Adult-FanFiction.org : Games

Kingdom Hearts: Dark Dawn	By : RotSeele Category: Kingdom Hearts > AU - Alternate Universe Views: 3168 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 0
Disclaimer: I do not own Kingdom Hearts. I do not make any money from this story.

Chapter List
- 3
- 4
- 5
Four - Traverse Town

The door Kaoru had entered led into the interior of a house. Dust covered everything, showing clear signs that someone hadn’t lived here in a long, long time. After exploring in the hopes that maybe he would find something to eat and ending up only finding more dusty furniture and something extremely questionable in a cupboard, Kaoru slipped out of the house and into an unfamiliar street. He looked left and right, studying the buildings towering over him. He dispelled Guardian, then headed right. Eventually he ended up in the main square again, and Kaoru sat heavily on the stairs, holding his head in his hands.
An apple appeared in his peripheral, held in a slender hand attached to a slender arm.
Kaoru lifted his head and looked up at the arm’s owner in surprise.
She was maybe a year or so older than Kaoru, with shoulder-length pink hair. Two blue diamond hair clips kept some of her hair out of her face. Magenta eyes sparkled as she studied him in turn. She wore a grey tank top and a purple skirt with a brown belt around her waist. Her right arm was covered by a brown sleeve that reminded Kaoru of an archer’s guard. Her feet were encased in simple brown boots. She seemed friendly enough, but Kaoru continued to stare at her until she waved the apple in his face.
“Go on.” She said, her voice soft. “Take it. You’ve gotta be hungry.”
“Uh, thanks.” Kaoru took the apple from her and studied the red shiny skin for a minute before taking a bite. The apple was sweet and juicy, and it eased the hunger gnawing at his backbone better than the few mouthfuls of water had.
The girl sat next to him, bracing her elbows on her knees. She cupped her chin in her hands and stared out at the courtyard, apparently waiting for him to finish with his apple. Kaoru took a few more bites, chewed, and swallowed before he lowered his hand and sat in silence with her.
“My name is Rinally. But everyone just calls me Rin.” the girl said, looking fully at him now. She was smiling a little, but she didn’t offer him her hand to shake.
“Kaoru,” he replied, cradling the half-eaten apple in both hands so he didn’t offer her his hand. “My friends just call me Kaoru.”
Rinally laughed. Despite himself, Kaoru began to smile. Rin had a pretty laugh. Finally, she quieted, once more looking out into the courtyard. “Where are you from?” she asked.
“Paradise City. What about you? And where are we? How’d we get here? Were you the one following me?”
“I’m from the Sky Islands. As for where we are, this place is called Traverse Town. It’s a hub world.” Rin pointed to the sky then, where the stars still twinkled in the black backdrop. “All those stars are other worlds, just like yours and mine. When the stars wink out, it means a world was destroyed. We ended up here because that’s what happened to our worlds. Somehow, we survived it.”
Kaoru looked up at the sky, at the hundreds stars. Each one really was a world? Did someone somewhere look up at the sky and see the light of Paradise City from where they stood? What worlds was he looking at now? Was one of those worlds Sora’s? “So if we survive the destruction of our world, we end up here?”
Rinally shrugged. “I don’t know. My world was destroyed a week ago. I woke up here, in Traverse Town, all alone.”
“You survived here alone for a week?”
“There are people here, but you just can’t see them. They hide when strangers appear.”
“So, again, were you the one following me?”
Rin shook her head. “No. I saw you sitting here from over there.” She pointed toward a set of huge doors on the other side of the courtyard. “There’s an inn that way. I’ve been staying there. I came out to the courtyard to get something to eat, and since you looked so miserable, I came over to talk to you.”
“Oh.” Kaoru looked back at the apple in his hands but no longer felt hungry. What Rin had told him made his stomach queasy. “How many hub worlds are there?”
“I don’t know.” Rinally shivered, took a deep breath, and slowly let it out. “I hope more than this one. I don’t want to be the only one who made it.”
“Who’d you lose?”
Rin flicked her maroon eyes toward him, then away. She lifted her chin out of her hands and clasped her hands together. “My parents. My little sister. We’d gotten into a fight an hour before they came and I ran away. Next thing I know, my world is gone and I’m waking up here.”
“They?”
“These little black creatures. They had huge glowing yellow eyes and big flat feet and spindly fingers.” Rin made a few gestures with her hands. “And I thought I saw... I thought I saw people with them. Guys in black hooded coats.”
Kaoru frowned. He didn’t remember seeing any people when the Heartless had appeared. He did, however, remember Sora and Riku talking about ‘them’, back when he was little. Were the Heartless being controlled by people? And if so, who? And why? Sora had to know. Kaoru stood abruptly, startling Rin. “They’re called Heartless. They consume hearts of people and worlds. Only the Keyblade can kill them.”
“Wait, what?”
Kaoru looked at her. “When I was little, I was attacked by a huge Heartless. It had a metal rod sticking out of its chest. I was saved by Sora and Riku, the Keyblade Masters. That’s when I was chosen as one of the Keyblade’s wielders.” To make sure she stopped looking at him so skeptically, he held out his hand and called Guardian to his hand. The Keyblade appeared immediately, its familiar weight settling in his hand as his fingers closed around the hilt. Rinally’s eyes went wide. “Yesterday - I guess it’s yesterday now - Guardian appeared to me just before my world was destroyed and I lost my best friends. I think I know why I ended up here. I need to find Sora.”
“Wait, time out.” Rin pushed herself to her feet, setting her hands on her hips. “You’re talking about the Sora, right? The kid from Destiny Islands who like, saved all the worlds by sealing Kingdom Hearts? The one who destroyed Organization XIII and connected the worlds?”
Kaoru shrugged. “I guess? I just know he wields the Kingdom Key and he travels around with Riku, who also has a Keyblade.”
“Do you even know the story, or do you believe Sora just happened to appear to save your stupid ass and choose you as a successor?”
Kaoru pressed his lips together and let Guardian vanish. “Do I know what story?”
Rinally’s mouth opened and closed for a few moments, her eyes wide with disbelief. Then she shook her head and launched into the story about Sora and the Keyblades and the hundreds of worlds that he had saved. Kaoru absorbed it all, stunned that one boy - a boy that had been Kaoru’s age when he had started wielding the Keyblade and saving worlds - had actually lived through and fought these battles. Had he not seen Sora and Riku with his own eyes, he would’ve believed Rin was just making it up. When she was finished, he asked the one question that had started bothering him since she started talking. “How do you know all this?”
“When I was six, they came to the Sky Islands. Only there was a girl with them when they came. She’s the one who told me the story. She also told me the story about the Princesses of Heart and how she was the guardian of her world’s heart. But there were only seven of them, you know? Seven princesses whose hearts were so pure they were like bright beacons of light.” Rinally smiled, her head tilting to the side. “I always wondered what it would be like to be a princess, you know?”
“Don’t all girls?” Kaoru asked.
Rin narrowed her eyes at him, as if she couldn’t decide if his question was in seriousness or an insult. Finally she shrugged. “I don’t know. But the girl that was with them was really pretty. She was like a real princess.”
They stood in silence for a little while, watching each other, and trying to gauge what the other was thinking. Kaoru looked toward the starry night sky, then around the courtyard, studying the huge doors before he looked back at Rin. “How do you get off a hub world?” he asked.
Rinally’s expression turned sad and she shrugged weakly. “I don’t know. I heard the people who live here talking about Highwind Shipping, which, I’ve discovered, is a company that takes people and stuff between worlds. But I haven’t seen him come here. In fact, I haven’t seen any gummi ship.”
“Do gummi ships make regular rounds here?” Kaoru had seen the bulky ships before. Paradise City often had gummi ships coming in to drop things off or pick things up, but he had never really considered them important before. He wished he had paid more attention to them.
“According to the people, yeah. Cid used to live here. Used to come around a lot more often, too. Now he might make a trip once every month or so.”
“Somehow, I don’t think we can wait around here for a month.”
“‘We’?”
Kaoru smiled. “I’m not going to leave you here if I can figure a way off this world.”
Rinally blinked, then slowly returned his smile. She shrugged. “If you can find a way off this place, then I’ll gladly stick by your side.”
“Have you explored the whole of Traverse Town yet?”
“Mostly.”
“And you’re positive you haven’t been following me around?”
Rinally nodded. Kaoru looked toward the big gates that led deeper into Traverse Town and summoned Guardian again. “Then I think I’ve figured out how we can get out of here.” He started walking toward the back of the courtyard, where the alley led back into the district where the water fountain was.
Rinally fell into step beside him. She now held a staff in her hands, her knuckles white around the haft. It was a plain red rod with a small gemstone floating in a gold circle setting at the top. He realized she must have summoned it, just like he had summoned Guardian. “Are you going to explain or do I get to figure it out while we do it?” Rin asked, her tone of voice both curious and sarcastic.
“I’m going to lure out whatever was watching me. If it’s a Heartless, I’m going to try to defeat it. They have to get here somehow, right? If I defeat it, then maybe Guardian will show me the way out of here.”
“How is that Keyblade going to show you anything?”
“That’s what we’re going to figure out.” Kaoru replied, placing a hand on the giant door that led into the deeper parts of Traverse Town.
“You’re useless.”
“Shut up.”
- 3
- 4
- 5
You need to be logged in to leave a review for this story.You need to be logged in to leave a review for this story.
Report Story

Kingdom Hearts: Dark Dawn