'Life water, or fountain of youth of you're an old crone that's desperate, is exactly what it sounds like. Water that can restore life,' Sombra said from one of Xion's shoulders, as that was the last place the girl had left Sombra. The two of them had spent half a week traveling, with once again only Sombra knowing where they were heading. At the moment their journey lead them to a small, grassy plain, with little of interest to look at aside from the calming green hills. 'But it does not restore youth, so if you get old and ugly you'll just have to suck it up like the rest of us.'
"So, life giving water? That's what we're gathering up next?" Xion asked with a bit of exhaustion in his voice, still having issues with her body. "And you didn't feel the need to tell me this until right this very moment?"
'Gods work in mysterious ways, Xion,' Sombra replied with a laugh.
"You're not a god."
'Huh, I'm not? Damn, I'm so powerful and mighty that I thought that I was,' Sombra cackled before his horn leaned back on Xion's shoulder and he looked up at the sky.
"Something the matter?"
'Yeah, as a matter of fact. See, the last time I heard of this place it was supposed to be guarded by over a dozen of Celestia's best soldiers. So cannon fodder to us, but you get the picture. Yet we're not that far out and I have yet to see anything to tell me that there are guards in the area.'
"And that's a bad thing?" Xion asked. "Less guards means less problems for us. Rarity heard about us from Pinkie and Fluttershy, but I'm fairly certain that the rest of Equestria is still under the wrong assumption that I'm the same kind of monster the Heartless are."
'Well, let me put it to you this way, puppet. If the guards aren't here, that can only mean a hoofful of things. The first is that they're bad at their job and left their posts. This is the most likely reason,' Sombra said with a snicker, before his aura grew darker. 'But the second reason is the reason they are not here fighting us is because they are off somewhere fighting something else. And if that's the case, how long until their problem becomes our problem?'
"So you think that they're currently dealing with the Heartless?"
'Heartless, Nobodies or maybe one of your old friends from the Organization. Who knows. Of course, I think that right now they've all, at the same time, managed to get their heads stuck in the ground and now can't tell which way is up,' Sombra said with contempt in his voice, something Xion hadn't heard in a long time.
"You know, I never did ask you about that. I, kinda, understand your hatred from the princesses, but what did the rest of the world do to you that was so bad? I mean, you are the villain, so you've got to expect that everypony that isn't evil will hate you," Xion pointed out, to which Sombra chuckled in reply.
'What they did, puppet, is that they failed to learn. I ruled the Crystal Empire for years, taught them magic and science the likes of which the world has never seen, and they rejected it. They rejected it for the old ways, the ways of the princesses. The two ponies that say light is good and darkness bad and friendship is key and blah blah blah...' Sombra snarled before taking in a calming sigh.
'My issue with the ponies of this world is that they refuse to grow, refuse to learn. They, like the guards that we can't find, keep their heads buried in the ground each time something bad happens and just hope it all goes away or somepony else deals with it. Hell, just look at the Heartless problem they currently have. Who thought of the magic solution? Twilight, the only pony among them with half of a brain. Everypony else just ran around flailing their limbs uselessly.'
"That's not entirely true. Pinkie, Fluttershy and Rarity have all been out here dealing with the Heartless the best that they can," Xion said, trying to stand up for the ponies.
'Hah, on Twilight's orders no doubt. And look how well that's gone for them. If not for you, all three of them would most likely be Heartless now and Twilight would have to strike down her closest friends...actually, now that I think about it we may have made a mistake in keeping her friends alive. Point being, I'm mad at the ponies because they refuse to learn, to change. And because they tried to refuse the darkness for too long. Look what that got them. Heartless.'
"The Heartless didn't come here because of too much light, the Maestro brought them here," Xion reminded him.
'Maybe he brought them here, but all he did was get them here ahead of time. Puppet, you can't tell me that the Heartless, beings that hunt strong hearts filled with light, wouldn't have eventually found this place, can you?' Sombra asked Xion. Xion tried to think of a way he was wrong, but once again his logic was too sound for her to fight against. 'My point exactly.'
"But Twilight isn't the only one battling the Heartless. I am too."
'Yes, you're cleaning up their mess. You're dealing with the problem because the ponies won't do it themselves.'
"More like can't. Only the keyblade can keep a Heartless down for the count, remember?"
'Puppet, you're very intelligent for...how old did you say you were?'
"Technically I'm less than a year old, but mentally I'm about fifteen," Xion replied.
'Faust I forgot how confusion your backstory is. Fine, whatever. You're very intelligent for someone who is fifteen, but you've a lot to learn about the world. And speaking about learning, I think we need to learn about what happened to the good ponies here.'
Xion looked forward after Sombra said this and her eyes went wide. A fortress stood before her, but instead of looking like a building that could withstand any attack there were flames that billowed smoke into the air with the walls. The doors to the fortress had been blasted open and spears along with other weaponry lined the ground.
"What happened?" Xion asked as she summoned her key, before racing towards the fortress.
'If I had to wager a guess, I'd say trouble,' Sombra replied. 'Those fires aren't that old, you can tell because they haven't spread that far yet. But what's really bad is that these are the ponies that were supposed to be guarding the life water. And if they're down for the count...'
"Then we need to get in there."
Xion rolled through the open doors and shot up to her feet, ready for an attack from any side. Yet when the attack didn't come right away, she took a moment to glance around the inside of the fort. The walls and buildings were made of the same stone material that made up the front, but in the center of a massive courtyard was a fountain that was as dry as a desert. Xion ran over to the edge of the fountain, looking in it for any sign of water.
'This is bad. Whoever did all of this also took the water,' Sombra snarled as his horn began to glow. 'And I can't sense any other trace of the water that this fountain once held. That makes this way more complicated than it was.'
"Why's that?"
'The Heartless and Nobodies would have little interest in water. Only a sentient being would. Like a member of the organization,' Sombra said quickly. Xion caught the tone in his voice and prepared herself for a sneak attack, but a moment later Sombra's horn began to glow with a violet light. 'Hang on, I'm picking up some life forms. They're not that far from here! Hurry, before something else has the pleasure of striking them down!'
Xion heeded Sombra's words and sprinted through the fortress, following his directions of where to turn or go. Despite wanting to get to whoever was in danger as quickly as possible, when she rounded one of the corners she met a sight that brought her to a screeching halt.
A suit of pony armor lay in the center of the street, with a sword and shield laying near the armor. But what drew Xion's full attention wasn't the armor, it was the weapon sticking out of the armor. A long lance stuck out of the armor, with the head of the weapons, which was shaped like a dragon's head, impaled through the armor and imbedded in the ground. On the other end that stuck in the air was a symbol, a symbol that Xion knew all too well.
"Xaldin is here," Xion said to Sombra with a voice filled with disdain. "That's his spear. I'd recognize it anywhere."
'And that solves our who would take the water problem. Question now becomes what would he want with the water when he isn't a being to begin with,' Sombra muttered, before catching Xion's expression. 'What? I pieced together that all of the organization are Nobodies. That or you told me. It's hard to remember without an actual brain.'
"Fine, whatever. Just keep your eyes on the sky," Xion instructed Sombra while she glanced up at the heavens, noticing for the first time the fact that there were gray clouds rumbling overhead. "Xaldin commanded the winds and is very skilled at ranged attack. I wouldn't put it past him to try and strike us down from above."
'So in comparison to the other members of your little group, how close would you say you and Xaldin are?' Sombra asked.
"Let's just say that he and I didn't like each other. At all," Xion replied.
'Good to know. But those life forms are still in danger. In fact, I sense less of them now. Hurry, puppet, if you want to save them.'
With one last, cautious look at the sky Xion raced off towards where the living beings were in danger, vaulting over a fallen barricade to find the exit to the back of the fortress. The doors at the back of the fort were missing as well, which allowed Xion to easily see the three guard ponies that were surrounded by a combination of Heartless and Nobodies.
"Freeze Raid!" Xion roared as she hurled her keyblade towards the group of Heartless, striking one of the Shadows that had been leaping at a guard mid air. As the keyblade passed through the Heartless it froze it in a block of ice, one that shattered when it fell to the ground. The Heartless and Nobodies all turned to face Xion, who was racing towards them as the keyblade reappeared in her hands.
One of the Dragoons vanished in a burst of air, leaving the Soldier behind it to be cleaved in half by Xion's weapon. A Blue Rhapsody began to charge a magical spell around itself to fire at Xion, yet Xion spun on her toes and launched herself at the Heartless, slashing through it in a single strike. Xion landed in a roll and came up next to the guards, who were looking at her with fear in their eyes.
"Are all of you alright?" Xion asked them, but from the way they flinched they could tell that they didn't see her how she saw her. "If you can move, get up and get away from here. Things are only going to get worse from here on out."
"W-what are you?" one of the guards asked.
"The only one that can stop these beings."
Xion then rose back to her feet and turned around to see that the Dragoon was now staring at her, with two more Dragoons standing behind it. Xion narrowed her eyes as she lifted her blade over her shoulder and summoning a dark aura around herself, which was concentrated around her left arms.
'Heh, seems that your skill with the darkness had the chance to grow stronger since you posses the light now to keep it balanced,' Sombra informed Xion in an impressed tone, but Xion said nothing in reply. The guards let out gasps at the dark being that stood in front of them, before the two that could move grabbed their comrade and dragged him away from the battle.
The first Dragoon lashed out at Xion with its lance, yet faster than even Sombra could keep up with Xion lifted her left hand and grabbed the lance. The Dragoon looked from its weapon to the puppet, before a dark cloaked blade sliced down the center of its skull. Xion then ripped her keyblade from the head of the Dragoon, only to its own lance around and impale it through the chest of the Nobody.
As that Dragoon fell the second one disappeared in a flash of light, vanishing from their sight. Xion stopped moving the moment it vanished, before she started to keep an eye on the sky. A burst of nothingness appeared above her, getting her to react a moment later by swinging the keyblade over her back. The Dragoon came hurtling down with its lance aimed at Xion, yet she had positioned her blade perfectly and the attack from the Nobody bounced off of her keyblade.
"Say goodbye," Xion snarled before she arched her keyblade in an upward swing, one that sliced one of the arms off of the Dragoon. The Nobody stumbled to the side before a horizontal slash of Xion's keyblade took the head off of the Nobody. As it faded away into nothingness, Xion spun and turned to face the final Dragoon, which had kept its distance the entire time. "One left. Let's make this quick."
The Dragoon lunged towards Xion, faking a low attack before switching its stance and changing to an overhead attack. Xion paid no attention to the Nobodies fancy moves and simply lunged towards it with her left hand, which became cloaked in darkness. She let out a roar as she thrust her left hand forward, creating a giant fist of darkness that slammed into the body of the Dragoon and pushed it back. Xion twirled and slashed through the Nobody in a diagonal motion, cleaving the being of nothingness in two and making it vanish from her sight.
With all of her foes out of the way, Xion closed her eyes and banished the darkness. She looked around at the area to make sure that she hadn't missed any of the Heartless or Nobodies, before she turned her gaze towards the sky and narrowed her eyes.
'I see you sense that too. Yeah, there's two beings up there, neither of which look to be anything good for us,' Sombra agreed with Xion, confirming her silent suspicions. 'The good thing for us is that the two of them seem to be battling it out right now. Any member of the organization that would want to take out Xaldin?'
"I can name a few," Xion muttered before two beings burst through the cloud cover, two beings locked in a rainbow light that was plummeting towards the ground. The two beings impacted not too far from where Xion was standing, allowing her to race over to the newly created crater before either being could resume the fight again. As the puppet reached the top of the crater, she narrowed her eyes at who she found inside.
One of the beings wore a black coat and was much taller than her, with long, black hair that shot out of his head. Around him danced six lances, lances that seemed to move with a mind of their own as they sought out any attack that would harm their master. And all Sombra needed to do was look at Xion's face to know who the cloaked figure was.
But then Xion glanced over at the other figure and Sombra could tell that it would be his turn to explain. The other foe was a sky blue pegasi with a rainbow mane that shown in the single ray of sunlight that shown down through the hole in the clouds the two had created. On her flank was a rainbow lightning bolt under a cloud and her body was covered in cuts and bruises. Even if Xion didn't know who she was, she could tell that the battle had not been going well for her.
'That's Rainbow Dash. She's one of Twilight's merry band of idiots,' Sombra informed Xion, who nodded to show she understood before she drew her keyblade and lunged towards Xaldin, aiming right for the back of his head before lashing out with her blade. A lance moved between her and the key and deflected the strike, knocking Xion back and forcing her to roll back up to her feet. Xaldin spun around to face Xion, but when he saw her his eyes went wide with shock.
'Attacking a foe from behind with the intent to kill. I knew you were secretly evil! My prayers have been answered!' Sombra exclaimed before he let out a cackle. Xion said nothing in reply, choosing to lift her keyblade and glare at Xaldin.
"So are you with the Maestro or did you come here by accident?" Xion asked Xaldin, before taking up a fighting stance. "Because either way, you're going to regret that decision."
"I am here because the Maestro told me that there was something in this world that did not have the right to exist. I thought it would be something interest, but now is see it is just another one of Vexen's failed puppets," Xaldin replied before the air darkened around him and he started to float, his six lances whirling around him. "Well, just like all the others, it seems I must break this toy as well."