Disclaimer: Look, we all know what the deal with
Kingdom Hearts is. It's a joint Squaresoft/Disney
venture, and one company or the other owns rights in
some fashion to every character in this story. 

Continuity: This takes place before Neverland and
after Atlantica. Yeah, I know, what a huge window,
right? :-p



KINGDOM HEARTS EXTRA -

The Hall of Lost Heroes
Part 3


by Aaron Bergman


"What the-"

Sora wasn't sure that he'd seen it, wasn't sure that
he wanted to have seen it. It had been, after all, a
mere shadow he'd seen for but a moment at the far end
of a dark, dark tunnel, but- 

But he couldn't simply walk away. He owed himself, he
owed his friends, too much to do that. 

So Sora ran down the corridor, being as quiet as he
can, Keyblade in hand, hoping that he hadn't seen a
Heartless stalking the tunnels of his benefactor. He
turned the corner and nearly slammed into a door that
blocked the tunnel off neatly. It was made out of a
greyish metal, seemingly in several interlocking
pieces. Sora glanced around and saw a panel of
blinking lights set into the wall, but he had no need
of that, not if he wanted to go in.

Sora thought about the warning the lady had given him
- _It could be dangerous if you were to try and open
any locked doors you may find_ - then, he shook his
head. "Man, she couldn't've known that the Heartless
might be here. I can't let it slide, not here and not
now." 

He lifted his Keyblade up to the door and tapped it,
once. The door grumbled metallically for several
seconds, then slowly the interlocking pieces began to
give way, sinking into the corridor walls. Sora
blinked and shielded his eyes from the light inside
the room, but once his eyes adapted, he saw...

"My ship!" 

His eyes were so full of the gummi ship that had
carried him to so many different worlds that he didn't
notice the Heartless until he almost tripped over one.


Actually, Sora DID trip over a set of blocks, wrecking
a small tower that had been constructed from them. He
stumbled for a few steps, windmilled his arms, and
barely managed to keep his feet before spinning
around. He brought the Keyblade to bear on the
Heartless who'd almost tripped him, but it wasn't
leaping to the attack.

All the Heartless did was glare up at Sora almost
reproachfully, before putting its small hands on the
blocks and slowly rebuilding the tower that had been
there before Sora's feet had destroyed it. 

Slowly, Sora lowered the Keyblade and looked around
the room for the first time. And, for the first time,
he saw the Heartless sitting and standing and walking,
scattered throughout the room's expansive space. In
fact, calling it just a room wasn't right; it seemed
more of a grand hall, easily large enough to hold two
or even three Gummi ships.

All of the Heartless were just the child-sized ones
he'd known since that first, dreadful day on the
island - since the nightmare before it, in fact - and
all of them, every single one, had a toy.

And they were _playing_ with them. 

There was one Heartless with a cat's cradle, several
with balls, two with little soldiers they were moving
back and forth aimlessly, a number with blocks like
the first he'd seen, even one off in the relative
distance with a wooden sword that looked like the one
he'd abandoned long ago for the Keyblade. 

Something seemed subtly wrong with the all of them,
however, aside from the outright _weirdness_ of the
Heartless playing with toys. It took a moment for Sora
to see what that was, and when he did, he gasped in
shock.

Suddenly, Sora jumped into the air as the lady who had
rescued him spoke. "They won't play with each other
any more," and her voice was a sinking pool of
resignation with just a hint of desperation tinting
it. "I've tried and tried, but they simply ignore each
other and go by themselves again." 

She sighed deeply, and now there was the sound of
tears barely peeking out. "They don't even _play_ with
the toys. They're only picking them up and using them
because I order them to."

Sora flinched and backed away from the lady, the
Keyblade rising. "You _order_ them to?" he said
incredulously. 

The lady didn't seem to notice the Keyblade, or even
Sora's question. "Do you want to know their names?"
she asked, the song almost friendly and somehow...
dangerous. Without waiting for an answer, she began
pointing. "That one was named Aryil, that one was
named Gane, that one was named Thyme, that one was
named-" 

Slowly, as she continued on, naming each Heartless,
her voice rose and rose, the song growing angrier and
angrier, madness rising in it with each new name. It
beat against Sora's body with physical force, sheer
power hammering at him so hard that he was driven away
from her despite his best efforts. He stopped moving,
finally, when his back hit the hull of his Gummi ship,
but it was rocking back and forth as the gale of her
rage slammed into it. The Keyblade flickered out of
Sora's hands and he pressed both his hands against his
ears, trying to block out her voice. 

The pain of it was incredible, tearing at his ears and
at his soul, and he moaned out loud, the sound lost in
the lady's mad scream. _Am I gonna die here? Does she
even KNOW I'm here? What HAPPENED to her?!?!_

Then, the lady stopped.

The ringing in his ears didn't stop for several more
moments, but Sora didn't need to hear. Almost as
though he were reading her lips, almost as though she
were whispering into his mind, he heard her last
sentence, the song muted and barely on the edge of
sanity. 

"At least, those _were_ the names they once bore. They
were... they were my children."

Sora took his hands away from his ears and slowly
walked towards the tall woman. She looked at him, her
grey eyes glimmering with sorrow and madness mingled
together, then she slowly slid to her knees. Her eyes
stayed on him, even as her knees gave way, and she
asked him, "I... I did what I could to save them. Was
that wrong?"

If Sora had thought he'd been shocked before, he'd
been sadly mistaken. "Wh-what did you say?" He
couldn't make his voice go above a whisper. _A way...
to save the Heartless? WHAT?_

In answer, she put one hand down to her belt and
pulled one of the small pouches that rested there
free. Undoing the draw strings, she spilled some of
what rested in there into her palm and held it out to
Sora. Hesitantly, he looked.

At first, he thought they were small green gemstones,
surely worth a lot, but not important - until one of
the gems gave a flicker that made him take in a breath
involuntarily. "Those are-!"

"Magicite," the lady said, then laughed shortly,
bitterly, the song now almost... amused. "No, I don't
know _what_ they are, spirits of my people preserve
me. I did what I could. I snatched these from the
beings that tried to steal them from my children,
hoarded them, and fled from my home when that vanished
into the void, but... but..." Her face twisted. "I
can't give them back!" 

Angrily, she plucked one out from the pile that seemed
no different from the rest and forced it into the
forehead of the Heartless that still sat beside the
door, unconcernedly playing with its blocks. For a
moment, the Heartless seemed no different as the
lady's hand withdrew from its body, then, suddenly, it
twitched wildly, uncontrollably. It jerked to its feet
and almost looked different for just a split second,
almost looked like a real being-

Then, the sound of crystal shattering resounded
through the room, and the Heartless sat back down and
played with its blocks. 

It didn't even look up as the lady's hand reached down
and wrenched its head free from its body effortlessly.
Both the head and body existed for several long
seconds, long enough for the lady to bring the head up
to her face and gently kiss the forehead, where the
gem had been forced into it, then they both flickered
into smoke. 

Softly, she said, "And now, Aryil has died forever.
Oh, oh, my dear girl, can you ever forgive your poor
foolish mother?"

****

I trust that I wasn't the only one who stepped back in
shock as Harle motioned her companion, the one she'd
guided us to, to step out from the jungle and into our
view. 

After all, it isn't every day that one sees a wolf who
stands taller at the shoulder than the woman who's
scratching behind one ear! Even less often do you see
a wolf with that shocking color of rust-red hair, with
a streak of black which zig-zagged down one side of
the mane that Harle's hand had disappeared into. She
smiled up at that grim face affectionately and said,
"Everyone, zis is ze friend whom I know will guide
us."

Rydia asked with a smile on her face, "What is his
name?"

"Name? Name?!" Harle asked with a fine pretense of
shock and anger, a pretense betrayed only by the
twitching of her mouth's corners. "I tell you zis,
madamoiselle, a true wolf 'as no need of such
frippancies as a _name_!" 

"Then what do _you_ call him?" Rydia countered, and
Harle laughed lightly.

"Ah, you 'ave caught me. _I_, at least, 'ave to give
him a name, yes, else how shall I know him from ze
othair wolves?" Harle waited a moment for that to sink
in, then with a mischievious smile, she said, "I 'ave
named him Wolf. A fine name, no?"

I groaned at the joke, if indeed joke it had been. The
wolf turned his head enough to look at Harle out of
one eye, a resigned air prevalent about him. Strangely
enough, I took heart at his attitude. Obviously, if HE
could become inured to Harle's attempts at humor, then
so could I...

Donald, as was his wont, cut straight to the chase.
"Khan he twack the gummi ship?"

As her mouth suddenly twisted downward into a frown,
Harle said, "Merde! You do not believe zat I would,
ah, drag you all the way out here for not'ing, do
you?"

With a flurry of placating gestures, Donald hastened
to add, "I, I, I whas juzt whondering!"

Her arms crossed over her chest and she looked at the
mallard with that feminine stare of utter disapproval
that Donald knew so well from his days with Daisy. She
let him hem and haw for several moments, her foot
tapping, then Harle threw her hands up in the air. "I
give up, you will not believe Wolf can do such a thing
until you zee it for yourself!" 

Rydia stepped between Donald and Harle, her hands held
up as though afraid she'd have to seperate them. Her
scowl disappearing into a wry smile, Harle said slyly,
"And for a second time today, you spoil my fun. Ah,
Rydia, how iz a woman to do any teasing with zere
being near a person such as you?"

The green-haired woman opened her mouth to reply, but
before she could say a word, the ground started to
shake under our feet. At first, it was just a slight
rumble, barely shaking the branches over our heads,
but all too quickly it rose to as great an earthquake
as any I'd ever felt. 

The ramshackle huts that so many had just tossed up in
the village simply collapsed in on themselves, sending
great piles of dust into the air. From the village
came many cries of agony, as people trapped under what
had been their huts proclaimed their injuries. Even
the trees creaked and protested, dancing back and
forth in such a way that all of us stepped away, lest
one or more choose now to fall on top of us.

What was worse than the quake, what set our nerves on
edge and our hair on end, what made us all cringe and
cower in near terror, was the scream. 

It started low, just like the quake, and rose to a
crescendo that matched the earth's worst trembles.
Even now, it makes me shiver to remember the emotions
contained in that wail of doom: self-loathing, pity,
sorrow, hatred, and above all of them, a sense of
bitter vengeance, as though the screamer knew that
what he raged against would destroy him, would crush
him like a bug, would never even notice his existence,
and he _didn't care_.

The scream cut off sharply, and the earth quieted just
as suddenly. All of us gaped at each other for nearly
a minute, trying to recover-

Then, the first Heartless appeared in that burst of
foul smoke that I knew all too well. 

It was of a kind that I'd never seen before - a
floating round ball, with what looked like short
streamers of hair floating from its back. It was red
shot through with purple, with black eyes that glared
around, looking for that first life to steal. 

It died as giant spikes of purest ice pierced its
body, flung from Rydia's hand. 

Even as more Heartless appeared, flickering into life
around the village, they died at the hands, spells,
and weapons of people struggling from the collapsed
huts. Indeed, these people bore a deep hatred for the
beings that had destroyed their worlds, and it showed.
A quick glance at my companions showed the the only
ones without snarls of rage were myself, Donald, and -
Harle?

The fool-clad woman looked at me, her eyes wide and
sorrowful, and then looked away from the village and
at the mountain. "Ze scream, it venez from zere." Her
accent seemed thicker now, as though she weren't
concentrating on the words she said.

I realized that she was right. "Shucks, should we go
t'the mountain then? These folks here seem ta have
t'Heartless under control." 

All of them looked at me for a moment, and both Rydia
and Bart seemed inclined to say something, but they
both closed their mouths. Donald was the one to speak.
"I don' whant to sound like a bhroken reckord, but
what about Sorah?"

"The Welcoming Green is on the way," Bart said, then
added grimly, "if your Sora didn't have nothin' to do
with this, I'll eat my whips." 

No matter how many times someone near me does it, I'll
never stopped being impressed by a leap of intuition.
I mean, how do they _do_ it? How do they see two
facts, two seperate questions altogether, and unite
them into a single answer? It croggles my mind, and no
matter how many hours I spend carefully pondering it,
I don't think I'll ever understand it. 

But, regardless of how he'd come up with it, my mind
built a tower of speculation on his cloud of
intuition. The mountain was the only place that could
_possibly_ hide our gummi ship; surely someone from
the village would have wandered across it if it had
been lying in the jungle. Likewise, they would know
everyone who lived on the island... unless that person
hid somewhere, like in a handy series of caverns. 

But without a bit of proof, all that was a lot of
weight to dangle from one mighty thin string. So, the
first order of business was to find that proof, and
there was one place to do that for sure: this
strangely-named Welcoming Green that I'd heard so much
about and had, as of yet, failed to see.

"Let's go!" I declared, and started off.

****

Sora didn't want to interrupt the lady - almost didn't
dare to interrupt the lady - but now he could _feel_
something wrong with this place, as though something
had been awakened. It was a disgustingly familiar
feeling, one that seemed to ooze along his bones, one
that crawled along his skin, one that sat in his belly
like a leaden ball of acid.

The first time he'd had this feeling, Sora had written
it off to nerves - the evening before his world had
been sucked into nothingness. The second time, he'd
been too shocked by the sight of someone losing his
Heart right before his eyes to note it coming over him
again. 

The third time, however, in Wonderland, Sora had
learned exactly what it was: A warning that the
Heartless had come to this world. The feeling faded
quickly, but it was always reliable. 

The only weird thing was that there were Heartless
right before his eyes; why hadn't he felt anything
until this moment?

Tentatively, Sora said, "Lady, I-"

"My name," she said distantly, "is Terra." There was
no song in her voice now, not merry or sad, and that
made Sora even more uneasy.

"Terra, there are Heartless in this world. I gotta
find the Keyhole and seal it against 'em, before they
destroy it!"

"You can..." Slowly, mechanically, Terra looked up
from the palmful of gemstones at Sora. "Do that?" Her
face was blank, empty as a china doll's.

Sora nodded, and a shadow of something passed over
Terra's face. "Where were you?" she whispered softly,
slowly standing up, then her fist tightened, sending
gemstones spraying everywhere.

"WHERE WERE YOU WHEN IT WAS MY WORLD BEING
DESTROYED?!?!?!"

This time, instead of being unfocused and undirected,
her scream of rage was directed solely at Sora. At the
last moment, he tumbled out of the way, and the scream
hit the side of the gummi ship. It shrieked as it
scraped across bare rock, shoved by the sheer force of
her anger. Sora shuddered. _If that'd hit ME..._

Terra turned to face him again, and he saw it. 

The crest of the Heartless, that appeared everywhere
they went, had been emblazoned on her forehead. It
glowed with a pure radiance, and as though the
radiance were wind, her bangs were bouncing and flying
away from her face, adding an even more eerie frame to
the still-empty doll's mask she was wearing. 

She lifted one hand, and the Heartless in the room ran
for a door on the far side of the room, dropping toys
everywhere in their haste to get away. "You won't have
my children!" Terra exclaimed hatefully, the tone
frightening from someone with no expression.

Terra dropped the palm so that it faced Sora, and - he
hesitated. She was the woman who had saved him, held
him while he wept for friends dead and friends he
feared dead. She was the woman who had tried to kill
him. She was surely mad, and not responsible for her
actions. She was a slave of the Heartless, and Sora
knew that he had to destroy her. 

The conflict in his mind was so great that he'd only
started to move  before a burst of lightning crackled
from her hand, catching Sora in mid-jump. He flew
backwards, and impacted the rock wall with a
bone-breaking crunch. 

Despite the pain, Sora rolled out of the way as she
sent another black-tinged lighting bolt at him, then
jumped out of the way as the very stone underneath him
erupted into flame. He got close enough to throw his
Keyblade and did so, but it bounced from a shield she
put up just before it would have impacted her. 

After it reappeared in his hand, Sora leapt in almost
next to her and used it to direct a cone of ice at
Terra's back, but she whirled around and flung up both
her hands. The ice stopped in mid-air and then flew
back at Sora, stinging him with razor-sharp shards. 

Defiantly, he swung the Keyblade at her. The first hit
impacted her stomach with a shock that resounded all
the way to his shoulder. The next, she blocked with
her forearm. The next, she _grabbed_ the Keyblade in
mid-swing, and Sora's eyes opened wide in shock. _She
can't do that!!_ 

It felt as though it were rooted in rock, so firm was
her grip. He made the Keyblade vanish and slid away,
just in time; Terra just barely missed siezing him in
her free hand. Remembering how she'd held the
Keyblade, Sora knew that despite her slender-seeming
frame, she could have torn him apart with just those
hands.

_Well, crap._ He ducked behind a stalagmite and winced
as it was blown apart. _I'm gonna have to run, won't
I? I'm just not GOOD enough to face her down alone._
Fruitlessly, he thought, _I wish that Donald or Goofy
were here..._

-END Part 3

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