and sat itself on the bench in front of it.  It sized up the keys on the keyboard as it flexed its fingers, placed them on the appropriate keys, and began to play, its pale eyes closed.  

The song started deep, the notes sounding like the growl of a demon in the quiet room.  Soon, the music rose slightly, lifting the mood slightly from blazing anger to deep sadness.  This sadness and a feeling of yearning permeated throughout the room along with the music.  The fingers of the Heartless moved like elegant spiders across the keys, flawlessly executing the music.  The musician watched on with curious fascination.

The piece played was a fairly short one; it was over in less than five minutes.  The Heartless spun around in the chair, facing the prostrate musician.  He sat up on his bed, his glasses in one hand as he rubbed his light turquoise eyes with the other.  When he put his glasses back on, he said, “Davy Jones always played that song.  Did you know him?”

The Heartless bitterly nodded and turned back towards the keyboard.  That was answer enough.

Another question popped up into the mind of the musician.  “Pardon my being so rude to such an interesting guest, but do you know any other pieces on the piano?”

The Heartless seemed to think for a little bit before nodding again.  It flexed its fingers and situated them on the keys again, beginning to play almost immediately.

This song also started somewhat low, but not quite as low as the first one.  At first, the same feeling of longing and sadness echoed in the room.  But, when the music purposefully spiked for a note, a new feeling altogether took hold:  a feeling of hope, happiness, and romance.  The Heartless seemed to get into this piece now, becoming more active and fluid in its movements.

Suddenly, the door leading into the castle was slammed open.  Caught by surprise, the Heartless slurred some of its notes together and turned towards its guest.  The musician turned that way as well, a humorous smile on his face.  Both of them stared at their guest, a woman wearing a snow-white dress.

The Heartless immediately hopped off of its bench and ran for her, a tear forming in each eye.  The woman knelt down and met the Heartless in a warm embrace, allowing it to grasp her dress for comfort.  “It’s okay now,” she whispered to it.  “I know who you are.”

The musician strolled over to the pair, saying, “Who do we have here, a fan for this Heartless?”

The woman turned her head towards him and said, “My name is Emily, thank you.”

The musician slid his glasses down his face, but only enough to expose his eyes.  “Emily, eh?” he asked suavely.  “My name is Demyx; a pleasure to meet you.”  He extended a hand down to her, but the Heartless swiftly batted it away.  It now glared at Demyx with annoyance.

“Apparently, this Heartless is rather fond of you,” Demyx commented.  “Was he your boyfriend or something before it lost its heart?”

Emily looked into the Heartless’s eyes and then back up to Demyx before saying, “Yes.”


The scene Naminé had portrayed in her picture was precisely what was happening to me.  My arms and legs were shackled at the wrists and ankles, the silvery chains holding me high in a dark chasm.  They branched off from me in four directions; but no matter which one I looked at, I couldn’t see the end to them.  I had awoken to this sight when I fell unconscious in the stairwell leading from Vexen’s and Lexaeus’s tomb.  At first, I had struggled to break the chains, but they had proved too resilient.  I could only hang my head in hopeless despair.

Suddenly, a bright light shone before me, piercing the gloom like an arrow in flight.  The light was small, but it increased in size as I lifted my head to see it.  

A dark blurry shape appeared in the middle of the light, obviously shadowed by it.  I struggled in my chains to get closer to the light, to get a better look at the shape.  As if bending to my whims, the ends of the chains started to travel through the brink of darkness straight towards the light.  When the chains touched the rim of the light, they jerked me towards the light.  

I didn’t try to struggle as the chains reeled me into the light.  Instead, I let them carry me.  The closer I got to the light, the warmer I felt.  

Soon, I hovered in front of the light, its previously blinding effects dimmed down to tolerable levels.  The dark eclipsing shape was still rather shadowed, but I could now tell who it was:  Naminé.  She gazed at me with a glint in her eyes as happy as her smile.  She took a step back, closed her eyes in concentration, and placed her hands together.  I noticed that one link from each of my four chains glowed brightly.  Naminé forcefully thrust her hands out to her sides, and each of the links that glowed instantly vanished, effectively shattering the chains’ hold on me.  All of the links instantly appeared in Naminé’s left hand.  Immediately, she reached out her right hand and grabbed my shirt, yanking me into the light.

Another, brighter, light flashed when I was about to crash into her, temporarily blinding me.  I never felt the impact.  All I felt were my feet gently alighting on a stone floor.  A pair of arms was wrapped around me, hugging me.  Their touch made my skin grow cold, but I could feel a hole in my chest warm up.  I heard a voice coo in my ear, “I knew you’d come back to me.”

I couldn’t help but smile as I hugged her back.  “It’s good to be back, Emily,” I replied as a tear of joy fell to the floor.

I heard footsteps echo behind me.  I turned my head that way, only to see Demyx.  He smiled as he said, “Nice to see you’re back to normal, Michael.”

Axel and Naminé reappeared right next to Demyx, both of them happy to see me.  Axel’s face was still quite serious, however.  “About time to get back to business, don’t you think?”

I nodded once, before a tremor shook the room.  Both Demyx and Axel looked towards the ceiling.  “Don’t tell me that arrogant little-” another tremor, stronger this time, cut him off.

Axel turned towards Demyx and said, “We need an elevator, up two floors.  We have to bring them with us.”  He pointed to Emily, Naminé, and me when he said this.

Demyx smiled.  “Can do.”  He nestled his sitar in a normal playing position and, turning the volume knob up to the maximum setting, struck a powerful chord.  The sound waves, even though I couldn’t hear them, were so powerful, they were actually visible!  All of the waves produced shot up towards the ceiling in a single column, cutting a circular hole clear through the next couple of floors.  Demyx instantly cut the chord as the debris fell to this floor.  

Demyx started playing again when the dust settled, but this time he was actually playing music.  The sound waves of this song were visible as well, but now they appeared as sheet music would, spiraling up through the holes made.  

Axel reached out and grabbed one of the notes as it lifted higher on the bars, taking him up like an elevator.  It was only when Naminé grabbed the note right below his foot that Emily and I caught on.  We too grabbed a pair of notes for ourselves, being whisked away by the melody (literally).  They felt cold and wet to the touch, like a solid force of water.

Demyx grabbed the last note that he played, the bar of music abruptly stopping without his enchanted sitar to sustain it.

All five of us were carried up through Marluxia’s throne room (as Axel revealed) and up into a vast laboratory.  One element of this lab I instantly recognized:  a portal to the Realm of Darkness!  A hooded figure faced the front of the writhing vortex, an all-too familiar scythe in his hand with blood dripping off of it.  He was too preoccupied with the portal to notice us enter.

I stayed behind Axel, who was camouflaged into the shadows with his hood up.  I looked through the gap between him and Demyx, who had also blended into the darkness.  Around the machine containing the dark vortex, four bodies were scattered.  Two of them had splotches of red staining their dark robes, dripping over their horribly mangled selves.  The other two were in considerably better shape, one with only a gash on his head and the other with barely a scratch on him.  Both of these two were unconscious, however.

Below Marluxia’s feet, sticking out of the machine were the three Keyblades of Heart.  The Twilight Key, stuck in the center, seemed to call out to me.  Axel seemed to sense its attraction to me and held me back.  He held up a finger to me and wagged it, clearly saying ‘no‘.  He then used this same hand to draw one of his weapons from his robes.  He brought it around to his front and threw it like a Frisbee.  I could barely hear it over the churning and writhing energy of the vortex, so Marluxia couldn’t have known it was coming.  

I couldn’t have been more wrong.  I still don’t know how he knew where it was, but he spun around when the weapon was about to strike him and caught the blade of his scythe in the decorative pattern.  He halted himself abruptly and threw back his hood, revealing a maniacal grin and purple eyes that shone like a blaze.  These eyes were aimed right at Axel.  “How amusing!” he thundered.  “The traitor is attacking his lord!”

Axel also threw back his hood; his identity was called.  However, he too was smiling.  “You’re calling me the traitor?  Organization XIII was founded to reconnect with our lost selves, not whatever the heck you’re doing.  The Superior wouldn’t like that.”

Marluxia smiled all the wider.  “You fool!  I’m releasing the Superior!”

This news froze Axel to the core.  He staggered backwards, knocking into me and Naminé.  Both of us fell to the floor in a heap.  It was only when the chains still attached to the manacles clattered on the floor that I realized that I was still wearing them from within that dark abyss.

This was instantly brought to Marluxia’s attention.  He looked our way with his violet vision with a humorous smile and said, “How very amusing.  The high and mighty Axel has brought in a couple of children to do his dirty work!  And don’t they make a cute couple though, the heartless boy and the manipulating witch!”  He threw his head back and gave a loud cackle.

Suddenly, the vortex sucked inward, like a bubble being blown inwards.  Marluxia turned around, his grin stretched from ear to ear.  “You’re all too late, none the less!  The King of Darkness is coming, and there is nothing you can do to stop him now!”  He stretched his arms out as if to embrace the vortex’s opening.

I got up and dashed past Naminé and Axel. Muttering, “Not if I have anything to say about it,” I loaded a fist at my side.  

Marluxia perceived this attack and calmly spun around again, flinging Axel’s weapon straight at me from off of his scythe.  I leapt into the air and performed a somersault over the weapon, plucking it straight out of the air as it flew under me.  I kept running, the weapon still spinning around my hand.  I even gave the weapon a charge of my own brand of energy.  White and black flames flared around the weapon, giving it an extra blade.

My determination and power impressed Marluxia, but not enough so to let up on me.  He sliced the air in front of him, and a pink energy wave shrieked from the scythe through the air and right towards me.  Keeping the momentum of Axel’s weapon going vertically, I held it in front of me and sliced the energy wave like a buzz saw cutting a board.  The energy dissipated into nothing as soon as it was split.  

I continued my charge right to the main control box of the portal under Marluxia’s feet, right where the keys were being held.  I wrapped my fingers around the Twilight Key, tearing it straight out of the machine in a shower of sparks.  Marluxia was completely caught off guard by my voracious move and could only defend himself as I thrust Axel’s weapon straight at him.  Our weapons were locked, the teeth of my weapon caught on the shaft of his.  With the weapon stopped, however, the flames I created were put out.

In this opportunity, Marluxia saw an opening.  He slid the shaft of his weapon through the teeth of mine, until the scythe blade collided full into my hand.  I was forced to let go.  Marluxia scooped the weapon into the curve of his scythe blade, throwing it back into Axel’s awaiting grasp.  

That was a big mistake.  With one of my hands free, I tore a key from the ring still in my pocket.  I held it in front of me and shouted, “Hero’s Crest:  Berserk!”  The key increased in size, looking like a firm Greek pillar at full size with brown blades hewn onto either side.  From this blade radiated a reddish energy that blazed from the rest of me as well.

With both of my Keyblades in my hands, I slashed at Marluxia with intense ferocity, my blows coming in quick combinations and striking at any weak spots I perceived.  Marluxia dodged them all effectively, but at least he was still on the defensive.  Both of us gave our strikes everything we had.

All of a sudden, I slid under a surprised Marluxia, now standing between him and the open vortex.  Marluxia’s back was wide open.  With my blades in an X formation, I leapt into the air to deliver the fatal blow.  Unfortunately, I hadn’t foreseen that he would turn around sharply and give me a thrust with his scythe.  I flew backwards, dazed by his attack.  This opening was all Marluxia needed.  He set up his scythe with the spikes scraping the top of the machine.  Then, as if he were a professional hockey player shooting the puck into the goal, he hit me straight into the open mouth of the vortex.

Marluxia stood back, admired his handiwork, and spat, “Ha, so much for your protégé, Axel.  It seems that not even one of the almighty Key bearers is a match for me!”  He let out an insidiously obnoxious cackle of victory to emphasize his point.

However, Naminé had other ideas.  She took out the four links that she took from the chains that bound me.  She held them in her hands tightly, pouring her magic into them.  They instantly fused together to form a single chain.  With a little more magic, the chain started to increase in length with more links being added to it.  The end link to this chain was an augmented hook, coursing with her magic.  She spun this special hook around a few times before throwing it like a lifeline straight into the portal of darkness.  The hook shot straight towards my falling form and hooked itself onto the chains still around my wrist.  

Realizing what she was doing, Marluxia instantly sliced the chain with his scythe.  All of the links in Naminé’s hand vanished, but the remainder of the chain continued to get sucked into the Realm of Darkness, following right behind me into the black oblivion.  Marluxia turned towards the group huddled before him, scythe and teeth in clear view as he said, “Now, does anyone else care to face me?”


I watched the room as well as Marluxia vanish as I was forced deeper and deeper into the Realm of Darkness, being pulled in by some unknown force.  This force surrounded me like a shroud, like a living presence I could feel almost breathing around me.  The air was thick with this heavy breathing and the scattered echoes of maniacal laughter.  I could feel the darkness around me invading my senses and seeping into my lungs as the laughter grew louder.  My eyes grew increasingly hazy, barely able to distinguish my arms from my legs…

In my intoxicated mental state, I saw figures before me.  All of these blurry forms were looking at me with smiles on their faces, their joy shining in the darkness.  I rubbed the black out of my eyes, and the light shone out more brilliantly, illuminating the figures completely.  My eyes grew wide as I recognized them one by one:  Aladdin, Hercules, Mike, Pinocchio, Arial, Peter Pan, Mulan, Will, the Beast, Belle, Demyx, Axel, Jack, Donald, Goofy, Sora and Riku… Everyone I had befriended on this adventure now stood before me.  “My friends… they gathered here to me…” I joyfully sighed, my eyes drifting from one to another and back again.  I could feel the Twilight Key grow warmer as a tear welled up in my eye.

Behind them, I could make out one last figure; actually, a pair of figures.  One of them I instantly recognized as Howl, but the second one I had trouble placing an identity on.  One minute she looked like Emily; the next she phased into Naminé and back again the next minute.  Both she and Howl were talking together, more businesslike than romantic from the looks on their faces.  They both turned towards me.  When they did, all of my other friends faded into the light, only leaving small objects behind.  Howl ran through the light, black feathers covering his bare arms and neck.  The mysterious woman followed behind.  Howl’s wings extended from his back and lifted him off the ground in a flying position.  As Howl transformed into his eagle form, the woman ran up behind him and leapt onto his back, right at the base of his neck.  She collected the objects left floating in the light as Howl flew towards me.  Without me telling them to, my legs spun around, coiled up, and threw me into the air, Howl’s head passing beneath me.  I landed on his neck, barely an inch away from the other passenger.  She was fiddling with the objects she had collected, which on closer inspection turned out to be chain links forming a chain.  The woman lashed this chain around Howl’s neck, the end of this chain snapping onto the manacle around my sword arm’s wrist.  The other end was gently thrust into my hand.

Howl increased his flying speed; I could feel the winds of his velocity whip through my hair.  I could also feel the woman’s cold hands grow warm on my shoulders.  I could hear her voice, a blending of Namine’s timidity and Emily’s soft tones, whisper a message in my ear:  “Neither I nor your friends will ever abandon you, so long as you keep hold of your chain of memories.  When all other lights are blocked, let it be your light in the darkness…”

This final word echoed in the chamber of light, shattering the light like a stone shatters a mirror.  The shards of light faded, leaving only the black oblivion of the Realm of Darkness around me.  I could feel the hands slip away, dissolving along with the rest of her like the sands of time.

One thing was certain, though.  The chains were still in my hands, and the dark form below me was no illusion.  I could still feel the winds brush past my face as much as I could hear the faint beating of wings in time with the breathing before me.  Was I actually riding Howl, or was my mind playing tricks on me, succumbing to the darkness around me?  

My answer came when I saw a pinpoint of light ahead of me, piercing my eyes and eradicating any possible illusions from it.  Howl was still visible.  This revelation loosed another question in my mind:  How did Howl get here?  

As we flew, the light grew brighter and larger.  The light revealed a scene in its brilliance, a picture that I didn’t wish to behold.  Marluxia and Axel were locked in combat, blood dripping from both of their weapons, but only staining Axel’s robe.  He was severely wounded but still determined to do battle with Marluxia.  Demyx was in the background, shielding Naminé and Emily, hiding their eyes from the gruesome scene and their bodies from the shower of blood.  I could feel the Twilight Key throb in my hands as I looked upon the scene.

Howl’s speed increased further, carrying us both closer and closer to the portal.  It was only a matter of time before Axel succumbed to Marluxia’s strength.  I held on to the chains as the portal to Castle Oblivion drew nearer and nearer.

When we were barely three yards from the portal, I felt Howl brake all of a sudden.  I raised my head that had been thrown into Howl’s feathery neck and spat, “Howl, what’s the matter?  Why are we stopping?”

“Something’s got my leg,” Howl grunted as he attempted to lurch forward.  Instead, we fell back more in the dark realm.  “No good; that thing’s too powerful, even for me.  You’re going to have to run for it.”

“What!?”  I couldn’t believe what I was hearing!  “I can’t run with nothing beneath me!”

“Sure you can,” Howl panted as he struggled against the force on his foot.  “Just straighten your legs, run for the light portal, and save yourself.  If he gets the Twilight Key or any Keyblade, he’ll be unstoppable.”  With a final tug by that unseen power, Howl was pulled out right from under me into the black oblivion.  I could tell by his coloring as he fell farther that he was transforming back into his human form.

I was left floating alone in the void again, only a few meters away from Axel and Marluxia’s fight; only a short distance away from aiding him but unable to stop or aid.  Blow after blow my eyes were forced to endure, my grip tightening on the Twilight Key’s hilt.

Suddenly, while their weapons were locked, Marluxia picked a rose from his pocket and threw it into the air with his free hand.  Axel threw himself back from Marluxia right when the rose exploded like a firework.  Petals from the rose shot out every which way, creating a vortex that both shielded Marluxia and attacked Axel.

However, Axel was one step ahead of him.  He held his chakram out in front of him, both circles staring Marluxia in the face.  Axel poured his power into the weapons, and a solid wall of flames shot out in front of him.  The petals weren’t powerful enough to break through the wall and burned upon impact.

Marluxia grinned as the petals fell before Axel’s firewall in charred ashes.  With Axel’s vision blocked by his own attack, Marluxia charged his scythe with his own power.  A demonic glaze iced his eyes as his grin exposed bloodthirsty fangs.  Demyx and the girls were paralyzed out of fear, unable to move or look away.  When Marluxia was satisfied, he brought the scythe down hard.  Another scythe blade made of energy appeared above Axel’s head; unfortunately, he didn’t notice it.  He was too concentrated on his defensive stance.  The energy blade fell as the original fell, faster, faster, faster…

The attack was halted with the energy blade a fraction of an inch from Axel’s skull, sliding right between two spikes in is hair.  It was only then that he turned down his flames to better view what happened.  Neither he nor anyone else present could believe their eyes.  A chain had securely wrapped around Marluxia’s arm, holding it still.  The chain extended from him into the portal of darkness, the other end wrapped around my wrist.  I jerked on the chain, and the chain tightened on Marluxia’s arm.  The added force shocked Marluxia into dropping the scythe with a clatter on the tiles.

“It can’t be…” Marluxia gasped.  “No one escapes – could possibly escape – from the Realm of Darkness.  How did you find your way back?”

I sneered and replied, “I found my light, and it guided me back.  Now let’s finish this, you self-righteous ass-jacker!”

Marluxia’s temper flared hotter than even Axel’s most intense flames, and it showed in his red face.  He took hold of my chain in his gloved fist.  He kicked up his scythe and caught it with his free hand while giving my chain a hard yank.  Unable to contend with his force, I was thrown forward, right at Marluxia and the scythe poised to cut my skull cleanly in two.  I put myself onto the defensive, holding out the Twilight Key before me perpendicular to the area of impact.  When Marluxia lashed out with his scythe, metal met metal with neither blade giving an inch.

Unfortunately, I forgot one factor.  When Marluxia reeled his arm back to pull me in, he was simultaneously pulling a punch.  This punch he delivered full to my face, the chain still held tightly.  The collision to my head felt like a brick shatter against it, while he appeared to take no recoil.  Instead, I took a return trip the way I just came.  The blow heavily weakened my stamina; I could feel my consciousness waning.  I had my eyes closed, half in pain, and half to prevent the blood from my wound getting to them.  Because of this, I didn’t see myself enter the Realm of Darkness; nor did I see the panic-stricken faces of Emily, Naminé, Demyx, and even Axel as they beheld this brutality and what was to come.  

Marluxia waited for the chain to become taught before he pulled m in again.  A slight blood splatter marked my moment of whiplash.  I expected another blow to join the first.  Marluxia seemed to read my mind.  His wicked grin revealed my plans even if no words were exchanged.  Instead of gearing up for another attack, he just let me sail right by him.  If I continued my course (which Marluxia had no desire to alter) I would surely crash into the wall.  He let the chain unravel from his arm, closed his eyes, and awaited the inevitable crash.  

He did hear a collision, but it wasn’t the one he was listening for.  Instead of body-on-stone, it sounded like body-on-body.  That couldn’t be right.  He opened his eyes, scowling as he looked around.  The spot from where he though he heard the noise was empty.  No body, no gash in the wall, not even a blood spatter.  “Where the hell did he go!?”

No one present had an answer for him.  No one, that is, except for two disembodied voices:  “Dude, don’t get your man-thong twisted up your ass!” “The Heil-men are right here!”  A portal appeared right above the center of the room.  There was something different about this portal, Marluxia realized.  It wasn’t a distortion caused by darkness; it was more like space was commanded to alter rather than forced to…

No, it couldn’t be!  But it was; only one Nobody in the castle had the balls but lacked the brains to taunt him in that indecent manner.  And, sure enough, it was Xigbar who came down from the portal’s depths with my unconscious body slung over his shoulder.  However, someone else accompanied him.  He was considerably shorter than Xigbar, but he wasn’t a shrimp either.  In one hand, he held one of Xigbar’s pistols trained on Marluxia’s head, his steely blue eyes never straying from their mark.  In his other hand he held a green-shafted staff wrapped near the end with purple silk.  A blue orb fixated onto its silk-adorned end was engraved with the mark of the Nobodies.  The spikes of this symbol protruded on either side from amongst the silks and at the end that poked a hole through the tiles.  Although the dark Organization robe clashed with these two colorful adornments, his demeanor clearly spoke of lighthearted finesse.  “So, who’s throwing this shindig without us?”

Axel’s chakram fell to the floor.  “Xigbar, what are you doing here?” he asked with a mixture of irritation and relief.  “I, we, could have been killed!”

Xigbar only chuckled.  “I thought that you of all people would know that we can’t truly die, especially after that incident last year.  Only he,” indicating me with a shrug of his shoulder, “could have died.”  He turned to the three in the corner and warmly said, “You can get up now.”

Demyx cautiously got up first, using his sitar for support.  He assisted Naminé as she stood up, but Emily stood up on her own.  She scrutinized this newcomer; her eyes darted from him to me and back again rapidly.  His hair was spikier than mine with blue streaks hanging right above his eyes.  The rest of his hair was brown.  He was almost precisely my height, but it was hard to discern his weight through his Organization robes.  But the feature that she compared the most was the face. Even though they were on two degrees of consciousness, the resemblance was uncanny, even scary.  Even the feeling she got from looking into his eyes was the same…

The stranger caught her examining him.  She immediately looked away out of embarrassment.  “It’s okay, no need to be shy;” he said.  “The name’s Machelix.”  She could instantly pick out something in his voice.  It was faint, but noticeable at the same time, like the flame of a match in a dark cave; a slight feeling of familiarity, of reminisce.  It seemed to her that he was gazing at her through a fog with those blue eyes of his.  “I’ll get to know you better after I deal with this jerk.”  He returned his gaze to Marluxia.  

Only Marluxia wasn’t there.  No one had even noticed as he escaped Machelix’s sights to the only sanctuary:  the portal of darkness.  Even now he was escaping into its depths.  

The other Nobodies had no intention of following him, not yet.  Xigbar knelt down and laid my body down on the floor.  He carefully inspected my injuries as Axel, Demyx, Naminé, and Emily gathered ‘round.  “Judging from my expertise in causing such wounds, his skull’s fractured and his right wrist is sprained.  I wouldn’t put it past the shoulder to be dislocated, either.  In short, his arm’s shot and nine out of ten chance of a concussion.  He hasn’t even recovered from his prior injuries properly.”

“That, and he’s unconscious.”

Xigbar frowned.  “Well, Axel, if you wanna get technical about it…”

“Shouldn’t we wake him up?” Naminé asked.  

“Nah, we should treat his injuries first,” suggested Axel.  “One of his friends was a spell caster who could cure wounds, so let’s find him.  Demyx, stay here and guard those three.  Xigbar, you’re with me.”

“And what about me?” Machelix huffed.

“You stay here and guard Demyx,” Xigbar sniggered.  Demyx was going to say something about that, but Xigbar slipped away through a portal at his feet before he could say anything.  Axel disappeared via the one he created.

Machelix was also displeased by their abrupt departure, but he shrugged it off.  “So, this is my other, right?”

Emily stared at him, questioning and curiosity flowing from her eyes.  “What do you mean by ‘other’?  Why do you look so much like Michael?”

Machelix quietly sighed and took a seat, saying in reply, “Me and Xigbar, Axel, Demyx, and even Naminé, aren’t exactly what you’d call ‘normal people’.  We aren’t born; we’re created through extreme circumstances.  The leading cause of our creation occurs concurrently with the creation of Heartless, when a person’s heart is lost.  The body and soul left behind from this process is called a Nobody.  I believe you can piece together what happened.”

Emily looked down at me, her eyes betraying her thoughts of joyful reminisce.  Machelix looked down as well, but he kept his face indifferent as he dove back into the pools of his memory…