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Kingdom Hearts: Dark Dawn	By : RotSeele Category: Kingdom Hearts > AU - Alternate Universe Views: 3169 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 0
Disclaimer: I do not own Kingdom Hearts. I do not make any money from this story.

Chapter List
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Fifty-Four - Atlantica

Rinally spun through the air on a concussive wave created by her own power. She stared helplessly at both halves of her witch’s staff, each of which plummeted to the sapphire waters far, far, far below her and disappeared. That staff had been a gift upon her confirmed entry into Sky Island’s School of Magic, and had been with her for as long as she could remember. It was as precious to her as Guardian and Sanctuary were to Kaoru and Kai. Without it, Rinally didn’t have a focus for her magic. Without it, she could easily kill herself as she could kill her enemies with her spells. She started to cry, mourning the loss of such an important gift and her own helplessness.
Then her descent began.
She saw Lorne hit the iceberg and smash right through it, sending himself and Morgana into the waters. She saw Melody and her father speeding with all haste toward the cliffs. She saw the waters in the distance boiling with activity as something speedily approached.
Then she felt the presences of Kaoru and Kai against her mind and she stopped crying.
Even without her staff she was still a powerful witch. Even without her staff, she could still fight. She wasn’t a Keyblade wielder like Kaoru and Kai whose weapon would simply reappear in her hand if she willed it, but she still had her power. Her staff might be destroyed, but her magic was still there.
She spread out her legs and her arms as she’d seen master sky divers on the Sky Islands do and leveled out her free fall into something she could control. Then she drew both her hands before her, slowly, and concentrated on infusing as much of her magic into the air as she could. Flickers of her power began to roil in the coalescing air beneath her palms and her Aeroga spell began to form. She fed power into it, making it grow large enough to surround her entire body. Her descent slowed enough that she could control it, and she cast a Float spell upon herself as soon as she was high enough that a controlled drop wouldn’t kill her. By then, she was close enough to Melody’s ship that she could see their faces and they could see her. Melody left her father’s side, waving her arms and calling out Rin’s name.
Rinally landed on the deck of the ship hard. She lost her balance and fell forward, catching herself before she smashed her face into the wood planks. She was pushing herself upright when Melody slid to her knees in front of Rin and grasped her shoulders tightly.
“Rin! Are you okay?” Melody asked, her voice colored bright with fear and worry.
Rin nodded. “I’m okay.” She hugged Melody tight and then drew back so she could get to her feet. She looked toward King Eric then and said, “I’m sorry. I tried to stop him, but he was just too strong for me.”
Eric shook his head. “You did what you could, Rinally, and the most important fact is that you’re alive and in one piece. Anything now, we can handle together.” He began issuing orders then, calling for the oars to stop and for the ship to be brought about.
Rinally raced with Melody to the railing and watched the waters near the cliffs churn as something took place beneath the waves. The ship began to turn, angling away from the frothing water at the base of the rocks and heading back out toward the open water. Melody clutched the railing and stared at the water as if she was waiting for something to happen. Rinally watched as well, her knuckles turning white as she gripped the wood.
The water finally stopped churning, but in its place a white-capped wave lurched away from the cliffside and raced toward the ship. It was due to Eric’s skill at the helm that the ship wasn’t capsized by the wave, and instead was pushed further out to sea. Rin crouched against the ship’s railing as the craft tilted, holding tight to the wood so she didn’t lose her footing and go sliding off the other side of the deck. Melody let out a small squeal then as a giant tentacle lashed out of the water, spraying everyone on the ship with water. It crashed back into the water and sank below the surface. Rinally stared at the water, having a sinking feeling she knew what had occurred beneath the water’s surface.
She pushed away from the railing and grabbed Melody’s wrist, pulling the girl with her back to the deck where her father was. They reached the deck and Rinally spun to face the sails of the ship. “We have to get further away! Get out of its range!” she cried.
“We don’t have time to deploy the oars.” Eric said, even as he spun the helm to continue turning the ship back out toward open water.
“That’s fine.” Rinally focused on the sails and lifted her hands toward them. She concentrated on those sails just as she had concentrated on controlling her fall, and an Aeroga spell appeared swirling in the air in the space between her palms and the sails. She unleashed the spell, forcing the air to fill the sails. That magic allowed the ship to speed away from the cliffside, and just in time too.
The water exploded in white frothy geysers, sending spray up into the air. Rinally didn’t end her spell until she was sure they were far enough away, and then she turned to see what was exploding out of the water behind her.
Tentacles writhed around in the air with whip-like motions. In the center of the whipping tentacles was the massive form of Lorne, but his mouth was caught open in a soundless scream, and his lower half seemed to be embedded in the chest of Morgana. The squid-woman herself was reaching toward the sky with both her arms, her fingers curved to display nails as sharp as knives. Her hair had gone from white and grey to emerald green with white streaks. Her eyes burned a fierce Heartless gold and black. Rinally stared with wide eyes, watching as water foamed and popped around the pair. Lorne’s muscles strained against whatever force Morgana was using to keep him bound to her and Rinally thought she saw true pain on Lorne’s face.
Rin bit her lip. As she was now, there wasn’t anything she could do about what she saw in front of her. Without her mermaid tail, she couldn’t get in the water to fight. She would have to fight from the deck of the ship, which could put everyone’s lives in even more danger if she made a mistake. Without her witch’s staff, she didn’t have the fine focus and control she’d enjoyed before, so she could easily harm her own allies as easily as she could hurt her enemies. But if she could focus as she’d done with the last two spells she’d cast, maybe she could keep the spells from lashing backwards at her and those with her.
“What is that?” Melody asked, coming to Rin’s side. Her eyes went wide at the sight of Morgana and the squid-woman’s changed form. “What is she?!”
“They’re fighting for control.” Rin said. “Lorne intended to use Morgana’s power to boost his own. Instead, she’s now trying to control him. So they’re fighting each other.”
“I thought she was dead!”
As if the sound of Melody’s voice was the trigger, Morgana’s Heartless eyes focused on the ship and the dark haired girl standing beside Rinally. The sea witch’s lips parted and a soul-wrenching angry cry escaped her. She lunged toward the ship, her knife-like nails stretching out wide. Rinally pushed Melody behind her and snapped out a Firaga spell. A huge fireball bloomed at the end of her finger and raced toward Morgana, making the air shimmer from the heat of the fire. It crashed into both Lorne and Morgana, knocking them back into the cliffside. Rinally gripped the railing as several huge rocks broke free and slammed into the water, causing waves that caught the ship and launched it even further away.
Rinally pulled herself upright and stared at the water, waiting for it to roil and break and waiting for Morgana or Lorne or whoever was in control to come after them. The water became as smooth as glass after it stopped churning, broken only by the waves that lapped at the stone of the cliff wall. A sinking feeling gripped Rinally then, and she looked below her, toward the water. Sure enough, a monstrous dark shape was passing beneath them. Rinally looked toward Eric, but she didn’t dare call out. The king seemed to get the message anyway, and began using hand signals to his men. They began racing around the deck, grabbing harpoons or swords or whatever weapons they had available to them. Then they braced themselves away from the railings and closer to the center of the deck, keeping enough space between themselves to avoid hitting each other with their weapons. Eric remained at the helm with Rinally and Melody, his knuckles white as he gripped the helm. Rinally gripped Melody’s shoulder and silently instructed her to watch the back and right while Rin watched the back and left. She didn’t want any of them taken by surprise, but her biggest fear was that Morgana would come up right beneath them and break the ship in half. They couldn’t make any sudden moves, nor could they try to run. They had to trust the ocean to take care of them and hope that Morgana was just going to pass them by. Of course, it was a slim hope, but a hope nonetheless.
The ocean exploded into a flurry of motion.
Rinally saw a giant tentacle coming down onto the center of the ship and cried out a warning to the men there. She concentrated all her energy upon them and managed to bring up a Barrier spell that protected them from the worst of the blow. Even still, her spell did nothing to keep the weight of the limb from pushing the ship down into the water by a few feet, nor did it stop the timbers from creaking and threatening to break. It took all of Rinally’s concentration to keep the Barrier from shattering under the weight. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw King Erik lift a small harpoon and cock his arm back. The harpoon flew through the air and embedded itself into the soft flesh of the tentacle. From below the ocean came a horrid scream of pain, and the tentacle writhed back away from the ship and sunk below the churning waters.
“Man your stations!” boomed Erik, already gripping the helm of the ship. “Full sail!”
As the men scrambled around to obey their liege’s orders, Rin and Melody watched the ocean continue to boil and writhe. The crystalline waters began to turn black, as if a massive oil spill had suddenly coated the surface of the water. Rinally shivered as she realized that it wasn’t oil or ink, but pure, absolute darkness. Erik brought the ship around as hard and as fast as he could, and the men worked the ropes and rigging in order to catch the wind. The water splashed over the side of the ship in their haste, the sea spray cold and frigid against Rinally’s skin. It felt like a herald of things to come.
The ship rocked on the waves as it sped away from the spreading darkness. Rinally left Melody by her father’s side and hurried over to the port side rail, clutching the wood as she leaned over the side as far as she dared. There, beneath the darkness spreading across the white-capped water, she could see Morgana’s tentacles writhing just under the surface. Rinally couldn’t tell what the sea witch was doing, but for the moment she wasn’t chasing them.
It has to be Lorne. He must be trying to wrest control of their joined form. Rinally dug her nails into the wood, biting her lower lip as she furiously thought of a way she could win this battle.
The ship was perhaps three yards outside of the darkness that covered the surface of the water when its movement was suddenly arrested. The instant stop threw everyone, even Rin, to the deck. Rin pushed herself up onto her hands and knees and looked for Melody. The girl was clinging to her father, who somehow had managed to keep a tight grip on the helm of the ship. Melody’s eyes were squeezed shut and her face was buried in Erik’s chest. Erik had his arm wrapped around his daughter’s waist, his face set in a determined grimace. Rinally reached to grip the railing and pulled herself to her feet. Her gaze found the darkness-covered water, finding it utterly calm, without even a single wave breaking its surface. It was flat, matte black, and Rin found it utterly terrifying.
Even more terrifying, out of that matte darkness something started to rise.
“Morgana,” whispered Melody. It was so soft that Rin barely heard it, but even she recognized the sudden fear in the girl’s tone. Glancing around, Rinally saw that all of the men on the ship, including Erik, were staring at Morgana’s rising shape in utter terror.
She still had the Heartless eyes, Rin saw, but Lorne looked to have been completely absorbed. Rinally saw signs of him, such as the tufts of fur that decorated Morgana’s shoulders and arms, but of the Brotherhood member, she couldn’t see any sign of life. It appeared as if he had lost the fight against Morgana, and rather than absorbing her power, she had absorbed him. The squid-woman’s lips split to reveal sharp, serrated, pointed teeth. She sat nearly frozen in the center of that darkness, her arms half raised, her fingers crooked to make her nails look like daggers. Rinally realized that one of Morgana’s tentacles must have grabbed the ship’s rudder and was holding it fast, leaving them completely at her mercy.
Morgana’s Heartless eyes focused on the ship and her smile became even more sinister. “I see you, Melody.” The voice that came out of that mouth was two-fold, both Lorne’s voice and what, Rinally assumed, was Morgana’s. “I’m so glad we have the chance to talk again. I haven’t forgotten about you, darling. I haven’t forgotten how you sealed me away in that frigid tomb. I should like to return the favor!”
The ship was suddenly yanked backwards toward Morgana. Rinally gripped tight to the railing, feeling her entire body strain against the sudden gravity being forced upon it. She knew that if Morgana was allowed to pull the ship back any closer to her, there would be no escape for anyone on the vessel, especially Melody and her father. Rinally rushed to the back of the ship and leaned over the railing where she could see the tethering tentacle just under the surface of the water. Rinally looked up then at Morgana, seeing the sea-witch’s eyes glow bright with the power of Darkness. More tentacles began to writhe under the surface of the obsidian water, breaking through the water to begin to reach toward the ship as it came into range. If they reached the ship, they would wrap around the men on the deck and squeeze the life from them.
Rinally’s heart pounded in her chest, filling her ears with the sound of a drum.
A brush of Light against her mind silenced that drum and filled her with confidence and certainty. A brush of Darkness against her mind made her feel powerful and gave her back the clarity that she hadn’t realized she’d lost.
Kaoru. Kai.
Rinally lifted her hands toward the sky. Her friends were on their way, so close that she could actually sense them. Her staff might be gone forever, her powers might kill everyone around her if she wasn’t careful, but she wasn’t alone anymore.
“THUNDAGA!” Rinally screamed, pointing her finger right at Morgana’s smiling face. Lightning, bright and yellow, snapped from Rinally’s finger, searing the air between her and her target. The bolts of electricity struck Morgana in the face, snapping her head back and filling the air with the smell of burned flesh. The Thundaga bolts also hit the black surface of the water, making it hiss and pop and steam. Her spell also struck the rising tentacles, sending electrical shocks through the limbs that made them twitch and spasm erratically. Her spell not only caused Morgana to retreat further from the ship, it caused her to release the ship, and as soon as that tentacle released the rudder, Erik ordered the men to unfurl the sails. Rinally spun around and cast an Aeroga spell toward the sails, forcing the ship to speed away from Morgana.
Her spell didn’t last long, and Morgana was soon giving chase again. She let out a bestial roar that was more indicative of Lorne than herself, and her hand swept up out of the water, sending up a sheet of spray. Erik quickly threw the wheel to the left, trying to turn the ship out of the path of Morgana’s hand. He was successful only in the fact that he brought the ship into a sharp but slow turn that gave Morgana only one target: the ship’s main mast. Wood shrieked in protest as a heavy weight struck it, and Rinally threw her arms up over her face to protect it from the flying wood shards. She was lucky compared to the men on deck nearest to the shattering mast, as most of the shards missed her, but one sliced into her thigh and drew a hot stinging line of blood.
“Watch out!”
Rinally looked away from her wound in time to see the mast, completely shattered from its moorings in the deck, begin to fall toward the port side of the ship. Men scrambled to escape the falling wood and sails, dragging themselves or pulling their wounded brothers if the men couldn’t move. The mast crashed into the railing of the ship, shattering even more wood and sending more splinters flying, and then it struck the surface of the water with thunderous force.
Rinally slapped a healing spell over her wound, then hurried toward Erik and Melody. Erik was still gripping the wheel, but he was doubled over, shielding his daughter with his body. Rinally touched his shoulder and when he nodded, she threw a Curaga at both him and Melody before rushing to the first of the wounded men. She knew that it was probably a futile attempt, considering they were sitting ducks now, and Morgana was closing in. She looked up at the men around her, seeing fear in all their eyes, even from the ones she had healed already. She saw the moment they knew their lives were over and were giving up.
“It’s not over yet.” Rinally said, earning their attention. “It’s not over. As long as we’re alive, we can still fight!”
“She’s right.” Erik said, joining the men. Melody stood beside her father, glaring up at Morgana. “As long as we have hope, we can achieve anything.”
“But, my lord, we have nothing to defeat that.”
Before Erik could refute the sailor, Morgana let out a laugh of confidence and victory and lifted her hand to point a sharp-nailed finger toward the ship. Darkness gathered at the tip of her finger, steadily pulsing as it grew larger. Then she howled, “I will pay you back for every ounce of shame, every ounce of pain, and every ounce of humiliation! I will destroy you! I will destroy everything!”
Rinally lifted her hands to the sky and focused her power into the most powerful Barrier spell that she could muster. The air around her and those with her flickered blue and white with her spell, almost as if the air itself was electrically charged. The shield formed fully seconds before Morgana unleashed her spell and that ball of darkness sped toward them. Rinally locked her elbows, splayed her fingers, and stared at that orb coming toward her, teeth clenched and all her focus poured into her Barrier.
A flash of light streaked across the sky and struck the orb before it reached the ship. It sent the orb of darkness flying backwards toward Morgana, though it never reached her. A shadow crashed into the orb seconds before it would have struck her, and the orb exploded with a massive shockwave that sent both the ship and Morgana reeling. The sea witch crashed back into the ocean with an animalistic cry while the ship was carried forward by the pressure of the shockwave hitting its hull and the waves that were born by Morgana’s fall. When the ship came to a rest, Rinally released her Barrier spell and hurried to the railing, leaning over the side.
A huge grin appeared on her face and relief filled her. She cupped her hands around her mouth and yelled, “It’s about time you two showed up!”
The flash of light and streak of darkness - Guardian and Sanctuary - spun through the air and each Keyblade returned to the hands of their owners.
Kaoru smiled up at Rin and lifted Guardian slightly, as if saluting her.
Kai flourished Sanctuary, his eyes blazing Heartless black and yellow, and said, “Get down here, Rin. We’ve got a job to do.”
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Kingdom Hearts: Dark Dawn