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Fanfiction ► Kingdom Hearts 4: Connected Worlds



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KeybladeOrder

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The titles of this chapter and the next one are a 2-part reference to Green Lantern: The Animated Series. Fans of that show (particularly its Official Couple) will recognize the reference.

Chapter 34: Loss:
Radiant Garden – Kairi's Bedroom:

The silence of Kairi's room was broken only by the soft rustle of a balled up wad of tissues sailing through the air as Kairi tossed it towards the trash can on the other side of the room. Tears rolled down her cheeks like waterfalls and damped the sheets beneath her as the princess of Radiant Garden laid back sobbing on her bed. It had been two days since the Battle of Knowhere, and there had been no sign of Sora anywhere in Coalition space. If she didn't have confirmation from Vanitas that the cube he'd grabbed only teleported him instead of killing him, she'd have believed her fiancé was dead.

As it was, she had no idea where he was, everyone's focus was directed at the war against the Hellfire Club and the investigation into the stupid Legion, and nobody had the slightest clue how she was supposed to find the love of her life and bring him home. The first day after the battle, she'd gone on the warpath in a panicked frenzy. When she realized that there was absolutely nothing she could do to track Sora down, she became inconsolable with grief. How was she supposed to find him if she had no idea where to start looking? It wasn't like she could get energy readings from Knowhere to search for similar energy signatures from the cube elsewhere in the universe. Malekith had seen to that.

After Sora disappeared, the scales began tipping in the Coalition's favor. Vanitas was able to contain the Cube and spirit it away back to Radiant Garden, where it now rested in the Chamber of Repose deep beneath her uncle's old laboratory. Vanitas' informant warned that it was suicidally dangerous to keep the two Infinity Stones too close together, so Vanitas hid the Mind Stone in a locked box in the castle of the Land of Departure. When Maleficent realized that the battle was clearly lost, Maleficent executed the Collector to keep him from providing Coalition Intelligence with any useful information. And then Malekith used one of those Black Hole grenades to make the mining colony implode in on itself, killing all who lived upon it. Coalition Forces barely made it out in time before the entire decaying alien skull was condensed into a tiny wormhole.

A knock at the door distracted her from her moping, and the door opened to reveal a face nearly identical to her own, only framed by blonde hair instead of red. Without any prompting or greeting, Namine slid onto the bed and gave Kairi a comforting hug.

"We'll find him, Kairi," her Nobody greeted reassuringly. "Don't worry."

"Hard not to when nobody really knows where to start looking," the princess of Radiant Garden retorted sarcastically. "And between everything going on with the Hellfire Club and the Legion nobody even has the time to really look for any clues."

"I know, I know," Namine replied. "But what would Sora do if he was in your place?"

"He'd spend a few hours beating himself up over not being able to protect me," Kairi answered with a chuckle. "Then he'd pick himself up and track me down to the ends of the universe and damn anyone who got in his way."

"Exactly," her Nobody answered. "It's been two days, Kairi. It's time for you to pick yourself up, dust yourself off, and start hunting." This managed to cheer the princess of Heart up considerably. She wiped the tears from her face as she stood up from the bed. The sorrow in her eyes was gone now, replaced by ironclad resolve.

"Thanks Namine," she said as she gave her "twin" a hug. "I needed that. And you did just give me an idea for starting my search."

"How?" The blonde artist asked. "What are you going to do?" Kairi answered with a grin that promised intense pain on anyone who tried to stop her in her quest to find her fiancé and bring him home.

"I'm going to get Vanitas to arrange a meeting with his informant."

Arendelle – Spaceport:
"I wish you didn't have to go," Elsa said as she gave her fiancé one last hug. The date for their wedding was only a month away, and now he had been called out to face a situation that he might not come back from. They stood together at the security checkpoint of Arendelle's Spaceport, saying their goodbyes before the former Flurry of Dancing Flames went off to war. Elsa would have gone with him were it not for the fact that her duties as queen meant that she needed to stay and protect her people in the event the Hellfire Club or the Legion attacked Arendelle.

"I do too," Lea replied forlornly. "But I have to. With Sora M.I.A., Team Keyblade needs all hands on deck." With one of their most powerful Keyblade Masters out of commission, every Keyblade Wielder in the order (all ten of them, excluding Sora) was called out of retirement and into active duty to help defend the known worlds against the threat of the Hellfire Club, and help solve the mystery of the Legion, as well as how exactly Marluxia, of all people, had come to be a leader of this group. It was going to be dangerous, but it was obvious to everybody that it needed to be done.

"Just promise me you'll stay safe," she demanded as she stood on her toes to give him a kiss. "Just promise me you'll come home." Lea was acutely aware that the room was growing colder with his fiancé's every word. He thought he even spotted chunks of frost forming on the windows. Elsa' control over her powers had improved dramatically over the past six years, but her control tended to slip when she was stressed or emotional. Like right now, when he was about to head off to war, for crying out loud! He sight.

"I can't make any guarantees," he admitted sadly. "But I promise I'll do everything I can to stay alive and make it back in time for the wedding." With that, he gave his fiancé one last hug and kiss before he got in line to go through security and into the concourse. He hadn't mastered turning his Keyblade into a Glider form yet, so he was taking a passenger Gummi Liner to the Land of Departure. The Gummi Ship that would drop him off at Terra, Aqua, and Ven's castle was coming in from Twilight Town, so Roxas and Xion had arranged to meet him at the docking bay while the ship was cleaned and refueled in between flights. Sure enough, he arrived at Docking Bay 13 to find the duo sitting on a bench near the boarding ramp with a pizza balanced between them.

Lea smiled as he walked up his surrogate siblings/kids and plopped himself down on the seat next to them, helping himself to a slice of pizza. Roxas and Xion laughed as they teased him about need to ask before he started mooching their food from them. It felt like old times sitting here. As they sat in the spaceport waiting to board their flight, Lea couldn't help but think about how much he missed hanging out with them. After they'd graduated from high school in Twilight Town, he'd gotten a job in Arendelle so he could be closer to his girlfriend. But at the same time, he felt nostalgia as he thought back to all those nights cooking dinner for the three of them, helping Roxas and Xion with their homework, giving them advice on everything from school to dating.

Lea was old enough to be their older brothers, but that didn't mean he was blind to the fact that he was the closest thing they'd ever had to parents. And over time, he'd come think of them like they were his kids as well. They were all still best friends first and foremost, but after everything they'd been through in the Organization, they'd become more than that. They'd become a family. A bizarre and dysfunctional one, but a family nonetheless. What Lea felt was Roxas' and Xion's best quality was that after everything that had happened to them, they still had a degree of childlike innocence in them. He just hoped that they would be able to come out of the coming battles with that innocence intact. Lea may not have been a very superstitious man, but it was obvious to anybody that dark clouds were on the horizon. A storm was coming.

Earth – New Avengers Compound; Roof:

Tony Stark was awake in the early hours of the morning for one reason or another. Whether it was staying up obscenely late for a project or simply having too much caffeine during one of his creative bursts earlier in the week, there was always something to give the billionaire to wander the hallways of Avengers HQ at 2 o' clock in the morning. But tonight was one of those rare nights where it wasn't his creative juices keeping him up. He'd simply woken up in his and Pepper's room in the middle of the night and just didn't feel like going back to bed just yet. So with nothing better to do for fear of having the angry yells of his irately awoken teammates directed at him, he went up to the roof to look at the stars.

He was surprised to find that he wasn't alone up on the roof. The new kid, Sora, the dude who was supposedly this great mystical "Keyblade-wielding" warrior from a chain of masters and apprentices going back to the dawn of human civilization. He was still having trouble wrapping his head around that whole story, and the brunette's answers to his questions last night only added to the genius' confusion. So when he noticed the guy leaning against the railing running around the perimeter of the building, his first instinct was to stay silent and observe. He was still cautious about how genuine this guy really was. So hopefully a rare chance to see how he acted when he thought nobody was looking might help ease those concerns.

As he watched and listened, Tony noticed that the younger man was holding what looked like a pendant made of seashells in his hand. Then he noticed that the railing and concrete beneath Sora's chin looked wet. Tony's suspicion of the kid (despite the fact that he was in his early twenties, Tony still referred to him as kid since he was the youngest one in the building besides Stitch) evaporated almost instantly as he realized what was going on. Poor guy, Tony thought to himself. Here we are worried about security when the kid's just had his whole world turned upside down.

"You miss her, don't you?" Tony commented as he walked over and put a hand on the younger man's shoulder. Sora glanced at Tony with a look that clearly indicated that he was questioning how the billionaire industrialist figured it out. Stark simply responded with a meaningful look of his own that said that it was obvious. "I know how that feels. There was this one time eight years ago where I was fighting this terrorist, called himself the Mandarin. Technically he wasn't who he said he was but that's not important. Anyway, his goons blew up my house and I managed to get Pepper out of the house before it collapsed on top of me. Thankfully, my armor saved my life, but at that point it was pretty much on autopilot. The suit flew me halfway across the country until it ran out of power, and at that point, I had no way of contacting her."

"What I'm trying to say," the "Genius Billionaire Philanthropist" went on. "Is that even if half a country doesn't compare to half the galaxy, I understand how you're feeling right now." That managed to cheer the Avengers' young guest up, and the young man thanked Tony for his surprisingly kind and insightful words.

"Don't mention it, kid," Tony replied. "You'll learn pretty quickly that meaningful and insightful comments from me are about as rare as a four-leaf clover." That managed to get a laugh out of the Keyblade Master, breaking the ice and lightening the mood. After a few minutes of stargazing in which Sora commented on how different the constellations were from his home, Tony started pointing out Earth's constellations, and Sora ended up explaining how most stars represented a world's heart, the conversation turned to the Key Bearer's love life. To his credit, Tony refrained from his usual brand of sarcastic humor as Sora showed him the thalasa shell good luck charm his fiancé had given him years ago, and talked about how it had always symbolized the promise to always find each other no matter what happened.

Tony honestly thought it was a bit cheesy, but he honestly felt that the team could use a little cheese form time to time. Besides, he could tell that Sora really cared about his future wife, and out of respect for the kid's situation, he withheld from joking about the guy's past. They continued to talk about relationships and other similar topics well into the early morning hours, and by the time the sun rose, the rest of the Avengers walked into the living room that morning to find Iron Man and the Keyblade Master passed out on the couches.

Kairi's on the warpath, and she's got something to focus on now: demanding a meeting with Loki. He should be afraid. Very afraid. Anyway, since this chapter was mainly about the heroes reacting to the Battle of Knowhere, next chapter will be the villains' perspectives on the aftermath. I also wanted to throw in a small scene with Lea and Elsa, because similar to last chapter Yuffie/Ventus scene, I wanted to have a few fluff scenes between all the action sequences. And before anyone comments on it being out of character for Kairi to swear, this was just a one time thing to show her frustration with Sora's Tesseract-induced disappearance.

I had the bit at the end with Sora breaking down over everything that happened as a reminder that even if he puts on a brave face, all the crazy stuff that happens around him still gets to him from time to time. Rest assured though, the rest of the fic isn't going to be Sora goofing off with the Avengers while everyone else fights the bad guys. Things are going to get action packed soon enough. Some of you are probably wondering why I picked Iron Man as the one to have a late night chat with Sora, and it's mainly because I felt that despite their contrasting personalities, one of the things they have in common is that they're both devoted to the people they care about, and will do everything they can to protect them.
 

KeybladeOrder

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After some plot re-configuring and trimming out unneccessary plot threads or details, I've cut the story shorter by about ten chapters. We've got 14 chapters to go before we move on to the next installment of the Acolytes of Chaos Saga. The remainder of the story is going to be primarily focused on Sora and the Avengers, with snippets of what's going on in Coalition space and a three chapter spread for Maleficent's invasion of Radiant Garden.

Chapter 35: Cold Fury:
The Kiln – Conference Room:

Much more serious circumstances than the last time we met in this room, Loki remarked to himself as he surveyed the faces of the other members of Maleficent's inner circle for signs of a reaction. It was extremely unlikely that any of them would ever allow their thoughts on the loss of not one but two Infinity Stones in the Battle of Knowhere to show so plainly on their faces, but even the most microscopic crack in a single mask could provide him with vital information to help unbalance the Hellfire Club. After their defeat at Knowhere, Maleficent had kept the Kiln on lockdown while she vented her frustration and pondered their next move.

Although the inner circle were all nominally on equal footing with each other, Loki was well aware that in practice it was Maleficent's empire to command as she saw fit, and the rest of them were merely her advisors and subordinates. Although that may not be the case much longer, he mused as he turned to regard one of the never additions to the Club. It was obvious to everyone that Malekith had his own agenda that was incompatible with Maleficents, and anyone with more than half a brain knew that each was preparing their own gambits to have the other eliminated. It was sad, really. According to Hades, in the final days of the conflict between the fledgling Coalition and Xehanort's Organization, the Hellfire Club operated like a well-oiled machine.

But now, the once feared cabal of the wicked and the power hungry had been split down the middle. Battle lines were being drawn, and it was obvious to everyone currently living in what used to be an interstellar prison who had chosen which side. Hades, Cruella, Hamsterviel, and Hook remained loyal to Maleficent, while Demona and Seymour sided with Malekith. Nebula only worked for the highest bidder, and Sephiroth's offspring had no loyalty towards anyone save each other. If Malekith's actions in San Fransokyo and Agrabah were any indication, the Hellfire Club was on the brink of tearing itself apart. All it needed was someone to press the right buttons at exactly the right moments and the two sides would tear into each other like a pack of starving wolves.

"We need to alter our tactics," Maleficent began, snapping the prince of Asgard out of his thoughts. "We have lost not merely the Infinity Stone we hoped to claim, but the one we already possessed as well. With the armies provided to us by HYDRA, Dr. Hamsterviel, and the Dark Elves, I believe the time for discretion and hiding has passed. It's time to step out of the shadows and take what is rightfully ours by force! No more scurrying about in the background like rats through a wall. It's time to start building our empire on the blood and bones of our vanquished foes. We will not simply wait to steal the Stones back at a moment when our enemy's guards are down. Instead, we will lower their guard ourselves. We will invade Radiant Garden, take back the Tesseract, raze their precious city and take the castle as the seat of our new empire!"

Amidst the cheering and discussion of the logistics of the coming invasion, the gears of Loki's mind whirled. He needed to get a message to his contact in Coalition Intelligence somehow and warn him that this attack was coming. He may not be able to totally prevent the loss of life the battle was sure to incur, but he could at least lower the casualties. All he had to do was figure out a way to keep Malekith's armada away from Radiant Garden or else it would be a slaughter. When the meeting concluded, Maleficent called out to him before he could leave the room.

"I have a different task for you, Loki," she told him. "Malekith would sooner destroy the entire world rather than leave the castle intact for us to rule. To that end, he'll be your chauffeur for the assignment. I know this may be hard for you, but I need you to return to the remnants of Thanos' lair and gauge whether the remains of the Chitauri can be added to our armies. Aand while you are there, I want you to set up a base for us there. While I wish to retake the Hollow Bastion as my throne, I'm also a pragmatist. I'm well aware that there is a possibility of failure, and should this invasion fail, the pathetic Coalition will trace our movements back here. So I'm sending you off to scout out a potential fall back point in the event that the Kiln is attacked. Do you understand?"

"Perfectly, old friend," Loki answered. He bowed to the self-proclaimed "Empress of Darkness" and returned to his quarters. Although outwardly stoic and calm, inside, he was fighting to keep his relief from showing on his face. This was better than he could have hoped. While he was uncomfortable about facing the Chitauri again, keeping the Nathalis and the rest of the Dark Elf fleet away from Radiant Garden would be well worth the wait. A pity that half the Dark Elves were being sent to Earth to help HYDRA test the world's defenses, but he was confident that his brother and the armies of Asgard would be more than capable of handling them on the home turf.

The Lanes Between – U.W.S. Anguis:

The Command cabins aboard the Anguis, High Praetor Aurilam reflected, were hardly the worst place he'd ever slept. While not as glamorous as the Legion's flagship, the Ava, the Anguis was still one of the most powerful and well-equipped vessel in the Legion's navy, second only to the Vulpeus. It's Spartan living quarters were reminiscent of the private bedrooms in the Castle That Never Was, but unlike that hollow castle full of half-dead abominations, the cabins aboard the Anguis and other vessels like it in the Legion's small but powerful star-fleet radiated warmth in spite of the lack of superfluous decorations. The High Praetor was snapped out of his contemplation by the chime signaling that his call had gone through. With the speed of a cheetah, he quickly got on his knees and bowed.

"Madame N.I.," he began. "Forgive me for my failure. One of the Lost ones escaped our custody. I underestimated her, thinking that her skills had atrophied after years of disuse. I was wrong, and I accept full responsibility for the consequences of my foolishness…"

"The Lost ones are only a secondary priority, High Praetor," N.I. interrupted. "Our first priority is The Endgame. We need the Infinity Stones or else nothing else matters."

"Of course, my lady," the former Graceful Assassin replied. "I'm merely concerned with the fact that she could expose us if given sufficient provocation."

"She will not unless we continue to pursue her, Aurilam," N.I. commented. "She has been content to keep our secrets as long as we have left her alone. We can execute her later. Right now, I have a new assignment for you. Take two Cohorts and retrieve the Mind Stone. Warden Lerena will take another group to retrieve the Tesseract." Aurilam looked up in shock.

"But Madame N.I.," he protested in shock. "Both worlds are heavily guarded around the clock. Even if we have the element of surprise on our side, getting out without any casualties will be next to impossible. We lost enough Legionnaires to that crime-riddled hollow skull. I refuse to sacrifice more of our people's lives as cannon fodder."

"I understand your reservations, High Praetor," the supreme commander of the Legion remarked. "Which is why a distraction has already been planned to ensure that your teams get in and out without sustaining casualties." Aurilam nodded his head in understanding before bidding his commanding officer farewell and signing off from the call. When the image of Madame N.I. fizzled out from the screen, he smiled as he stood up and made his way to the mission briefing room. He had to plan this carefully in order to ensure that casualties were kept at zero. He had some research to do, but he understood what his superior was planning. And with the distraction she had planned, this could actually work.

Earth – New Avengers Compound; Kitchen:

Breakfast in Avengers HQ was always an interesting experience. Whether it was Tony attempting to turn the toaster into a robot and inadvertently blowing it up, or the one day where Odin had secretly let the now-reformed Loki out for some exercise and he ended up winning the team's forgiveness through his incredible coffee making skills, there was always something happening in the vicinity of the kitchen in the mornings. But what consistently dragged every team member out of bed in the morning, without fail, was the first breakfast with a new teammate or other resident of the building. Even the team members who lived elsewhere spent the night whenever someone new joined the team.

The roster of the Avengers had changed over the years, with new additions joining and veteran members retiring every three years or so. After the capture of HYDRA leader Wolfgang Von Strucker back in 2015, Hawkeye and the Hulk retired from the team. Clint got a job closer to his family's homestead, while Bruce ended up becoming a teaching assistant at MIT. Tony had long since retired, while Kim and Ron had gradually settled down to start a family together. But despite not being active members, they never hesitated to put their gear back on and jump into the ring when their friends needed them. This particular morning, they had been prepared to sit down and welcome Sora into the fold, only to find him passed out on the couch.

After Tony told them that the kid hadn't fallen asleep until almost three A.M. they decided to let him sleep and have the obligatory life story sharing at lunch whenever the guy woke up. Around one in the afternoon, Sora finally stirred, and Tony dragged him into the kitchen for brunch and sat him down around the large communal table. Most of the team had already eaten, but everybody liked sitting down together whenever there was a new recruit for who they were as a person. Everyone usually had their own spots selected after years of habit and routine, but Tony and Stitch surprised everyone by breaking the mold and sitting on either side of the newcomer.

"So, Sora," Steve began. Although the Avengers didn't have an official team leader, most of the Avengers considered Steve the de facto leader of the group, and so he was always the first one to extend a hand of welcome to the new guys. "We didn't really get a chance for us to get to know you last night. Why don't you tell us about yourself? Where're you from?" Sora was nervous about how the rest of the Avengers viewed him at first, but once he had something to focus on, his anxiety melted away as he started telling the Avengers all about the Destiny Islands and his life there. As he talked about the major events of his life that had happened on the islands, the conversation diverted towards how he'd gotten his Keyblade, which in turn lead to telling the story of his adventures and the fight against both Maleficent and Xehanort.

"Damn, this kid's a badass," Tony commented when Sora finished telling the story of his first adventure. "You were what, fourteen? And you 1, killed a dragon; 2, fought the Legions of Hell with no reward, 3, earned the respect and admiration of a sentient mystic weapon that was supposed to be passed on to your best friend until he went off the deep end, and 4, were perfectly willing to kill yourself in order to save the girl of your dreams. Can I just say, Holy shit!" Most of the Avengers were all expressing similar sentiments, although not nearly as profanity filled as Tony. After everyone took a break to get snacks and use the bathroom, Sora continued the story and told the Avengers about his forgotten sojourn into Castle Oblivion.

Natasha and Bucky got haunted looks on their face when they heard how Organization XIII had tried to use him as a weapon by manipulating his memories, but were otherwise silent. From there, Sora told the tale of his second journey, followed by his Mark of Mastery exam. Occaisionally, he had to go off on a tangent to explain different aspects of life in what was now Coalition territory, or to add in backstory on the life of Roxas and Xion, and Terra, Aqua, and Ven's struggles against Xehanort. Adding in the story of Xehanort's final defeat and the explanation of the recent conflict with the Hellfire Club that ended with him being stranded on Earth, it was time for dinner by the time Sora finished his tale.

Reactions were varied throughout the Avengers and their significant others. Rhodey, Sam, Bruce, Betty, Pepper, Jane, Hope, and Scott were all concerned about the fact that he'd only been a teenageR when he'd gone through all that chaos and conflict. Natasha, Bucky, Clint, and the Maximov twins were impressed that he'd gone through all that and still managed to maintain his youthful cheerfulness and optimism. Tony, Kim, Ron, T'Challa, and Thor were in awe of Sora's achievements, particular how he'd become a Keyblade Master in all but name by the age of fifteen with absolutely no formal training. Steve, however, looked pensive.

"Hey Sora," Captain America began. "Have you ever heard of a man named Joshua Sweet?" Everyone looked at the super soldier in confusion at why he was asking.

"Yeah," the Keyblade Master replied, an edge of curiosity in his voice. "Kairi mentioned him to me one time after we beat Xehanort. He was a doctor on one of those Tethered world fragments she and Riku went to. Part of some expedition for some guy named Whitmore to find a lost civilization. Why do you ask?"

"Wait a minute," Tony interrupted. "Whitmore… Preston Whitmore! The guy was the primary financial backer for Project Rebirth, right?"

"I knew him," Steve answered. "Whitmore and the expedition crew. He talked about her and Riku a bit. He and the other crew members of Whitmore Industries' expedition to Atlantis formed a secret society for people from eras both Tethered and non-Tethered who knew about the Keyblade and its history."

"And how pray tell did you happen to know all of that, O Captain, my Captain?" Iron Man retorted sarcastically. But despite his flippant demeanor, there was a fire of curiosity in his eyes as his mind began connecting the dots to figure out what his teammate was about to say. With the entire team, plus Sora staring at him waiting for an answer, Steve took a deep breath before responding.

"Because I'm part of it," he said calmly.

That's right, people! Steve is secretly a member of S.A.C.K. If you've read my interquels you'll have already started to suspect this, but I'm sure you'll all enjoy definitive confirmation. Next chapter is going to be the Avengers reacting to the S.A.C.K. and seeing just how many people around them know about the Keyblade and the associated lore. The comments about Tony blowing up the toaster and Loki's coffee making skills are a reference to the gloriously amazing Harry Potter/Avengers fanfiction crossover Child of the Storm by Nimbus Llewelyn, finally completed early this month at 80 chapters and now starting on the sequel.
 

KeybladeOrder

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The Society of Advanced Cultural Knowledge. Think Avatar The Last Airbender's Order of the White Lotus meets Marvel Comics' Illuminati. They're a secret society I made up consisting of Disney and Marvel characters who know about the existence of other worlds, the Keyblade, and all that KH mythos, and are working to prepare Earth for the day when all the pieces of the original world come back together. I introduced them in previous Acolytes of Chaos stories.
 

Master Exin

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The Society of Advanced Cultural Knowledge. Think Avatar The Last Airbender's Order of the White Lotus meets Marvel Comics' Illuminati. They're a secret society I made up consisting of Disney and Marvel characters who know about the existence of other worlds, the Keyblade, and all that KH mythos, and are working to prepare Earth for the day when all the pieces of the original world come back together. I introduced them in previous Acolytes of Chaos stories.
Interesting. Are you planning on throwing in some Final Fantasy/Chrono Trigger characters in there?
 

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If you mean the S.A.C.K., I did mention earlier in this story that Zack was a member of the group. If you mean the story in general, the Final Fantasy cameos would mostly be like their roles in KH1 - allies of the main cast who had important roles in the narrative but weren't the focus of the story. I will be sprinkling in a few name drops and scenes throughout the story.
 

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If you're all wondering what happened to Jake, he's still there. Last chapter was just more focused on Sora interacting with the Avengers, so I didn't mention his presence since he already heard most of the information from Sora earlier. Anyway, this chapter is going to be less dialogue heavy, and more focused on the events.

Chapter 36: First Contact:
Washington D.C. – S.A.C.K. Headquarters:

"So you met Xion?" Sora asked the formerly frozen super soldier as the group walked through the hallways of the S.A.C.K.'s underground headquarters. After explaining the origins and history of the secret society, a man with no eyes named Gordon teleported to Avengers HQ and brought them to the Society's base on the outskirts of Washington D.C. for a tour of the facility and a meeting with the group's leadership. Apparently, the man was part of a race of super-powered people called Inhumans, which Sora thought was awesome. The experiments performed on the original generation of Inhumanity by the Kree, however, less so. The brunette Keyblade Master's thoughts drifted back to the present when Captain America answered his question.

"Yeah," Steve replied. "My wife and I ran into her outside the theater in New York City on our way to see a play called Wicked. It was an adaptation of an old movie from my time, The Wizard of Oz, told from the villain's point of view. Anyway, we were both part of the society at that point so we recognized a Keyblade when we saw one. She was on the run from Organization XIII at the time, and since she hadn't ever really had much in the way of a normal life, we bought an extra ticket for her to come see it with us. She really enjoyed the play. I think it helped her with a lot of stuff that was bothering her too." Sora nodded. Xion had told him about her secret love of the play and how she'd ended up seeing it.

The conversation gradually died down as the group filed into a large conference room for their meeting with the Society's leadership. The Avengers were all hurt that Steve had kept this a secret from them for so long, but they could also understand why and most of them were planning on joining the Society if offered. After all, they were some of the only people who knew, and it wouldn't hurt to have a support network when dealing with the Hellfire Club or the Legion if they eventually showed their faces on Earth. Bucky, Natasha, and T'Challa got a pass on the "being mad about secret keeping" issue, since everyone knew that the three of them had secrets. The fact that they were part of this society with Steve (and T'Challa being part of the council running it) was just par for the course in their cases.

After a few minutes of waiting, a group of six people filed into the room. The first was a bald, muscular African-American man who looked to be in his late mid-fifties. The second was a black haired woman in silver armor who the Avengers apparently knew if the glances she sent them were any indication. The third figure Sora recognized immediately from his Mark of Mastery exam in the Realm of Sleep. The fourth was an enigmatic Asian woman with dark hair braided just above her shoulders. The fifth was a lanky man with short auburn hair and large round glasses, and the sixth was a woman with brown hair who sat next to Steve, who was seated the closest to the empty chairs now taken by the council. From there, introductions were made.

The African-American man now seated at the head of the conference table was Joshua Sweet, one of the society's founding members kept young by Atlantean crystals. The armored woman was Lady Sif, a friend of Thor's from Asgard. The third was Neku Sakuraba, while the fourth was Jiaying, former leader of the Inhuamns. The fifth was Milo, King Consort of Atlantis, and the sixth member of the council besides the Black Panther was S.H.I.E.L.D. co-founder and Captain America's wife, Peggy Rogers, also kept young by Atlantean crystals. Tony was immediately fascinated by the longevity-granting properties of the small teal crystals, and only the fact that Atlantis's existence was a secret kept him from bringing in a few lab junkies to help him study them.

An hour later, the team had been inducted into the Society and were now touring the briefing room for when they needed to send their members on reconnaissance or combat missions when the report came in from S.H.I.E.L.D. (Or rather, the high-ranking S.H.I.E.L.D. Agents who were part of the club got the update and relayed it to everyone else). Agents of HYDRA (Having fought one himself in Olympus Coliseum, Sora thought that the name was a fitting choice given what he'd been told of the group's history) were making plans to raid the headquarters of the Institute for Infectious Diseases in Lagos, Nigeria to steal an unknown chemical with the potential to be used as a biological weapon in the wrong hands.

Without waiting to be asked, Gordon teleported everyone back to Avengers HQ so they could get their gear and go. Just because they were trying to help their newest member get home didn't mean that they'd forgotten the nefarious groups already in existence on Earth. Tony, Bruce, Thor, and Rhodey stayed behind since the team needed to avoid civilian casualties in such a crowded city. Meanwhile, Steve, Natasha, Bucky, Sam, Wanda, Pietro, and T'Challa geared up for battle. Sora didn't have anything but his Keyblade and the clothes on his back, so he was up and ready to go before anyone else on the team was ready. The leadership of the S.A.C.K. had stressed the importance of maintaining the society's secrecy, so rather than have Gordon teleport them across the ocean, they all boarded a Quinjet and set off for Nigeria.

Montressor – Benbow Inn:

Sarah Hawkins sighed as she finished wiping the counter as the last of the breakfast rush customers paid for their meals, checked out, and left. She'd hired a few extra hands to keep the Benbow Inn operating at peak capacity in the last six years, but the morning rush with people checking out, asking for assistance, and ordering breakfast all at once was still exhausting no matter how often she had to do it. She wasn't as overworked as she was back when Jim was still in his teenage rebellion/juvenile delinquent phase all those years ago, but running an inn and restaurant out of your home around the clock was still tiring work.

After Jim had returned home from his voyage to Treasure Planet, he gave her the jewels he'd brought back with him for her to sell in order to raise enough money to rebuild the inn. Construction took a little more than a year, during which time she'd hired a few recently unemployed neighbors to help with various tasks from interior decorating to being on the inn's housekeeping staff. After its rebuilding, the Benbow Inn had become a popular tourist destination to visitors of Montressor, and over the years, she'd had to build more extensions to keep up with the demand. Not enough for it to grow into something like one of those upscale resorts on Turo, but enough to ensure that Sarah had enough rooms to deal with the tourist traffic.

The single mother and Innkeeper was jolted out of her nostalgic reminiscing by a bright light coming from outside the inn. She looked up just in time to see a small, flaming spaceship slam into the ground at the edge of the parking dock at the edge of the property. Startled, Sarah raced out the front door and sprinted for the burning craft, which from its size appeared to be an escape pod of some kind. Rolling up her sleeves, she dashed forward to get see if there was anyone inside who needed help. As she neared the impact crater, she saw a young woman, human, with blond hair and blue eyes, climb out of the crater.

"Are you all right?" she called out as she raced forward to help the woman up. The woman appeared confused for a moment, then nodded as she took the innkeeper's hands.

"Yeah," she answered. "Is this Montressor?"

"It is," Sarah replied as she helped the blonde back to the Benbow Inn. Even if the woman appeared to be fine, she still needed to be checked for internal injuries from the crash just in case. Once she got her guest inside, she instructed the concierge to call a doctor before bustling about and getting the necessary equipment to treat the woman's injuries. Cold towels, bandages, pillows to elevate her head and legs, the works. A few hours later, the doctor left, having given the young woman a clean bill of health, and Sarah left her unexpected guest to sleep in peace. From the sound of things, she and her husband were in law enforcement on their home planet, and a criminal gang she had busted a few years ago had come after her for revenge. She'd been abducted, but had quickly managed to escape to safety.

Delbert and Amelia arrived with their children as she closed the door, and she quickly explained the situation to the couple. The captain and the astronomer had gotten married a few months after the Treasure Planet voyage, and Amelia had quickly become a close family friend just like Dr. Doppler had been since Jim was a child. Ameila and Sara had been good friends ever since, As soon as they heard what had happened, both of them offered to help in any way they could. For now though, all they could do was wait until the woman woke up. She hadn't said much about her personal life, but Sara had at least been able to get her name before she drifted off to sleep: Rose Long.

That's right, people, Steggy FTW! In all seriousness, I never really had any particularly strong feelings for the Steve/Sharon pairing, so when I knew I was incorporating both Marvel and Atlantis: The Lost Empire into this universe, I decided to have Peggy use an Atlantean Crystal to stay young until Steve was unfrozen. Virtual brownie points to those of you who picked up on the hints and figured it out ahead of time.

Obligatory shout-out to my favorite KH 358/2 Days fan-made video? Check. When I was writing The Xehanort War last fall, I came across a fan-made music video combining the visuals of 358/2 Days and Kingdom Hearts 2 with the song Defying Gravity from Wicked. There were so many parallels that I keep coming back to that video every time I'm surfing YouTube. So in every story I write in this universe, I reference that by having Xion be a Wicked fangirl. She basically made a pit stop on modern day Earth during her "fugitive from the Organization" stage during Days, where she ran into Steve and Peggy (who those who figured out Steve's membership in S.A.C.K. can already guess), who were on their way to an afternoon showing of the play, and after hearing of how she was on the run from the Organization, brought her to see it to give her a dose of normality.

In this universe's backstory, Wakanda gradually became less isolationist after the battle in Sokovia, and while they don't share all their wonderful gadgets with the world, they aren't hostile to all outsiders or anything. Also, T'Challa's dad never died in this universe. Getting old (and may or may not be targeted by The Legion later on in the saga), but still very much alive. Wakanda has always known about the Keyblade and the whole world order deal, so once they heard of the S.A.C.K., the crown prince of the country basically serves as the kingdom's representative on the Society's leadership council so that Wakanda has a seat at the table.

For those who haven't picked up the subtle hints from my previous fics in the Acolytes of Chaos universe, the reason there are humans on worlds outside of Coalition territory is thus: since the Tesseract only teleports, rather than destroying, everyone "killed" by HYDRA's fancy space cube powered guns in Captain America: The First Avenger is still alive somewhere in the universe. So in this universe they all ended up on either Montressor or the world that would eventually become the Incredibles world, and society went in different directions from there. The Montressor humans went with the whole steampunk look from Treasure Planet, while the ones on the Incredibles world took things in a modern direction in terms of technology, culture, and fashion.

So yeah, Rose is now on Montressor from Treasure Planet. I have no intention of any characters playing the damsel/dude in distress role (except for one case at the end of the saga, and that's only a partial case, staged to make the heroes think the trope is being played straight), so Rose is doing all the rescuing herself. Nobody's waiting around to be rescued in this story (the only exception to this being the handful of times a character does this in a Disney world when the story of it follows the movie). And speaking of Disney worlds, after KH5, the story will be set entirely on Earth, so enjoy the Disney worlds while you can (this isn't to say that the Disney worlds aren't important to the plot, merely that the plot is moving in a more Earth-centered direction, which those of you who rememb
 

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The first part of the chapter borrows dialogue and action from the opening battle sequence of Captain America: Civil War and deviates from there. Chapter title is a reference to the song "I'll Make A Man Out of You" from Mulan.
Chapter 37: Down To Business:
Earth – Lagos, Nigeria; Institute for Infectious Diseases:

The heardquarters of the Institute for Infectious Diseases was in chaos. HYDRA agents, using a garbage truck as a kamikaze battering ram, had stormed the facility and had rendered all of the personnel and visitors unconscious with tear gas. The terrorist group was after a hazardous chemical that had the potential to be turned into a devastating weapon if it fell into the wrong hands. And HYDRA’s hands were most certainly the wrong ones, but with everyone in the building who wasn’t HYDRA either dead or unconscious, there was nothing anyone could do to stop them from simply marching right through the building. Fortunately for them, the Avengers had been given advance warning about the attack, and help was on the way.

The sound of a sonic boom momentarily distracted the terrorists as Captain America hit the ground at supersonic speeds and smacked a HYDRA agent’s head against the window of a nearby car, shattering the glass in the process. He then kicked a truck hard enough that it slid sideways and nocked another HYDRA trooper back before taking down a fourth with a throw of his shield. With a little parkour, he drop kicked one more, then took a moment to survey the area and take stock of the situation. He looked around at the men he’d just incapacitated and noted the guns they were using, what they were wearing, and how many of them were left still standing.

“Body armor,” Steve reported as he analyzed their opponents gear and equipment. “AR 15s. I make seven hostiles.” As the Captain reported this, Falcon flew up to the roof before using a combination of guns and his wings to eliminate two more foes.

“I make five,” he chimed in. Behind him, the Scarlet Witch leaped over the building and used her powers to lower herself to the ground. While she and Black Panther deflected the incoming bullets, Kim and Ron charged in and took out four more terrorists. Bucky sniped the last one from a distance as the rest of the Avengers present for the mission (and Sora) emerged into the now clear courtyard. With the coast clear, Falcon scanned the building with his Redwing drone and reported that Brock Rumlow, a former HYDRA. Agent-turned mercenary, who S.H.I.E.L.D. had identified as the leader of the attack, was on the third floor. Everyone found it curious that HYDRA agents were taking orders from someone who’d defected, and hoped to get some answers about that while they were here.

Armed with the knowledge of the merc’s location, Steve had Wanda propel him up to Rumlow, with orders to draw out and contain the tear gas the man had used to evacuate the building. While Wanda used her powers to suck the gas out of the building, Stitch, Falcon and T’Challa shielded her as more HYDRA agents swarmed into the courtyard. When HYDRA agents began storming out of the building in an attempt to escape with their prize, Sora, Quicksilver, and Black Widow quickly thwarted their efforts. Natasha handed the vial that HYDRA had been after to Black Panther for safekeeping until the battle was over. As the fighting wound down, everyone looked up to the sound of glass shattering as Captain America threw Rumlow out the window, where he slammed hard onto the ground below.

“Thanks for the warm-up, everyone,” the mercenary known as Crossbones groaned loudly as he struggled to his feet while Steve leaped down to the floor of the courtyard. To everyone’s surprise, the more reinforcements arrived as strange dark portals opened up against the facility’s outer walls. Out poured what looked like an army of red doppelgangers of Stitch, tall-elf looking things that looked like someone had tried to make a Doctor Who monster Asgardian-style, and a tall man in an all-black outfit that everyone present bar Sora recognized as the uniform of the Winter Soldier. Bucky’s old HYDRA uniform.

“Guys,” the man in question began over the comms. “We might have a problem.” And oh, how right he was. While Steve and Black Panther could keep up with both the man in the Winter Soldier outfit, and Sora could handle a few of those elf-looking things, the Avengers were quickly outmatched. Stitch scrambled back inside the building to look for something to deal with his evil copycats, while Bucky climbed down from his sniper’s nest and charged in to assist against this second Winter Soldier. With enemies on every side, outnumbered and under attack, the Avengers did the only thing they could do. They called for back-up.
San Fransokyo – Lucky Cat Café:

San Fransokyo’s Lucky Cat Café was always busy during the lunch rush, but today it was even more so. Every table was taken, and it was a fifteen minute wait just to be seated. Even those seated had to wait longer for their food, as the small, family-owned cafe was unusually short-staffed today. Thankfully, the loud din of customers chatting to each other or complaining about the service allowed two people seated in the back of the café to discuss important business without fear of being spotted or overheard. To any casual observer, the tall, dark haired man and the red-headed young woman appeared to be a couple. But they were as far from a couple as one could possible be. Especially when the meeting concerned the fate of the woman’s fiancé.

“I know about the properties of the Tesseract,” Kairi remarked. “Vanitas told me. It’s supposed to allow someone to transport themselves anywhere in the universe. So, where could Sora have ended up?” The man who served as Vanitas’ spy within the Hellfire Club paused for a moment, as if contemplating her question.

“Truthfully,” Loki answered, “I do not know. Unless one is focusing on a destination with all their will, their destination would be entirely random. That was how Johan Schmidt ended up as Xehanort’s prisoner, after all. The Tesseract is partly alive, meaning it will not transport someone into a situation that will immediately kill them, like into the heart of a star, or a planet where they cannot breath the atmosphere. That means that your beloved would have to have been sent to a world with an atmosphere rich enough with oxygen for him to breath. And while there are indeed hundreds of thousands of planets out there in the galaxy, the amount where humans could survive is actually a little less than ten thousand.”

“Only a little less than ten thousand?” Kairi retorted sarcastically with a groan of frustration. “Great, I was afraid I’d have to comb the entire galaxy planet by planet until I found him.” The fear was evident in her voice despite her uncharacteristically bitter tone. She was afraid to lose the man she loved, and she refused to simply wait around for him to find his way back home. But she had no idea where to start looking and the fact that there were almost ten thousand possible places where he could have ended up did nothing to help calm her nerves.

“Worry not,” Loki replied. “I have a theory. Maleficent has begun collecting data on this “Legion”. She sees them as an obstacle on the road to galactic conquest and seeks to remove them as swiftly and as thoroughly as possible. Anyway, her spies had overheard several high ranking Legionnaires talking about banishing someone they referred to as “The Dark One” to Earth. We both know that the Legion sees any use of Darkness as evil, regardless of the intent behind it, and your betrothed has been relying on dark powers for the last six years. Given that, I believe we’ve narrowed the man’s location down to a single planet. The only question now is how to get there from Coalition Space.”

Kairi breathed a sigh of partial relief. She still had no idea where to look for this “Earth” but at least now she had a lead. A concrete idea of where Sora was. Hopefully, Loki at least knew enough for her to piece together her own map. She doubted Maleficent kept a map showing every single planet in the galaxy, but maybe she had enough points on her map for Kairi to start piecing together a plan. She expressed the idea to Loki and while he couldn’t promise any results, he agreed to look into it.

“Maleficent doesn’t exactly have a map of the universe,” he explained, matching up with Kairi’s earlier thinking. “But there is a galactic government similar to the Coalition known as the Galactic Federation. Earth was inducted into their ranks a few years ago. We do not know Turos’ location in relation to the Coalition, but Maleficent does have a map of where Earth is in relation to Turo. Our spies have indicated that one of the Legion’s prisoners escaped and is headed for Radiant Garden through Federation territory. If they can provide you with a map to Turo, then you need only take a Gummi Ship from here to Turo, then from Turo to Earth.”

Kairi nodded her head in understanding. Coalition Intelligence sent out scouts every few months to search for new worlds, and from the sound of things, they’d be making contact with Galactic Federation territory soon, and from there, she had a trail to follow back to Sora. She thanked Loki for the information and finished her meal while the Asgardian prince’s astral form melted away back to the Hellfire Club’s base. He’d given the location of that facility to her as well, with the warning that Maleficent was planning to move between lairs after the attack on Radiant Garden in anticipation of a Coalition attack on the Kiln. Once she’d paid for her lunch, she left the restaurant and headed for the spaceport back to Radiant Garden, texting Riku, Donald, and Goofy asking them to meet her there before she boarded a Gummi Ship home. She had a plan.


While Captain America: Civil War didn’t happen in this universe, there are some elements of the film that I’ve incorporated into the overall story of the saga, like Black Panther, the battle in Nigeria, the other Winter Soldiers, the Siberia base, etc. Speaking of the other Winter Soldiers, as you can see, Maleficent has found a way to control them, and is using them and the Dark Elves to test Earth’s defenses and see how much of a threat to her plans the Avengers are, with Red Skull and HYDRA acting as her proxies on Earth. So I borrowed the dialogue and action scene from the beginning of the movie for the beginning of the chapter before swiftly taking things away from MCU canon.

And Kairi’s busy putting together a trail to follow in order to find Sora and bring him home. To be honest, this decision was one of those where the idea came to me as I was writing and I altered my game plan to fit around it, figuring that Kairi wouldn’t want to sit still while Sora was missing, just as he wouldn’t do the same if she’d been captured again. Anyway, while this story is more focused on Sora being on Earth, my KH5 fic will focus on Sora trying to find his way back to Coalition space while Kairi tried to find her way to Earth. Naturally, they’ll reunite somewhere in the middle, but the story won’t be over yet. I’ve got big plans for the Acolytes of Chaos saga, and we’re not even halfway through it yet.
 

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This chapter is going to be a little bit shorter than the others. Any Bionicle fans recognize the reference last chapter?

Chapter 38: Cut Off One Head:
Lagos – Institute for Infectious Diseases:

It would take Iron Man and Thor an hour to reach the laboratory, so the Avengers did what they could to buy themselves time. Inside, Stitch was able to hijack the PA system and began playing a recording of Elvis Presley's Aloha Oe. Once the song started playing, the little alien's evil twins started dropping like flies. With them taken care of, the rest of the team was able to redirect their attention on the larger problem of the Dark Elves and the super soldier. Sora and Steve were able to hold off the elven warriors' attacks while Bucky and T'Challa dealt with the copycat Winter Soldier, but between the sheer numbers and the brutal power of the fake soldier, the team was quickly being overwhelmed.

"There's too many of them!" Sora called out as he knocked a Dark Elf across the battlefield with his Keyblade. "We need to figure out a way to contain them and regroup." Though nobody said as much out loud, most of the Avengers agreed that the twenty-three year old Keyblade Master had a point. For all the team's fighting skills and reputation, they were all very clearly outnumbered and outmatched. It would be better to regroup and fight another day than die in a suicidal last stand while HYDRA took what they wanted off the Avengers' cold, dead bodies. Unfortunately, there weren't many options for how to do what Sora was proposing.

"And how are we supposed to do that?" Wanda retorted as she used her powers to telekinetically slam another one into the ground. "It's not like any of us can handle one of these things on our own." She was right, of course. Steve and Bucky could handle one Dark Elf each, while Sora could take two. T'Challa could hold the super soldier at bay but didn't appear to be capable of gaining the upper hand, while the rest of the Avengers who didn't have powers were stuck dodging and dealing with the remaining HYDRA agents to keep them unconscious and out of the fight.

"Well," Sora replied as he Reversed around a HYDRA soldier and knocked him unconscious with a smack to the back of the head with the hilt of the blade. "I'm open to suggestions."

"So," Bucky interjected as he blocked a punch from the other Winter Soldier. "Anybody got any ideas?" As if right on cue, Dark Elf warriors were incinerated across the courtyard as Thor slammed his hammer into the earth. The Hulk leaped down a moment later and swung the Winter Soldier wannabe around like a ragdoll (or more accurately, like Loki during the Battle of New York back in 2012) while Iron man hovered above the battlefield, finishing off the remaining HYDRA agents with missiles. With the aid of three additional Avengers, the battle quickly began to swing back in the heroes' favor. Rumlow managed to escape with the knockoff Winter Soldier through a Corridor of Darkness, but since they didn't get away with the stolen chemicals, the Avengers considered the day a win.

"What the hell was that?" Sam demanded once the HYDRA agents had been cleared out. "When did HYDRA decide to try a repeat of what they did to Bucky? Who was that guy anyway? Some guy they grabbed off the street or something?" The original Winter Soldier shook his head as an answer. He had always believed that the inhabitants of the old Siberian HYDRA base had been killed off decades ago. Evidently, today proved that he had been misinformed.

"No," Bucky interjected. "I wasn't the only Winter Soldier. There were five others, created using a super soldier serum stolen from Howard Star, but they were too unstable. Last I heard they were supposed to have been euthanized back in the nineties. Obviously, that information was wrong." Sam and Tony were a little frustrated that Bucky had sat on that secret for so long, but as Sora pointed out, Bucky had no reason to believe that the other Winter Soldiers were even still alive.

Once the local authorities arrived to take the surviving HYDRA agents to prison, the Avengers loaded the remaining Dark Elves into the newly arrived S.H.I.E.L.D. Quinjet to be taken to The Raft, a prison constructed by Director Hill as a replacement to the now defunct S.H.I.E.L.D. penitentiary known only as the Fridge. Once the bad guys had all been carted off to various prisons, the Avengers got back into their Quinjet to regroup at the nearest S.H.I.E.L.D. safe house to cool down and wait for news on the location of HYDRA's remaining bases. It was time to hunt down the remaining HYDRA bases and finally destroy the international terrorist organization for good.

The Underworld – Entrance:

Loz couldn't help but shed a few tears in defeat as he and his brothers turned away from the River Styx and started to trudge up the stairs back into the land of the living. Their mission so far was a failure. They had come to the Underworld hoping that by freeing their father's soul from the Underworld, they could bring him back to life. They had gotten the chance to speak to him, but he told them that such a plan was doomed to failure without a body for his spirit to go back to. The only way for him to form a new body was with the use of the remaining DNA samples of the Inhuman entity known as Jenova, last seen hidden away by Xehanort and his followers deep beneath the bowels of Radiant Garden's castle.

Getting in wasn't going to be a problem. Maleficent's impending invasion was the ideal time for them to sneak in, look for Jenova's cryogenically preserved remains, then get out. What worried the children of Sephiorth so much wasn't how to obtain the entity's corpse. It was the possibility that Xehanort or someone from either the Coalition or the Legion had gotten a hold of their grandmother's body and destroyed it. If that turned out to be the case, they'd have no other way to resurrect their father. No! Kadaj thought to himself as he and his brothers climbed out of the land of the dead in sullen silence. If someone has destroyed our grandmother's remains and prevented us from restoring father to life, then we will avenge him and destroy those who would dare oppose our reunion! We will find our lost brother and sister and take revenge on those who seek to keep our family apart!

While sifting through their father's files back in the fortress on Maveth, Yazoo had discovered a letter addressed to their father indicating that they had a sister whose mother had died giving birth to her. Like their lost brother Peter, she had been taken from father and hidden. The mighty Sephiroth had never been able to track down his only daughter. But after some research, Loki had apparently gotten a lead to her location. Apparently, she'd been taken by a group known as that Chaste that was apparently a front for the Legion to operate on Earth. The three brothers could only hope that they could get to her before the Legion could brainwash her towards their juvenile beliefs that everything that used darkness was evil. Then they would be a family again, and the rest of the universe would burn.

As many of you probably already figure out, having the battle with HYDRA and the presence of the other Winter Soldiers was all inspired by Captain America: Civil War. While the movie does not take place in this universe (not because I don't like it. Far from it, it's my absolute favorite Marvel Cinematic Universe movie to date. I just wanted to keep the Marvel side of the story relatively simple, and including Civil War would over complicate the backstory too much for my taste, so I just decided to leave it out), a lot of the elements they introduced gave me inspiration for Sora and the Avengers' plot-line on Earth, and so I've incorporated these elements into the rest of this story.

That means that yes, there will be future chapter set in Vienna, and the team will eventually battle the Winter Soldiers at the Siberian HYDRA base. But there will be more twists and turns in this story. As these last few chapters indicate, the fight against all five Winter Soldiers isn't going to be so easy for the Avengers. Thor will have to head up to Asgard soon and even Iron Man and the Hulk can be overwhelmed by too many opponents. And there will be a surprise Big Damn Heroes moment when that battle nears its end and dovetails with the Siege of Radiant Garden.

I think you all have a pretty good idea of who Kadaj, Yazoo, and Loz' lost brother is now, don't you? The same goes for their sister. Daredevil fans, now you all know what a Black Sky is in this universe. ;)
 

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This chapter is going to be less focused on action and more character driven. And yes, this chapter and the one before refer to HYDRA’s infamous catchphrase.
Chapter 39: Two More Shall Take Its Place:
Lagos, Nigeria – S.H.I.E.L.D. Safe House:

It was quiet in the large apartment as the Avengers continued to sleep as the sun began peeking through the curtains. Bucky and Natasha were curled up together in the master bed, while Sora and Steve were passed out atop air mattresses on the floor of the room. Kim and Ron got a bed to themselves with Tony and Sam passed out at the foot of the bed in sleeping bags. Wanda got her own bed while T’Challa and Pietro got air mattresses of their own. Bruce and Thor took the couches. It had been a restful evening, as S.H.I.E.L.D. took over the legwork of finding HYDRA’s newest base so that the Avengers could recover from yesterday’s battle.

After the fight, the team had grown a little closer to their newest member. While there was still some lingering distrust towards the young Keyblade Master, most of it had been replaced by friendly camaraderie after yesterday’s battle. It was the same as every time someone new was inducted into the team, Steve reflected as he threw on some clean clothes before walking out into the living room. Each time the Avengers recruited a new member, there was always the brief period of wariness as they waited to see if the newbie could be trusted. Over time, the wariness faded to be completely replaced with friendship and acceptance.

From what Steve could tell, Sora was pretty much one of them already, joking around and sharing stories at dinner like he’d been with the team for years. The super soldier emerged into the kitchen to find the Keyblade Master in question sitting at the table staring longingly at a set of photographs he’d pulled out of his wallet, along with the star-shaped charm he’d been carrying around with him. The glint of the light off his cheeks revealed the stain of fresh tears.
“Don’t worry,” Captain America reassured the newest Avenger as he took a seat next to the brunette Key Bearer. “We’ll get you home, kid. You’ll be walking down the aisle .on your wedding day in no time” Sora almost jumped, so focused on his photos and the Thalasa shell charm that Kairi had him carry every time he went off into battle that he hadn’t noticed the Avenger come into the room.

“I hope so,” Sora admitted with a sigh. “I know Thor’s heading back to Asgard tomorrow to see if they can find a way to track his brother and use him as an anchor to find Coalition space, but that could take years. I know Kairi can defend herself but I don’t want her to wake up every day worrying if I’ll come home or not.” Steve nodded. He knew how that felt. While coming out of the ice after being asleep for seventy years had felt instantaneous for him, he imagined that Kairi’s situation was much the same as how Peggy had felt looking for him after his disappearance. If she hadn’t been recruited by the S.A.C.K., she’d probably have presumed him dead and moved on.

And while the young man didn’t say as much, Steve knew that was what Sora was really scared of. Even though he and Kairi had been together for six years, the Keyblade wielder was afraid that if it took him longer than a few months his fiancé would be convinced that he was dead and give up looking for him. But from what Steve could tell, that was about as likely to happen as hell freezing over.

“I doubt she’d move on that easily, Sora,” he countered reassuringly. “From what you’ve told me, Kairi sounds like the kind of girl who would never give up on you no matter how long it takes. You always come back to her. You said she waited on that island for a year before she came to look for you on her own, after all. Heck, she’d probably just grab a Gummi Ship and start flying all over the universe looking for you herself.” That managed to brighten the young man’s mood as he looked down at the prom photos his parents had taken of him and Kairi with a laugh.

“You’re right,” the Keyblade Master admitted as he put the photos back in his wallet. He smiled as he glanced down at his fiance’s old lucky charm and thought of the promise it represented. “When Kairi sets her mind to something, she never gives up. Every time we head into a battle, she always gives me her homemade lucky charm she’s had since we were fourteen and makes me promise to give it back to her when we were done. She’ll probably turn every planet in the galaxy upside down until she finds me.” That got both men laughing at the mental image that comment brought up before Steve got up and walked over to the stove to make coffee and breakfast.

An hour later, the rest of the Avengers all dragged themselves out of bed at various hours. Thor promised to talk to Heimdall and Odin about finding a route towards Coalition territory over s few quickly made Pop Tarts before heading up to the roof to return to Asgard. T’Challa and Sora got into a discussion on Wakanda’s knowledge of the Keyblade War while Wanda and Pietro headed up to the roof for a morning workout. Rhodey held Tony back from “upgrading” the toaster while Sam poured himself a bowl of cereal. Bucky and Natasha simply sat on the now vacant couches with raised eyebrows as everyone’s morning rituals spilled out of the kitchen into the rest of the safe house.

An hour later, the team was finally cleaning up from their assorted morning messes when J.A.R.V.I.S.’s British-accented voice announced an incoming phone call from Director Maria Hill of S.H.I.E.L.D. Hill informed the team that HYDRA had been tracked back to a hidden compound in Vienna, Italy. To make matters worse, there was a U.N. conference scheduled to take place later that day. With time running out and a bunch of potential assassinations to prevent, everyone scrambled for the showers and struggled into their gear. Within half an hour, the Avengers were on their way northward to Italy. With any luck, they could catch HYDRA by surprise and prevent them from taking advantage of the summit to cause their trademarked chaos.
Titan’s Refuge – Throne of Thanos:

The cold breeze of the artificial atmosphere of the Titan’s Refuge, more commonly known to its former inhabitants as Sanctuary, swirled around the legs of the newest arrivals as asteroids tumbled through space overhead. This was a world that had been a lifeless, sterile shell long before Thanos first carved out his seat of power here. And it would remain that way long after the visitors had returned from whence they came. Once, this crumbling artificial world of asteroids and warrens had been the command center of the infamous Mad Titan, one of the most feared warlords in the known universe, his might and ambition dwarfing even that of Maleficent and Xehanort themselves. Which was why the latter had hired Sephiroth to assassinate the alien madman to eliminate any potential rivals.

A pity he didn’t consider Maleficent worthy enough to be a rival, Loki thought bitterly to himself as he marched through the gravel of the Refuge towards Thanos’ throne, Malekith and Nebula flanking him as the Nathalis loomed large and imposing behind them. I might not even be in this position if he had. Of course, without Maleficent to offer him an alliance, Malekith may have attacked Asgard. And my family would surely have been slain. But now was not the time to dwell on what might have been. He forced himself to focus on the task at hand as he marched up the steps towards the imposing chair of the being who had once managed to terrify, torture, and brainwash the prince of Asgard into submission.

He needed to figure out a way to avoid handing the hundred or so Chitauri still living in their carved out warrens beneath Sanctuary’s rocky surface over to Maleficent. The Chitauri were all that remained of Thanos’ empire, and without the Mad Titan and his lieutenants there to command them, they had gone into hibernation, steadily breeding to keep their numbers up as they waited for orders that would never come. And Maleficent wanted to add them to her growing army, in preparation for the day when the inner circle needed to throw the Dark Elves under the metaphorical bus. Coming back here alone was enough to almost give Loki a panic attack. He had no idea how he was going to deal with interacting with the Chitauri on a daily basis.

He reached the top of the stairs and sat on the throne, feeling around for the buttons he knew were there from the last time he kneeled before this floating chair. The button that allowed Thanos’ to summon the Chitauri from out of the catacombs they’d burrowed into the asteroids beneath his feet. Nebula stood on the top step looking around nervously at the planetoids scraping and crashing against each other overhead. Clearly she enjoyed being back here as much as Loki did. Malekith stood a few steps down while his Dark Elves stood in formation at the bottom of the stairs. With a calming breath, Loki found the button and pressed it, sending out a signal that only the Chitauri would be able to hear, giving them a primal command to report to their master’s throne.

They came out of the caves in droves, the first ones crawling, then a few more came flying out on their nimble hovercraft as the swarm emerged from the tunnels. The Dark Elf army parted down the middle to offer the insectoid warriors a clear path to throne as the Chitauri legion crawled and scrambled along the gravel pathway up the stairs. When they reached the top of the stairs and found Nebula standing beside the throne and Loki sitting in their master’s chair, they all stopped as one. Inwardly, Loki was desperately scrambling to figure out what to do or say that would stop these creatures from joining the ranks of the Hellfire Club’s growing army. Fortunately, (or unfortunately, depending on how one looked at it) he needn’t have worried. The Chitauri were well aware of Loki and Nebula’s betrayal, and reacted accordingly.

The prince and the assassin dodged with reflexes that would have made lightning look slow as the Chitauri began opening fire on the duo and the ones on the ground turned their plasma guns on the Dark Elf army assembled below. As the Chitauri opened fire, Malekith gave the order to attack, and the battle began. Well that was easier than I thought it’d be, Loki thought as he ducked to avoid a piece of a Chitauri hover sled that had been sliced in half by one of the Dark Elf space-craft launched when the beasts began targeting the Nathalis. Of course, Malekith was probably trying to destroy them for much the same reason that I was, to keep them out of Maleficent’s control. No matter, every once in a while my enemies do my job for me.

Loki dodged a head shot from a Chitauri plasma rifle before taking off the offending warrior’s head. Behind him, Nebula had leaped from the top of the stairs and began wading through the swarm, cutting down Chitauri two at a time while Malekith’s legion cut off the army’s retreat. Loki meanwhile, took up the job of keeping the insectoid warriors from escaping up the stairs. Within an hour, every last Chitauri in the Titan’s Refuge had been killed. A few Kursed were sent into the catacombs to root out the handful that hadn’t answered the summons, having stayed to look after the nest. With the mission accomplished, Loki sat on the throne that had once belonged to Thanos as he waited for word from Maleficent. He had kept the Chitauri from helping Maleficent, but now, it would seem that Nebula and Malekith might be suspicious of his motives.


Sora’s pretty much one of the Avengers now. I figured that since Tony got a bonding scene with Sora, then Captain America should have one two. Both of them have similar experiences to what Sora’s feeling at the moment, and so they can each provide him with encouragement as they work on finding a way to get him home. Forgot to mention this last chapter, but as you can tell, Kadaj, Yazoo, and Loz’ subplot will have a great deal of parallels with the movie Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children, only take away the Geostigma, the mass kidnapping, etc, substitute Maleficent’s invasion of Radiant Garden for the Bahamut SIN attack in FF7AC, etc. Anyway on to this chapter, I wanted to write the Chitauri out of the story as far as threats go, so I decided to go with Loki killing them all to preserve his cover. But it looks like in the process certain people may be suspicious of whose side he’s really on.
 

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Only ten more chapters left ladies and gentlemen. (Well technically eight chapters, an epilogue, and a timeline of the chronology of each scene, but I digress.)

Chapter 40: Winter Soldier:
Vienna, Italy – HYDRA Compound:

"What did you find?" Captain America asked as Sora, Natasha and Pietro returned from scouting the defenses of the HYDRA base. The Avengers had arrived in Vienna an hour ago and had followed S.H.I.E.L.D.'s intel to the enemy's lair hidden in the heart of Vienna. Recognizing that rushing in blind would only allow the terrorist group to scatter and regroup elsewhere once again, Steve had sent out Quicksilver and the Black Widow to sweep the base's perimeter defenses and analyze the security of the place. Sora had gone along, and thanks to the Vanish spell Ven had taught him after the Xehanort War, the three of them had managed to walk through the entire base undetected.

"This base is just a small staging area for local HYDRA operations," Black Widow explained. "Also doubles as a training facility for new recruits. No sign of any Leroy clones or Dark Elves, but that could change at any time. The base is only lightly defended, with only one entrance about thirty-something guards. Communications are easy to jam, but they have a direct line to the Siberia facility. That's where they're still keeping the Winter Soldiers. So if we can listen in on the next call, S.H.I.E.L.D. can trace the coordinates of the Siberian HYDRA facility. Once that's done, we can sneak three of us in there and launch a sneak attack from the inside while Stark, Sam, Wanda, and Banner create a diversion outside and draw their attention off the infiltration team."

Steve nodded his head in agreement before beginning to strategize where each team member would be deployed. The team was split into three groups Two to launch a full-frontal assault on the base, while a third would sneak inside the base and cause havoc from within. As Natasha suggested, Iron Man, Falcon, Scarlet Witch, Captain America, and the Hulk would be part of one team, while Black Widow, the original Winter Soldier, Kim, and Ron would be part of the other. Sora, Black Panther, Quicksilver, and Stitch would use the Keyblade Master's invisibility spells to infiltrate the building undetected and sabotage the other defenses and apprehend the HYDRA agents. All they were waiting for now was the signal to go.

Ten minutes later, S.H.I.E.L.D. Agent Daisy Johnson called to let the Avengers know that the Vienna base had called for help and that S.H.I.E.L.D. had a lock on the coordinates of the Sibera facility, and they were a go for "Operation Overlord." Steve smiled a little at the name. Borrowed from the codename for the Allied invasion of Normandy during World War II, it now referred to an international collaborative protocol thrown together by S.H.I.E.L.D. after the destruction of the Triskellion in 2014. It gave the international security network the authority to bypass bucket loads of political and jurisdictional red tape to put together an operation designed to eliminate HYDRA's agents in a single, surgically precise swoop.

So while the Avengers had been fighting the HYDRA bases across Europe, S.H.I.E.L.D. had been busy tracking down every last HYDRA base on the planet. Monitoring the terrorists' movements and gathering up the necessary military forces in preparation for the opportunity to strike once and burn the entire organization to the ground. Sora's arrival and the attack on Nigera finally gave them their chance. While the Avengers charged into battle in Vienna, Italy, S.H.I.E.L.D. and the rest of the world moved in for the kill.

In London, Daisy Johnson led her team of Secret Warriors in an attack on a HYDRA base near Battersea Power Station. Fire, lightning, and liquefied metal flew through the air as Lincoln, Joey, and Shego fought their way through the base with the force of a jackhammer pounding on concrete while Elena "Yo-Yo" Rodriguez flicked across the room incapacitating HYDRA agents in a rapid blur. At a HYDRA base hidden under a bank in Switzerland, Lady Sif cut her way through Dark Elves like a hot knife slicing through butter as bullets and I.C.E.R. pellets flew through the air around her. Back in Vienna, Black Panther moved through HYDRA's troops with the speed, grace, and strength of a predatory jungle cat, his claws downing one agent after another.

In less than two hours, the battle was over. Between S.H.I.E.L.D., the Avengers, and a little help from the Defenders in dealing with the New York base, HYDRA's forces had all been routed. Only the Winter Soldier base in Siberia remained. And that was where the surviving terrorists were all gathering even as everyone was debriefed. While S.H.I.E.L.D. was busy doing post-battle debriefs, the Avengers all boarded their Quinjet and made a beeline for the coordinates they'd been given for the Siberian compound. If they hurried, they had a chance to end this threat once and for all and make sure HYDRA's "heads" never again grew back. Steve just hoped they made it there in time.

Radiant Garden – Spaceport Docking Bay #5:

Rose couldn't help but feel a sense of wonder as she stepped off the gangplank of Captain Amelia's ship, the R.L.S. Legacy, and into the surprisingly efficient chaos of Radiant Garden's spaceport. After the destruction of the Huntsclan, her knowledge of this corner of the universe was at least a decade out of date. Fortunately, Captain Amelia had been to the Daybreak Coalition before and was able to fill in what she knew of the alliance's history. Once the feline spaceship captain had filled out docking and customs paperwork, she lead the former Huntsgirl through the throng of people boarding and disembarking large gelatinous looking spacecraft towards a train station deep in the mountainside caverns.

As they boarded the train, Amelia explained where they were going. Rose had told Amelia, Delbert, and Sarah the story of what had happened to her (leaving out the Legion's connections to her past, of course) once she'd regained consciousness, and they'd immediately offered to help her find her way home. Amelia and Delbert had some friends here in Coalition Space, the cat-like captain explained as the two women sat in the crowded metal tube of the train as it raced through the spiraling tunnels carved into the mountains outside Radiant Garden's walls towards the city's Market District.

And one of them had gone missing. Rose guessed that this was the young man who had landed in her bedroom from the Tesseract portal. Since It would take at least a week for the Legacy to get to Earth at top speed, an agent of Coalition Intelligence had hired Amelia to transport some friends of her and her husband's associate to Earth and bring the man home. Since she and had stopped on Montressor to drop her family off at the Benbow Inn on the way to meet her new passengers and were going to Earth anyway, she invited Rose to come along on her journey. While Earth had been part of the United Galactic Federation for three years now, not many aliens visited Earth. Which, Rose supposed, was a bit of a relief for S.H.I.E.L.D., since they had to monitor Earth's major spaceports on top of dealing with extra-normal threats like HYDRA, rogue Inhumans, etc.

Still, Earth was beginning to make waves in the intergalactic community, gaining itself a reputation as a planet of resilient warriors, particularly after the Chitauri invasion almost a decade ago. Some other federation worlds looked down on Earth because of its status as a low-tech (by intergalactic standards at least) newcomer, but thanks to the political savviness of Earth's representative Lilo Pelekai, most extraterrestrials left Earth alone. Every attempt made by the criminal underbelly of the galaxy was quickly thwarted by S.H.I.E.L.D., the Avengers, or both. Rose pinched the bridge of her nose to focus herself back on her current situation as the train slowed to a stop and the doors began to open.

Captain Amelia grabbed her passenger's hand to avoid getting separated in the crush of bodies pushing their way out the doors of the train car. Once the stampeding herd of departing passengers had thinned out enough to move freely, Amelia and Rose exited the train and climbed up the stairs up to the city Marketplace. Rose took a moment to survey the changes made to great city since her last visit in awe. Directly before the ledge rose the great castle of Hollow Bastion. To the right, the city's famed Fountain Court stretched across the city as the laughter of children playing in the fountains echoed all the way to the marketplace.

Farther to the left, the Boroughs spread across the circumference of the city, peppered by flashes of green indicative of small gardens set up to keep the city more in tune with nature. The city's power stations had been moved underground to allow the Restoration Committee more room to install more housing for returning survivors of the Fall, and the Palace Gardens spread up and down the steps along the high-walled path leading to the Castle Gates. Beyond the city walls, rivers flowed outward into the mountains across what used to be a desolate and dull, rocky blue landscape but now sported rich soil and lush green grass. And far beyond the city walls was the Dark Depths, the cliff that once overlooked Maleficent's ruined lair at Villain's Vale but now served as the entrance to the spaceport's docking bays.

Chuckling at her guest's slack-jawed wonder, Amelia gently convinced Rose to tear her attention away from the breathtaking beauty of Radiant Garden and follower her down to the Marketplace. Amelia had arranged to meet her client at a local restaurant to discuss the terms of her charter over lunch. They only had to wait about fifteen minutes before a red headed young woman about five years younger than Rose herself walked up to the table. She wore a pink hooded jacket with black lining and fox ears attached to the hood over a white tank top. It was difficult to tell from what she was wearing that she was someone important, but the two grey-clad bodyguards flanking her were a dead giveaway.

And now Kairi and Rose finally meet. Next chapter will have the three ladies working out the terms of Kairi chartering Amelia's ship to take her, Riku, Donald, and Goofy to Earth while Sora and the Avengers finally get to the Siberian HYDRA base where the other Winter Soldiers are kept. This chapter title was a reference to the second Captain America film, so naturally given the subject of the chapter, the next chapter will be titled "Civil War." Expect more little shout outs and mythology gags to that movie there too. For those who noticed, Kairi's outfit comes from Tetsuya Nomura's recently released Kingdom Hearts X 3rd anniversary artwork that apparently reveals Riku and Kairi's new outfits for KH3. I didn't mention the color of her pants because the artwork only shows Kairi from the torso up so I'd rather not speculate on what the rest of the outfit looks like.

The "Operation Overlord" bit is another reference to Child of the Storm, where Nick Fury had a similar protocol in place. The same also goes for the HYDRA base in London, only in that fanfic the base was in a pocket dimension attached to Battersea Power Station, rather than simply near it. The Switzerland base is a reference to Red Skull's Alps HQ in Captain America: The First Avenger.

For those who have never seen Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. or aren't caught up, the Secret Warriors are a team of Inhumans crated by Daisy "Skye" Johnson to help S.H.I.E.L.D. deal with HYDRA and other threats. It's members on the show included Lincoln, Daisy's love interest and an original character; Yo-Yo Rodriguez, a woman from the comics with super speed, and Joey, another original character with the power to liquefy all metal around him. In this universe, Drakken and Shego joined S.H.I.E.L.D. after the Kim Possible series finale, and Shego and her brothers are all Inhumans in this verse, so she was recruited when Daisy started up the Secret Warriors.
 

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Due to some last-minute storytelling decisions, I decided to rearrange the order of the story and do the invasion of Radiant Garden first, then come back to the battle on Earth. I also had to shave off a few chapters so only 4 chapters, the epilogue, and the timeline to go, people.

Chapter 41: Death From Above:
Radiant Garden – Marketplace:

The atmosphere in the restaurant was both relaxed and sense at the same time as Princess Kairi and Captain Amelia discussed the terms of Amelia's contract. Kairi agreed to pay the captain her usual rate, promising to pay half once they reached Earth, and the rest upon their return to Radiant Garden. As part of Amelia's charter, the Princess of Heart would be held accountable for anything she damaged aboard the ship, pirate or Hellfire Club attacks notwithstanding. While the conversation was going on, Rose couldn't help but feel that there was something familiar about the Princess of Radiant Garden, but for the life of her she couldn't figure out why she looked so familiar.

Once the business portion of the meeting had been taken care of, Kairi asked Rose how she was handling her situation, and from there, the conversation turned towards Rose' capture by the Legion and what they might want with Sora. Eventually, the conversation turned towards chatting about each other's lives, and soon, the two young women were chatting away like they'd known each other for years. And as they talked, the dots finally connected in Rose's head why Kairi seemed so familiar and the lightbulb went off. Red hair. Keyblade. Pink hood. Fox ears. Ava! Though outwardly calm, Rose was reeling at the fact that she was carrying on a conversation the reincarnation of the Foreteller Vulpeus In all her millennia as an Unchained, she had never again expected to see the face of Foreteller Ava.

Though she knew that Ava had never Unchained herself, Rose was hesitant to broach the subject as she had no idea how much Kairi knew about Kingdom Hearts' cycle of reincarnation worked. Rose was far behind on local news for the last millennia or so, having spent her last several lifetimes on Earth running the Huntsclan, which had been founded by Unchained during the Keyblade War to protect civilians against rogue vampires and other dark creatures that were taking advantage of the chaos of the war and attacking refugees left and right. In her previous lifetime, Rose had eventually realized how far the Huntsclan had fallen from their original purpose.

But before she could do anything about it, the Huntsman had killed her, intending to use the amnesiac period before her next (current) life's twenty-first birthday when her memories returned to break those thoughts out of her. But fortunately for her, she'd met Jake, and the rest was history. She was about to ask a vague question about how much Kairi knew about Ava when the ground shook. The three women raced outside to find large pirate ships bearing the Heartless emblem on their sails flying overhead, raining cannon and spell fire down on the city from above. Panicked screams came from the stairs leading to the burrow as Heartless began spawning all over the marketplace and began attacking innocent bystanders.

Clearly, the Hellfire Club wants their precious Infinity Stone back, Kairi thought to herself as she summoned her Keyblade and raced off into battle, firing spells and swinging her sword at Heartless left and ride as she waded through the franticly fleeing crowds. Captain Amelia drew her plasma pistol and started firing at airborn Heartless whenever they dove down within range. Behind them, Kairi's bodyguards swung their lances and axe at every enemy that came close enough for them to use it, slicing the demonic creatures apart. After a moment of hesitation, Rose decided that hiding her status as an Unchained was no longer an option as she whipped out her long disused Keyblade and charged into battle.

The Land of Departure – Forecourt:

Things had been quiet in the Land of Departure lately, and for that, Terra was grateful. No insane Keyblade Masters around stirring up trouble, no nefarious Organization attempting to exploit the castle's secrets for their own gain, just the same tall mountains and golden castle that Terra had lived in for years. Right now, he was currently examining the streaks of white in his hair while his son Littus tossed a ball around the courtyard. Ever since he'd been freed from Xehanort's control his hair had been permanently streaked white, a consequence of being possessed for so long. He'd dyed it brown and cut it to the preferred length to get rid of the uncomfortable reminder of Xehanort's influence.

Judging by how long it was getting and the new streaks of white, it was time for him to get it cut and dyed again. His attention snapped back to the present when he heard Littus say hello. Terra froze as he saw the man formerly known as Marluxia standing at the entrance to the courtyard with a pack of armored warriors, presumably Legionnaires, standing in formation on the low, grass-coated ramp spiraling down the mountainside behind him. At the feet of the former Number eleven was the ball Terra's son had been playing with. Taking stock of the situation, the former Superior acted quickly.

"Littus, stay there," Terra ordered loudly as he raced over and stood next to his son as he glared at the former Organization member.

"Hello traitor," Aurilam remarked coldly as he walked into the courtyard with his iconic pink-bladed scythe over his shoulder.

"Marluxia," Terra replied equally as coldly. Lied to by Xehanort or not, the former Number eleven's human self was still a high ranking operative of the mysterious Legion, had physically and emotionally abused Namine for several months, and attempted to brainwash Sora. He was still the enemy. "I was as much a pawn of Xehanort as anyone else in the Organization. In any case, that's a bit hypocritical coming from you."

"I'm well aware of that madman's deceptions. That's why Larxene and I joined the Organization, to destroy his schemes from the inside. But not, I wasn't referring to the Organization. I was thinking of a far more ancient betrayal. You can't deny your guilt in that, Aced."

Terra's eyes narrowed in suspicion even as they widened in surprise. The secrets of Kingdom Hearts' cycle of reincarnation, how it cleaned the darkness from a heart after death before regurgitating it into a new infant body, were not common knowledge. It was something known to Coalition scientists, of course, but not necessarily something that every person in Coalition space needed to know. It was generally agreed that making such information accessible to the public would only end up sending a wave of soul-crushing angst across the Coalition as people speculated on who their past incarnations had been and what they'd done, or angsted over whether or not every bad thing that happened was because of something they did in a past life.

That would be extremely detrimental to society, and so the information was largely kept quiet. While it was possible that The Legion simply had access to an up-to-date computer database somewhere in the Daybreak Coalition, there were only certain people outside of the Keyblade wielders and their most trusted friends who knew about certain Keyblade Masters being the reincarnations of the Foretellers.

"You're Unchained," Terra guessed, more of a statement than a question. "Aren't you?" Braig had explained the existence of the Unchained in a letter to Kairi (or rather, her past incarnation, Ava, Foreteller of the Vulpeus guild) as quasi-immortal Keyblade Wielders who had gained access to all the memories of their past lives. Recruited by Ava to ensure that Keyblade Wielders would survive the coming war, they had instead gone on to avenge her death when Gula, Foreteller of the Leopardos guild murder her during a peace summit in the capital of Atlantis. They all knew from Braig's (or rather, Ephemer, as he had originally been known) letter that there were more Unchained out there among the stars, but for the last six years they hadn't encountered any. Now Terra was beginning to suspect why they hadn't found them.

"Unchained, Dandelion, different names for the same thing, really," Aurilam remarked as he ran his hands down the edge of his scythe, gingerly testing the sharpness of the blade. "All that really matters now, traitor, is that my fellow Unchained and I will be taking the Infinity Stone in the basement."

"Over my dead body," Terra retorted angrily as he took a step forward, placing himself between the Graveful Assassin and his son. Though only four years old, Littus could understand that these people who had come to their home were dangerous, and following his father's silent instruction, turned and raced up the stairs. As the front doors creaked open, Terra summoned his Keyblade. He would defend his son to his dying breath if that was what it took to keep the former Organization member away from his family.

"Even better," the man formerly known as Marluxia replied as a light flashed in his hands and his scythe was gone, replaced by a wickedly sharp looking Keyblade. Behind the salmon-haired man, his fellow Legionnaires all drew Keyblades of their own as they advanced on him with a furious roar. Terra braced himself to fight the invaders off until his last breath, only to be picked up by a sudden gust of wind and thrown up the stairs through the doors himself. As his son cried out for him, he climbed to his feet in time to see the familiar hexagons of a barrier spell spread across the threshold of the castle from floor to ceiling. While he was grateful to still be alive for his son, his heart froze as he saw two familiar figures standing at the bottom of the stairs with their backs to the door.

"VEN!" He shouted as he watched his surrogate little brother and his ninja girlfriend charge into battle with the Keyblade wielding horde. In the midst of ducking a swing from Aurilam, Ven turned towards the door and shook his head. While the gesture was vague, his eyes conveyed his message perfectly. Don't worry about me, they said. You need to stay alive for Aqua and Kair. We'll hold them off. I called the army. Reinforcements are on the way. With that, the blonde Keyblade Master who had practically been Terra's brother cast another Aerogza spell that blew the doors shut. The last thing Terra saw before the front door slammed closed was Ven and Yuffie facing off against two dozen Keyblade Wielders.

But despite his brother-in-all-but-blood's reassurance, Terra knew that Ven was fighting a losing battle. It was at least an hour of flying to the nearest Coalition base at top speed, and the former Superior of the Organization seriously doubted that one Keyblade Master and a ninja could survive against so many opponents for that long. Xehanort probably could, but he had been a Master for several decades at that point. Ven hadn't even had the title for half of one, and he was nowhere near Xehanort's level. As Terra helped his son into the panic room Aqua had installed for emergencies like this the last time they'd renovated the castle, he couldn't help but silently pray to any deity that was listening that reinforcements would get there quickly.

If you haven't read The Xehanort War or aren't familiar with the Rebirth Theory then you'll be incredibly confused on Rose's thinking and what the heck Unchained even means, (and if you still haven't read TXW by this point, I cannot stress the importance of having the knowledge of what happened in that story to understand this one better). So to sum things up for those who stubbornly refuse to go back and read my previous stories first, the Rebirth Theory basically suggests that every heart in the KH universe is reincarnated via Kingdom Hearts, and that Riku, Kairi, Terra, Aqua, and Ven are the reincarnations of the Foretellers (Specifically that Kairi is Ava, Riku's Ira, Terra would be Aced, Aqua being Invi, and Ventus is Gula, Luxu obviously being Xehanort himself).

In this universe, the Unchained are Keyblade Wielders who, through an unknown process, retain the memories of their past lives (Think of it as regular reincarnation being like Avatar: The Last Airbender, where each incarnation is still a separate character, while Unchained reincarnation is like Time Lords regenerating on Doctor Who), and are basically immortal. Aside from Rose, the only notable Unchained explicitly identified in the Acolytes of Chaos saga was Braig, who's the reincarnation of Ephemer(a). The only way for an Unchained to permanently die is if they're killed by the X – Blade (which Braig was at the end of The Xehanort War).

I know that the latest Kingdom Hearts X update confirms that Gula and Ava are friends, but The Xehanort War was written months before, and I had pegged the Leopardos Foreteller as the traitor and wrote the story based around that assumption. As for the Foretellers' names, I originally came up with my own names for them all since aside from Ava, their names hadn't been revealed yet and the whole "seven deadly sins" theme naming wasn't known. Now that this part is known, I went back to TXW and fixed the names. The comment about "a wave of soul-crushing angst" is another Those Lacking Spine reference. Brownie points to TLS readers who figure out what it was a reference to.
 

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Rose will be supplying more Keyblade War lore in the middle of the battle as she and Kairi fight off the Hellfire Club invasion, so be ready for a few info dumps in between action sequences. Five chapters to go.
Chapter 42: None Shall Pass:
Radiant Garden – Central Square:

Rose ducked before launching a Fira spell at a dive-bombing Air Soldier before following up with a downward strike at an Orcus attempting to hit Ava – Kairi, she reminder herself – from behind. Despite the fact that Ava was dead and Kairi was a different person than her previous incarnation (the princess had explained her theory regarding the role the soul played in reincarnation with Rose after the blonde from Earth revealed her status as an Unchained), old habits die hard, and she kept getting the names mixed up in her mind. That one would certainly take a while to break. In the meantime, she, Kairi, and Captain Amelia, accompanied by Kairi’s bodyguards Dilan and Aeleus, had fought their way through Heartless and Leroy alike to clear a path from the city Marketplace to the Central Square outside the Castle.

The fighting was intense, and more than one soldier had fallen to the enemy troops. But the number of loses incurred by the forces of Light seemed almost minimal compared to the number of casualties on the other side. Something didn’t sit right with the blonde Unchained as she leaped over a shock-wave as a newly arrived Darkside slammed its fist into the earth. The massive, writhing monstrosity quickly faded away into ash and smoke with a few bursts of Light from Kairi’s outstretched palms. Rose had never heard of such a technique in all her eight millennia of life. Must be a princess of Heart thing, she thought to herself as she fought her way through the fray. Although the scale of the fighting was nothing compared to the Siege of Daybreak Town, Rose couldn’t help but be reminded of the Keyblade War as the three women began the combat-filled trek up the slope towards the castle gates.

Despite the chaos and strife of the now ancient conflict, fighting alongside Kairi with Keyblade in hand was just like old times for Rose. While she didn’t miss the war and was tired of the immortality that came with being an Unchained, running around fighting the forces of evil was something comfortably familiar to the former Huntsgirl. Because all Unchained were functionally immortal, those that didn’t interact with their main social groups tended to live off on their own. While some of her kind saw this as a good thing, as it meant that they’d never have to get too attached to the rest of the world, it did mean that there was no one to reminisce over old times with.

That’s why once her memories had returned, she was glad to be a part of S.H.I.E.L.D. With the added memories of nearly a hundred lifetimes came the ability to sense the location of other Unchained. Which was why she was relieved to not be the only near her when she recognized fellow S.H.I.E.L.D. agent Natasha Romanov as another Unchained. While Rose was good friends with all of her colleagues in S.H.I.E.L.D., she was closer friends with Black Widow since they had known each other for longer than S.H.I.E.L.D. had ever existed. The only agent Rose wasn’t very comfortable around was Daisy Johnson.

It wasn’t that she and Daisy didn’t get along, or that she thought Daisy was a bad person, far from it. But as an Unchained, it was difficult to talk to someone while knowing that you had a hand in causing the deaths of several of their ancestors. Rose knew from her experiences that things that were different weren’t necessarily evil, but as the last surviving descendant of the Boltagon family, just being around Daisy always brought up bad memories of the Attilan Massacre. Thousands of innocent people had been slaughtered in less than a month, caught between the power plays of the extremist Inhuman king Black Bolt and the corrupted rebel Inhuman Jenova.

During the Keyblade War, it was not only the warriors of the Keyblade who did the fighting. There were other countries, other kingdoms fighting to achieve their own goals in the midst of the battle between Light and Darkness. The Crystal Gardens spread across what was now Japan. The Wakanda Conglomerate controlled most of Africa. The Republic of Sokovia occupied two thirds of Europe, with the remaining portion being part of Daybreak Town’s territory. But one of the largest and most powerful factions during the war was Blackagar Boltagon’s Inhuman Empire. Spanning across the entirety of the Asian continent, Inhuman territory controlled nearly half the planet, and was one of the most contested regions in the course of the war.

Even after the massacre at their capital of Attilan and the subsequent fall of the Boltagon dynasty, the different empires and city states continued to fight over Inhuman territory like dogs over a scrap of meat. After eight thousand years, modern day Lai Shi was all that remained of a once powerful empire. Rose had turned down many offers to visit the Inhuman community since regaining her memories, owing to the fact that its current site was conveniently located near the ancient ruins of Attilan. It had been the Attilan Massacre that had prompted Rose and a group of like-minded Unchained to break away from their respective guilds and found the Huntsclan for the purpose of protecting the civilians caught in the middle of the power struggles of the warring armies and left as easy prey for those looking to take advantage of the chaos and rape, pillage, and burn their way across the globe.

Rose’s thoughts jumped back to the present just in time to roll out of the way of an oncoming Darkball before using a Thundaga spell to take out half a dozen Neoshadows. As she, Kairi, and Amelia arrived at the top of the slope and looked down at the city below them, Rose took a moment to survey the battlefield. While the amount of Heartless being deployed was still formidable, things seemed to be well in hand. Burning chunks of Heartless pirate ships rained from the sky outside the city walls, brought down by Coalition Gummi Ships, while the Coalition Army worked their way through the city eliminate the Heartless and Hellfire Club soldiers. It was almost too easy. Wait a minute! Rose though as realization struck her.

“It’s all a diversion,” she gasped in panic. Kairi turned to look at her and nodded in understanding as the Princess of Heart quickly grasped the former Huntsgirl’s line of thinking. Without pausing, Kairi pulled out her cell phone and contacted the Royal Guards’ command center where the battle was being coordinate from. She explained Rose’s thinking before hanging up and informing the rest of the quintet that Intelligence agents and other Coalition troops were being dispatched to the lab where the Tesseract was being kept. Kairi, however, was not one to sit back and let someone else take care of a problem when she was better equipped (or in this case closer) to deal with it.

The group quickly made their way down into the castle’s lower catacombs, weaving their way through every twist and turn as they raced to get to the Infinity Stone before anyone else could. Between the Legion and the Hellfire Club, they had no idea who was currently in the castle looking for the stone, but the trail of Coalition and Hellfire Club corpses enabled them to make an educated guess. Soon, joined by Vanitas, Cloud, Even, Violet, and Lea, they arrived in what used to be the Heartless Manufactory to find a familiar looking woman with blonde pigtails emerge from the ramp leading down into the Chamber of Repose, accompanied by a group of armored, Keyblade-wielding warriors. For a moment, nobody moved as the two sides stood facing each other intense silence. Eventually, the silence was broken by the voice of a certain red-haired pyromaniac.

“Hello, Larxene,” Lea remarked.
Radiant Garden – Corridors:

Meanwhile, a particular trio of silver-haired young men silently made their way through the abandoned labyrinth of corridors leading to Ansem’s basement laboratory. The three siblings were as silent as a grave as they darted from shadow to shadow amidst the quaking of the room. While Maleficent had sent them inside to collect the Tesseract, they had another destination in mind. Especially now that this accursed Legion had already beaten them to it. While their father had trained them in combat, none of them felt confident going up against even just one of the Legion’s agents. So they got the hell out of dodge while they still could. Rumor had it that Jenova’s remains… Their grandmother’s remains, were buried within Ansem’s laboratory complex beneath the castle.

So now Kadaj, Yazoo, and Loz were changing their plans to focus on their personal goal while everyone was distracted fighting over the Infinity Stone. Gingerly stepping over and around the corpses of Maleficent’s minions and the Coalition soldiers, the three brothers made their way through the underground maze in search of the correct lab. Eventually, they found the lab their sources had indicated, only to find that it had already been ransacked during the fighting. Blood and black ooze smeared the walls, floor, and ceiling in a nauseating monochromatic painting as the trio climbed over the tables and counters searching each and every drawer and cabinet for their prize. While they had no qualms about wading through a battlefield coated in blood, feces, and urine, the appearance of the room was unnerving to the point of making them genuinely nervous to touch anything that wasn’t still clean.

Quietly but carefully, they tore the rest of the room apart. They ripped out every drawer, threw open every cabinet, searched every shelf. But they couldn’t find what they were looking for. Eventually, they made their way to the open refrigerator, where they found a piece of paper sitting on the shelf between two small metal contains.

“Sephiroth’s spawn want Jenova’s head so badly, they can come and find it on Earth. We’ll be waiting.

The Legion.”

Outraged, Kadaj launched a massive beam of fire at the fridge, melting it to slag. After a few minutes of shedding tears, the three brothers fled the lab to report on the Infinity Stone’s theft to Maleficent. Although not without Loz tearing up the rest of the room on their way out. Once they notified Maleficent of the Legion’s acquisition of the Stone, they were cutting all ties with the Hellfire Club and going solo. They knew how to get to Earth from Maveth, so they would find their grandmother’s remains on their own, and against all odds and expectations, find a way to bring their father back.


Marvel fans will certainly recognize a lot of the names dropped in Rose’s reflection on the Keyblade War. While Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. introduced the Inhumans to the Marvel Cinematic Universe, with the movie cancelled, I’m unsure how the cast of the Inhumans comic would fit into the existing setting in relation to the Inhumans introduced so far. So as I was planning the Acolytes of Chaos saga, I came up with the idea that during the Keyblade War the Inhumans were a major world power, ruled by the ones from the comics, only for the war to reduce their empire to a single ramshackle settlement. And yes, you all read that right, this saga is expanding on Jenova’s origins and fleshing out the backstory of my KH version of her. More information on that will follow in later stories.

And that’s right, folks, Black Widow is an Unchained. The decision to make Natasha into an Unchained was inspired by two things: the fact that in the comics, she took the Infinity Formula, which makes the user immortal, something that was removed in the MCU, and a Kingdom Hearts/Avengers crossover on fanfiction.net which basically has Loki’s Nobody leading the Invasion of Earth in The Avengers with lesser Nobodies instead of Chitauri, and Natasha as a Keyblade Wielder. When coming up with ideas for subplots in this saga, I had the brilliant idea to combine the two elements. And yes, this means that the mysterious “V” that Natasha was on the phone with earlier was actually Rose.

Brief reminder for those who forgot Sora, Kairi, Donald, and Goofy’s discussion of the reincarnation thing. Basically after finding out about her being the reincarnation of Ava in The Xehanort War, Kairi was having some existential angst for half a chapter, then Goofy questioned how the reincarnation cycle worked even though the Underworld in Olympus Coliseum is filled with the souls of the dead. They talked about it for a while and they came up with the answer that while the heart is reincarnated, the soul is different each time, and since Kairi and Ava have different souls, they’re two separate people even though one is the reincarnation of the other, sort of like in Avatar and The Legend of Korra.

Violet is from The Incredibles. A future story in the Acolytes of Chaos saga will revolve around her, Vanitas, Cloud, and Even after the events of this fic. The blood, feces, and urine comment is a reference to a Harry Potter/Final Fantasy 7 Crossover called Sephiroth Potter and the Order of the Phoenix. It’s a reference to a joke where Sephiroth comments on how he’s seen his fellow SOLDIER and close friend Genesis Rhapsodos calmly walk through a battlefield covered in all manner of foul substances, yet is disgusted by the idea of a burrito. The Orcus Heartless is an upgraded version of the Invisible only seen in 358/2 Days.
 

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Chapter 43: The Last Stand:
Radiant Garden – Heartless Manufactory:

Silence reigned as both sides stood off in the bowels of Ansem’s laboratory. Organization XIII’s former number eleven held in her hands the special container Coalition scientists had been using to keep the Tesseract’s massive power contained. Lea held his remaining chakram in his freehand while he held his Keyblade towards the Savage Nymph’s head while Dilan and Aeleus slowly circled around the platform until they jumped down onto the ramp leading down to the abandoned containment cells where they and Xehanort used to perform their experiments, cutting off the intruders’ escape.

Vanitas and Cloud flanked the enemy from the side while Violet hung back and brought up her largest force field yet to encompass the platform and cut off the only exit. Even brought up a barrier of ice behind Dilan and Aeleus to seal off access to the Chamber of Repose. Kairi, Amelia, and Rose stood directly in front of the enemy troops, ready to charge in and fight. After a few more moments of silent tension, the former Organization member finally spoke. But only this time her comments were not addressed to Lea or any of the warriors and spies of the Coalition, but to the newcomer.

“Hello, traitor,” Lerena remarked as she turned her attention to Rose.

“Long time no see, Lerena,” the former Huntsgirl retorted.

“How exactly to you two know each other?” Lea interjected.

“Because we fought together during the Keyblade War,” Rose replied. “Allow me to introduce Lerena, Warden of the Unchained Legion.” The Savage Nymph snarled in anger in response.

“Gee, thanks for pulling back the curtain on us,” the woman formerly known as Larxene snarked. “Although I’m surprised given how quickly you spread your legs for a – “ whatever insult the former Nobody was about to spew at the younger woman was cut off by a Waterga spell to the gut that sent Lerena flying down the ramp leading to the Chamber of Repose. The other Unchained warriors formed up around her in a defensive formation while the containued used to house the Tesseract clattered to the floor in the middle of the formation. The Unchained all slipped into combat stances as they got ready for the battle everyone in the room knew was coming.

“Remember when I said I’d kill you myself if you made offensive comments about my husband again?” Rose asked rhetorically as she advanced towards her fellow Unchained, Keyblade in hand. “Well the same thing applies to calling me a slut for marrying someone who isn’t human. And I have had a very stressful week being abducted by Aurilam and held captive aboard the Anguis, so go ahead. Give me a reason to vent my frustration. Make my day.” For a few tense moments, Lerena glared at her old friend, as if expressing doubt that Rose would ever follow through on her threat. The rate of attacks from the Hellfire Club had slowed down considerably if the extended periods between quakes were any indication. Recognizing that her only option left was to cause enough chaos to cover their escape, the woman who used to be Larxene narrowed her eyes.

“Just because you’re not part of the Legion anymore doesn’t mean nobody cares who you spread your legs for, Rose,” she remarked with a deliberate smile on her face. With an enraged snarl, Rose charged forward and the chaos began. Rose, Even, and Lea raced forward and engaged Larxene herself, while Kairi, Dilan, Vanitas, Cloud, and Aeleus stated battling the other Unchained. Now that they knew the true nature of the mysterious Legion, the heroes began to piece together bits of vague comments and writings into a vaguely defined but more clear than before picture of the Unchained Legion’s motives. Braig’s comments indicated that the Unchained sought to restore the original world by any means necessary. How that involved mass mind control or Night Howlers was another matter entirely, but Kairi supposed that she could always ask Rose later.

The fighting was fierce and intense as the battle raged on. Facing three opponents meant that Lerena had to stay on her toes and move as quickly as she could, even employing her doppelgangers to buy herself some breathing room. But while everyone fought valiantly, the Unchained had eight thousand years of experience over everyone else in the room, and quickly retook the upper hand. After dodging a particularly brutal looking ice shard from Even (who evidently still held a grudge for the disrespect and insults she sent his way back in the Organization), Lerena put her fingers to her mouth and whistled, giving her fellow immortals the signal. On cue, the other Legionnaires fired off Firaga Burst spells that buffeted their opponents with streams of fireballs while they all ran for a Corridor of Light that the former Savage Nymph created at the edge of the platform.

“Even, Strife, Parr, with me!” Vanitas ordered as he drew his Keyblade and charged towards the corridor in pursuit of the runaway Unchained. “We follow them back to their base and hit them where it hurts.” Before he passed through the portal, each of them fired of quick texts to their family members (or his boss in Vanitas’ case) to let them know what they were doing. They had no idea where this portal would lead or how long it would take to return, but Vanitas was the highest ranking officer there, and he knew an opportunity when he saw one. This was their chance to return fire and strike back at the Unchained Legion. With any luck, they could gather more intel on the Legion at the same time. But the Legion had been keeping them on the defensive ever since they showed up. It was time to turn the tables.
The Land of Departure – Forecourt:

Contrary to Terra’s expectations, Ventus and Yuffie were able to hold their own. Thanks to their smaller size and greater agility enabled them to weave their way through the attacking Keyblade Wielders like snakes through grass. They blocked and parried every strike that came their way and retaliated in kind, using Aeroga and Mega Flare spells to clear themselves some breathing room. Ven healed himself while knocking opponents off the mountain with Salvation spells, while Yuffie would throw her shuriken to get away from an enemy combatant before using a Curaga spell on herself to heal her wounds. If they had been facing Heartless or any other opponent, they might have actually been able to win.

But unfortunately, they weren’t facing Heartless, or Hellfire Club troopers, or even just ordinary soldiers. They were facing the immortal warriors of the Unchained Legion. And because every time a Legionnaire died they were reincarnated (granted they had to wait just over two decades for their memories to return but still), the Unchained could afford to throw everything they had into this attack. For every Unchained Ven and Yuffie knocked over the edge with a Blizzaga spell, two more came charging up the mountain slope into the courtyard. Like the Earth terrorist organization HYDRA, they always came back. And the young couple were quickly being overwhelmed.

Eventually, the pair were forced into the middle of the stairs leading up to the castle. They were surrounded by Unchained on every side as they hastily brought up Reflega shields to protect themselves against the relentless barrage of spell fire and energy blasts from the Legionnaires’ Keyblades. One spell after another impacted against the glittering shield as Ven and Yuffie stood inside the large spherical barrier. Both of them were worn down and exhausted. At this point, they knew that even with the aid of Coalition Reinforcements, it was only a matter of time before one of the invading Unchained got in a lucky strike.

“It looks like this is the end, Ven,” Yuffie admitted with tears in her eyes as she fed him a continuous stream of Hi-Ethers to keep the shield up. But even that wasn’t enough. More and more cracks appeared on the shield every few minutes. Sooner or later, the barrier spell was going to collapse. “I wish there was a way out of this but there’s nothing we can do.” She looked at her boyfriend and found that he too had tears flowing down his cheeks.

“At least we made the end memorable then,” he replied as he blinked away the tears. “We bought Terra the chance to get his kid and the Stone out of here, and delayed these guys long enough for reinforcements to get here in time to stop them from getting the Infinity Stone.” He leaned over and kissed her. “I love you, Yuffie,” he whispered hoarsely as the Reflega spell cracked even further.

“I love you, too,” the “Great Ninja” whispered back as she embraced her boyfriend for the last time. With one last Mega Flare spell, the Reflega shield shattered into a million tiny pieces. The Unchained held their fire as their commanding officer advanced up the steps, curved scythe in hand. Ven and Yuffie could have gone out with one final fight, but they didn’t have the energy to do little more than die quickly. And the Glider-mounted Unchained hovering overhead blocked all avenues of escape. At least this way, the last thing they saw would be each other. Ven and Yuffie remained intertwined with their lips locked and eyes closed as Aurilam’s scythe ran them through.
Deep Space – Morag; Unchained Base Camp:

Lerena fumed as she stormed down the corridors of the Unchained compound on Morag towards the command center. All around her alarms blared and the sounds of combat echoed through the facility. That wretched demon, Vanitas, and his troops had followed her hit squad through the portal back to base. Now they were wreaking havoc all over the place. This was bad, but she trusted her fellow Unchained to hold them at bay and keep them from accessing any truly vital information while she reported the status of the mission to N.I. With a slam of the door, she marched into the command center and stormed over to the communications console. Pushing buttons violently, she put in a call to the supreme commander of the Legion aboard the Ava.

“Get me the Novus Imperator,” she demanded as the call went through. “I’ve got the cube.”


And so the true nature of the new villains is revealed. More information will be revealed later on, but now you all know the main villain of the Acolytes of Chaos saga. Maleficent’s not going to stop being a treat through. I’m going to be treating Maleficent’s alliance the way that Remember the Tides treats her. The Hellfire Club and the Unchained Legion will both be major, credible threats throughout this saga. The Unchained will just become a more serious threat as the heroes learn more about them and their overall goals.

Now you all know the meaning of Madame N.I.’s name. It’s Latin for New Emperor and ties into the Unchained Legion’s overall goals. But the meaning of the acronym isn’t going to give you all any hints about her identity. But I’ve left enough clues for you to guess who she is. She’s not a marvel character, and she’s only a part-Disney character (a Those Lacking Spines reference that basically means she an existing KH-original character). But if you figure it out, hold your tongue, for all shall be revealed in time. Muwah Ha Ha Ha! Anyway, joking aside, Lerena’s mention of doppelgangers is a reference to Larxene’s ability as an Absent Silhouette Battle in Kingdom Hearts 2 Final Mix to create clones of herself to distract you.

Rest in peace, Yuffie and Ventus. You will be missed. I didn’t want the heroes to make it through every fight unscathed in this fic. That meant killing off a major Kingdom Hearts character or two in order to demonstrate how powerful and numerous the Unchained Legion really are. And since as much as I love Ventus and Yuffie, I felt that they were the most expendable. After the end of this story, I’ll be doing a prequel called “Before the Storm” that will have some scenes of Ven and Yuffie in the years leading up to the beginning of the Acolytes of Chaos storyline.
 

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2 more chapters left plus the timeline.
Chapter 44: Civil War:
Earth – Siberian HYDRA Base; Winter Soldier Chamber:

There’s too many of them, Sora thought as he reversed out of the way of a blow from one of the Winter Soldiers. Without Thor, we’re toast. And indeed, that seemed to be an accurate assessment. Thor had left for Asgard for some formal meeting that he was required to be home for, and while the Hulk was able to handle one or two Winter Soldiers, but when they went up against all five of them, the Avengers were quickly overwhelmed. Since Leroys had been captured at the battles in Lagos and Vienna, even Stitch was having trouble avoiding the fast and furious kicks and punches from the villainous super soldiers.

The Avengers had arrived at the Siberian HYDRA base to find the entire compound seemingly deserted. After combing the corridors for any signs of life, they soon found that not to be the case. They had reached the chamber containing the stasis pods where the Winter Soldiers had been stored to find the five super soldiers and every HYDRA agent in the facility waiting for them. Falcon, Black Widow, Scarlet Witch, Kim and Ron were busy dealing with the mortal HYDRA forces, leaving Stitch, Pietro, Iron Man, The Hulk, Sora, and Bucky to deal with the other Winter Soldiers on their own. And so far, they weren’t doing so well.

Captain America was busy facing down an old foe. The Red Skull himself had taken charge of the base, and had been looking forward to a rematch with the Captain ever since their duel aboard the Valkyrie all those decades ago. Their punches flew fast and furious as they brawled back and forth across the cramped and crowded battlefield. But after years of combat training, the original Super Soldiers were too evenly matched to actually do any damage to each other. Meanwhile, Sam, Natasha, Wanda, Kim, and Ron were being slowly but surely overwhelmed by the increasing amount of henchmen. Reinforcements from S.H.I.E.L.D. were at least half an hour away, but Sora didn’t think that the team would last much longer if help didn’t come sooner.

Suddenly, everything stopped as a glowing portal of light appeared in the middle of the room like a rainbow in the dark. Sora and Natasha immediately tensed, recognizing corridors of Light as the primary method of transportation for the Unchained Legion. But one of them cheered up as they recognized the faces of three of the four new arrivals. Sora’s, on the other hand, held an ear to ear grin as Vanitas, Cloud, Even, and Violet emerged from the portal and took stock of their situation. The logo of the soldiers Sora and his associates were fighting was an exact match for the Hellfire Club troops present at the Battle of Knowhere. And the man with the mutated, skull-looking face was clearly the enemy’s leader. That left only one course of action.

Before anyone could react, Vanitas warped over to the Red Skull and drove his Keyblade through the HYDRA leader’s chest. The terrorist leader’s minions all stood still in shock as their leader slumped to the floor with a gaping, bleeding hole in his upper torso. This was all the opening the Avengers needed. With HYDRA’s agents too shocked to do anything, everyone else in the room struck. Bucky felled the Winter Soldiers with five quick bullets to their heads, while Pietro ran around knocking out the normal HYDRA troopers with a single running punch. With the aid of Vanitas and his team, the battle was over within ten minutes. Once all the fighting was done, Sora and Vanitas cast Sleep spells on the fallen foes to keep the ones still living unconscious.

“Van!” Sora greeted warmly, happy to see a familiar face. “It’s great to see you again. What are you doing? How’d you get here?”

“I was about to ask you the same thing, Sora,” his older brother’s dark half retorted with a friendly smirk. “How about we find something decent to eat around here and we can all trade stories and figure out what’s going on. Sound fair?”
“Took the words right out of my mouth,” Tony interjected. “So, Sora, this is your older brother’s not-evil-anymore twin. Why the hell does he look like a younger version of you?” Vanitas only quirked an eyebrow in response. Six years of making friends all over the Coalition had taken care of his Xehanort-induced self-esteem issues, so Tony’s bluntness did not even remotely faze him. That didn’t mean he was okay with being referred to as Ven’s “Not-Evil-Anymore twin.” He shot Sora a look silently demanding to know why he’d been referred to as such in whatever conversation he’d been discussed in.

“Don’t mind Tony,” Sora apologized. “He just says whatever comes to mind with no filter between his brain and his mouth.” Vanitas smirked in satisfaction as Tony protested only to admit that the accusation was mostly true. “Anyway that sounds like a plan to me.” With the tension broken, greetings were exchanged as S.H.I.E.L.D. Agents arrived to take the captive HYDRA troopers into custody and clean up the bodies of the Red Skull and his empowered goons. Once all the post-battle cleanup was taken care of, the two teams piled into the Quinjet and headed off for some Shwarma. It was time to catch up.
The Kiln – Prison Yard:

Maleficent was positively livid when Sephiroth’s progeny returned to the Kiln without the Infinity Stone. She was so furious that she told the three siblings that they’d outlived their usefulness and ordered them executed. And then they had the gall escape, killing half a dozen Dark Elves on the way out. The loss of Malekith’s troops was the only real consolation for today’s events. Well, that and Yzma’s release from prison in the chaos of the invasion, but Malekith’s impending power play was a higher priority. She was walking towards her office to summon her inner circle for a discussion of their recent losses and the rise of this “Legion” when the entire station shook.

As the Mistress of All Evil braced herself against the wall she felt a rare chill of fear as she realized what was going on. They were under attack. Someone, either in the pathetic Coalition or that meddling Legion, had discovered their location and, judging by the increasing frequency of explosions and the sounds of spell and laser fire, had boarded the station intent on either bringing the Hellfire Club’s upper echelons to justice or wiping them out. But it was not for herself that she was afraid. Lily was reading in her room while her father cooked dinner. Lily would not understand what was going on, and the shouting, alarms, and shaking would draw her out of her room in curiosity, and then she’d be at risk of being injured or worse, killed, in the crossfire.

I have to get my daughter out of here, Maleficent thought to herself as she frantically teleported upstairs to Lily’s room. Grabbing Lily, she teleported up to the communications room and ordered everyone to evacuate the station. While she would have preferred to stand and fight, what little of her military forces remained were still on their way back from the failed invasion of Radiant Garden, while Malekith’s fleet was still scouting the Titan’s Refuge with Loki and Nebula. As much as it burned Maleficent to admit it, they were sitting ducks right now. Holding their ground in a desperate last stand would only get them all killed and her daughter taken away from her. And that she refused to allow.

She felt a surge of comfort at the familiar “poof” of her husband teleporting into the room.

“Maleficent, babe,” Hades greeted calmly. “What’s the plan?” He didn’t have to ask why she was ordering their cabal to evacuate the abandoned prison complex or why they weren’t standing up and fighting back. He knew his wife better than anyone and one thing he learned since he’d met her was that she never did anything without a good reason. If she was ordering the evacuation of their base, it was because she had a plan to regroup and strike back.

“We regroup at Thanos’s sanctuary,” she replied calmly as she initiated the self-destruct system she’d installed after they’d moved into the facility. “We take stock of our losses, find out as much information about this “Legion” as we can, and then destroy them. They’re too big of a threat to us for them to be ignored. They need to be eliminated now before we can have any hope of succeeding in our campaign. We learned that the hard way with Xehanort. We’ll scout out their bases and defenses, then we slaughter them all and take back the Infinity Stones.”

Hades nodded his head in understanding as he teleported out of the room. He warped all over the former prison making sure everyone in the Inner circle escaped through Dark Corridors to their new base safely. Once everyone had made it out, he poofed away himself. As the smoke faded he found himself standing at the foot of a series of floating metal stairs leading up to a hovering golden throne. Taking Lily in his arms, he watched his wife ascend the steps towards the chair that once belonged to Thanos. When she reached the top of the stairs, Maleficent turned and took her rightful seat on the Mad Titan’s throne, directing her gaze first down at her followers, then up towards the stars.

I could get used to a view like this, Maleficent thought to herself as she surveyed the universe above her. She realized now that she had been too hasty in her rush to obtain the Infinity Stones. By neglecting to get proper reconnaissance of potential enemies such as the Legion, she had left herself open to attack. But she always did love the old adage “what doesn’t kill you makes you stronger.” For she had indeed survived everything the pathetic Daybreak Coalition had been able to throw at her, and emerged from the conflict stronger than ever. This time, she had her priorities straight. She would eliminate all competition, retake the stolen Infinity Stones, retrieve the rest, and then, the universe would be hers.


And with that, the action minds down. The next chapter and the epilogue will be focused on everyone’s reactions to the aftermath of the last few chapters. Vanitas’ team adjusts to being on Earth, Kairi and Rose get ready to head off on their trip, and Maleficent regroups after her losses and reassess her priorities. After the prequel fic Before The Storm is finished, I’ll be working on Kingdom Hearts V: Balance of Power. This one will be focused on Sora and Kairi travelling across the galaxy in search of each other in the midst of the nascent conflict between Maleficent and the Unchained. She’s reevaluating her priorities and decides that the Legion is a bigger threat to her operation than Xehanort ever was, and directs her focus towards destroying them and anyone else who gets in her way.

So yeah, Vanitas’ team is on Earth. Expect a feelsy reunion between Cloud and Zack in the possibly near future ;). The next chapter is going to be focused on the Earth and the Coalition based characters dealing with the fallout of everything that’s happened in this story. And then the Epilogue will focus on the Novus Imperator of the Unchained Legion, and the identity of Madame N.I. will finally be revealed. Beware though, for the shocker of an ending will make you anxious for the next story to come out. And just to make sure it’s clear (although it will be brought up in the next chapter), the Daybreak Coalition were the ones who attacked Maleficent’s hideout.

The “rainbow in the dark” line is a reference to an amazing punk rock urban fantasy comic series with that title that I discovered at Honolulu Comic Con yesterday. It’s a really interesting story with themes about the nature of reality and of freedom vs. conformity. It’s really entertaining and really addictive. I picked it up and couldn’t put it down until I bought my own copy. It’s self-published by author/artist team Comfort Love and Adam Withers, so you can only get individual issues from them at conventions, but the complete omnibus edition is available on Amazon.com.
 

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Short chapter this time because all the action is over and it's time to recuperate and prepare for the next installment.

Chapter 45: Moment's Reprieve:
New York City – Shwarma Restaurant:

Vanitas' story was surprisingly straightforward. Sora was expecting a long convoluted explanation to explain how he got to Earth from Coalition Space. But pursuing the Unchained back to their own base during the attack on Radiant Garden only to be thrown out through a random Corridor of Light was so much easier to understand. Thankfully, Vanitas and his team had managed to steal a few of the Unchained Legion's files before they got kicked out, and one of the documents they'd managed to download was a map of Coalition Space in relation to Earth and the Galactic Federation. Sora was thrilled to finally have a map home. And he couldn't help but let out a chuckle when Vanitas told him that Kairi had hired Captain Amelia to bring her to Earth to get him.

"Looks like I'll have to meet her halfway," the Key bearer commented with a hopeful smile. He'd talked with Stitch the other day about getting him a ride offworld, and Stitch had offered Sora a ride in the spaceship of Stitch's creator, Jumba Jookiba, who was also living on Earth. Jumba had taken it to the garage for maintenance, and it wouldn't be done for just under a week, but at least he had a plan. He wasn't just sitting around waiting for bad guys to fight while he waited for Kairi to come pick him up.

"Don't you mean "we'll" be meeting her half way?" Tony interjected. "And here I thought we were friends." Sora looked at the armored Avenger incredulously while Vanitas just smirked knowingly. "Come on, Sora," he went on. "Did you really think we'd let you just jet off halfway across the universe without us? You may not have been here very long, but you're still part of this team. All for one and one for all, am I right? Where you go, we go." Sora smiled and thanked Tony for the gesture.

"But what if S.H.I.E.L.D. needs you guys here on Earth?" Cloud pointed out, concerned that either the Unchained Legion or the Hellfire Club might take advantage of the absence of Earth's mightiest heroes for their own nefarious purposes.
"Which is why only some of us will be going," Steve answered. "We decided that the founding members of the team will be going with him as ambassadors to the Coalition. The rest of the team will be staying on Earth to keep fighting the good fight and protect Earth. Whenever you need their help while you're here on Earth, you'll have the full support of S.H.I.E.L.D., the Avengers, and the S.A.C.K."

"You really should think of a better acronym for your little secret society, you know," Violet commented with a laugh.
"Nobody's ever really been able to come up with anything that's both catchy and sums up our purpose," Steve admitted shyly, drawing another round of laughter from everyone present. "Anyway," Captain America changed the subject as he addressed Vanitas and his team. "When we head off into space, will all of you be joining us?"

"Actually," Vanitas replied. "I think we'll be staying on Earth for a few weeks. From what we know HYDRA is allied with the Hellfire Club, and Maleficent will likely attempt to take more personal control of the survivors now that the Red Skull is gone. Not to mention the fact that the Unchained Legion apparently has ties to Earth. We'll stay and help S.H.I.E.L.D. investigate those connections and search for dormant Hellire facilities waiting in the shadows." Everyone in the room nodded in understanding, and the conversation soon turned to more personal matters as they resumed their meal. The war was far from over, but at least now, they had a plan.

Radiant Garden – Spaceport; RLS Legacy:

"Are you ready for this?" Riku asked as he walked in from putting his bags up in his private cabin. After the incident with Silver and his men, Captain Amelia personally ran background checks on every member of her crew that she hired. She refused to allow a repeat of Silver's pirate mutiny. All of them had been briefed on the Daybreak Coalition in advance and sworn to secrecy. The Coalition government wasn't exactly hostile towards outsiders or even remotely isolationist, but they had enough things to deal with making sure the various member worlds stayed on good terms with each other and fighting the Hellfire Club or the Legion to just broadcast their existence to the wider galaxy.

"I've been ready for a week now," Kairi answered as she looked out over the rail at the modern Gummi Ships spread out around the spaceport's four other docking bays. While travel between worlds was more common, spaceship traffic was never crowded enough to necessitate the construction of additional terminals. The Daybreak Coalition had been around for six years, but there was always something new to see wherever you went. But where they were going now was completely uncharted territory. To her knowledge, nobody in Coalition space had ever been beyond their small corner of the universe. But they would have to soon.

When Sora used the X – Blade to seal Kingdom Hearts, they all knew that the worlds would begin the process of merging back together into one whole planet. For the last six years, the worlds were all slowly but steadily moving in one particular direction. The movement was infinitesimal, unnoticeable to the people living on each world, but plainly obvious to scientists charged with observing the route, speed, and direction of the migrating worlds. Whatever source was drawing the worlds of the Coalition back towards where they had originally come from kept the suns around which they all orbited moving with them to keep the populations alive. While they'd yet to encounter any other civilizations in this corner of space, they knew it was only a matter of time before they bumped into other inhabited planets.

"Hang in there, Sora," Kairi whispered as she shook those thoughts out of her head to focus on her goal. The Legacy was gliding silently out of the docking bay and up through the gateway into Radiant Garden's atmosphere. Riku, Donald, Goofy, and Rose joined her on the deck watching the blue canyon walls surrounding the city glide silently past. Montressor-built ships like the Legacy were equipped with atmospheric shield generators that produced breathable air for its occupants while travelling through the vacuum of space. So much had changed since they were kids on the Destiny Islands, but one thing that would never change was how she and Sora felt about each other. "We're coming for you."

Just the epilogue left now folks. I'll have that up tomorrow. But now you've all got a clear idea of the storyline for KH5. Once I post the epilogue and timeline tomorrow, I'm going to take a day off and rest my brain before starting on the prequel Before th
 
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