As Sora, Donald, and Goofy sat in the cockpit, continuing through space as they headed for whatever world was nearby, Radiant and Fluttershy returned to their world for a time, where Sombra found that the puppies were going to be placed in part of the residence that the pair were building. It was more of a workspace than actual housing, since they had rooms and beds in the Gummi Ship, though she could tell that they were planning on adding beds as well, just in case they exhausted themselves with their various tasks, a worthwhile addition in her mind. Half of it was positioned near the area that Radiant wanted to build a mine in, as she needed materials and it seemed like the best way was to use her time gathering them in a natural way, even though Sombra knew she'd spend some of her time studying the items they had acquired from the various Heartless. The other half was currently being used to house the dalmatian puppies until it was time to return them to their parents in Traverse Town, something that caused Fluttershy to smile as she made sure they had everything they might need, before turning her attention to the field that the worker rabbits were working in.
Sombra had to admit that it was an interesting thing to see, they were like miniature farmers as they carefully tended to the area that Fluttershy was working in, aiding her in planting seeds and watering other areas, all while protecting the crops that were already growing, meaning this place would produce things faster than a normal field.
Since she didn't care to do that sort of work Sombra returned to her room and sat on her bed for a time, where she held a hand out and called forth the fragmented heart piece they had recovered from the mad world they had visited, a world that she only now realized was something Discord, the Spirit of Disharmony, would have made. She thought about it and quickly determined that since most of her focus was on the new world, and the strangeness of the Queen of Hearts with the rest of the oddness, she hadn't made the connection until this point, which she would have to work on in the future. Right now her focus was on the strange fragment she had obtained after defeating the Trickmaster, because the power inside it was great, more than she was expecting, and it only made her wonder how strong the full heart would be once all of the pieces were finally recovered. With that thought in mind she confirmed what she had thought earlier, that for the time being the fragment would be stored in a smaller inner storage area so it wasn't accidentally absorbed like the rest of the hearts she had recovered so far, allowing her to focus on everything else that had happened so far.
In addition to studying the hearts that were in her possession, and thinking about who the fragmented heart might belong to, Sombra found that Fluttershy delivered some of the items she had grown to the kitchen, allowing her to taste what appeared to be cherry tomatoes, rather good ones when she tried one. Since Donald clearly couldn't cook, and the rest of the group didn't seem to want to give the duck another chance, Sombra decided to take this part of her new life seriously, where she used their rather limited supplies to make the best meals that she could, while preserving items so they could be used in the future. Such a thing told her that they were going to have to return to Traverse Town before long, because the ship, while outfitted for more than three people, wasn't stocked for more than three, so having six was going to cut down on their supplies faster than if there were only three or even four. Fortunately Fluttershy's farming provided some relief to the situation they were in, adding the cheery tomatoes and other items to the pantry, especially when she gained the seeds of other items to plant in her farm, allowing Sombra to focus on what was currently going on.
After another day of flying through space, however, Sora informed everyone that they were getting closer to another new world, where Sombra and the others finished what they were doing before regrouping in the cockpit, where they found that this one looked like a vast jungle.
"A jungle world... fascinating." Sombra commented, as this would no doubt provide them with all sorts of new challenges and foes to overcome, plus maybe even give them some new items for the ship, in regards to materials and maybe even a few food items to replace some of their stores.
"Maybe your King or my friends are down there." Sora said, because he was keeping his hopes high, especially since they hadn't found any of them on the last world, which was why he was already starting the landing sequence like Goofy had taught him when they first boarded the ship.
"In a backwater place like that? No way!" Donald stated, where Radiant and Fluttershy found that he tapped some controls to cancel out the process Sora had started, something that caused the boy to frown at him for a moment as he started the process once more, causing them to glance at Sombra for a moment.
Sure enough Donald jumped onto Sora in an attempt to stop him from sending them down to the world that was in front of them, causing the pair to struggle against each other for a couple of moments, before the duck knocked Sora's back into the console as he was thrown away. That caused the teleport system to engage at random, without any set area for all of them to be dropped in, where Donald and Goofy paused for a few seconds before vanishing as they were warped down to a random part of the world's surface. Sombra and the others barely had time to react as the same happened to them, as the ship's system wrapped around them and warped them down to the world that Sora wanted to explore, though he found that they appeared in the air above what appeared to be a large wooden house at the peak of a massive tree. With that in mind Sombra found that she and Sora were close to each other, just how Radiant and Fluttershy were close to each other, where she wrapped her magic around herself and Sora as they fell, forming a spherical barrier to protect them, all while Fluttershy used her wings to save herself and Radiant.
Such a thing caused them to smash through the roof of the house and came to a stop in what appeared to be the living space of the structure, with fragmented wood falling all around them, where Sombra kept the barrier up for a couple of seconds, just to be sure there was nothing else to worry about, before dropping the barrier as Fluttershy landed outside with Radiant right behind her.
"Thanks for the save." Sora said, as he was grateful for the assistance in staying safe, though at the same time he really had no desire to know how much pain he would have been in had Sombra not been there with her magic, causing him to look around for a time as Fluttershy made sure they were fine.
As they regrouped, however, a yellow and black spotted leopard jumped down into the area and attacked them, as in an actual animal, a predator no less, wanted them dead, though as most of them readied their weapons, intending to defend themselves, Fluttershy glared at it with a stare Sombra had never seen before, causing the beast to jump back and rush into a corner as she approached it.
"No way... she knows the Stare?" Sombra remarked, something that made her reevaluate her opinion on the shy one for a few seconds, because with that sort of power in their arsenal it meant she might be able to tackle some greater foes, or at least when she felt like it, before noticing that Sora had raised an eyebrow, "It's something from our home world, a power I had believed to be a myth... I'll tell you what I know later, once we're back on the Gummi Ship."
It looked like Fluttershy was lecturing the leopard, if the fearful look on the animal's face was any indication, confirming that she was definitely more useful than Sombra had originally assumed, though as they seemed to reach some sort of understanding a tall man rushed into the house, who seemed to be wearing a loincloth and nothing else, though he did seem muscular from his time in the jungle and carried a spear.
"Sabor, danger." the man said, holding his spear while looking at the leopard, where the cat let out a light growl for a few seconds, showing that they must be rivals or something, or mortal enemies as Sombra studied the man, who had long brown hair that seemed to have clumps, like he never combed it or anything.
"Ah, she's not that bad." Fluttershy replied, causing the man to just stare at her as Fluttershy had the cat, Sabor, sit for just a few seconds, where Sombra watched as the leopard did so, as the animal realized that the shy one wasn't someone it could just bully or assault, before she pulled out the animal sphere and tapped Sabor on the forehead, which was when the leopard vanished and appeared inside the device.
Sombra wasn't too sure what the two had talked about, but apparently it was enough to convince the leopard that it was better off in Fluttershy's hands, meaning there had to be more to the special farming area than what she had been told, all while noticing that Sora was interested in the man. It was clear that the stranger must have grown up without any humans to interact with, meaning this place must have belonged to his parents and they had been slain, maybe by the Sabor due to how focused he had been when he stared at the leopard, but Sora still thanked him for the aid. The man listened to him for a few moments, repeating phrases like 'this place' or even 'friends' when the boy gestured to himself for a moment, a fact that caused him to start asking about the others, before switching to Riku and Kairi, since Donald didn't deserve any recognition after his stunt. In fact it looked like Sora thought that one of them might be here, since he glanced behind the man for a moment, though the interesting thing was that he claimed that Sora's friends were actually here, before doing something odd, he uttered a few sounds that sounded like he was trying to mimic a gorilla.
Eventually they reached an agreement, the man, Tarzan apparently, was going to bring them to those he assumed were the ones Sora was asking about, where he walked out of the house and the group followed after him, since there might be a chance for them to find people to talk to so they could figure out what was happening to this world. At the same time Fluttershy, despite the fact that Donald caused all of this to happen, wanted to find the missing pair before they thought about leaving this world, something that Tarzan didn't seem to pay attention to, or maybe he thought they were like the people he knew. Following that their new acquaintance leapt off the area below the house, dropping down into an area that everyone followed him into, even though that caused them to slide down a rather large and long branch that seemed to head down towards the ground floor of the jungle. With Tarzan leading the way it was easy for them to make their way to what appeared to be a camp, because at the end he jumped off the branch and landed at the edge of a camp, one that had a bunch of suitcases, materials for people who were out in the field, a makeshift kitchen, a few tents, a grandfather clock that kept track of time, and who knew what else.
The oddest part was that there were slide cards scattered here and there, something the group ignored as Tarzan stopped inside one of the tents, where they found a young lady, roughly around the age of those they had seen in Traverse Town, who was dressed for the jungle, instead of a city, who Tarzan called Jane.
"Hm, you definitely aren't related to Tarzan. None of you are." Jane commented, as she had been interested in them the moment she laid eyes on Sora, more because she was a scholar based on what Sombra was seeing right now, though she, Radiant, and Fluttershy were more interesting to the lady than Sora was, "And you three, I've never seen anyone like you before. Tell me, are you here to study the gorillas as well?"
"That's highly doubtful, Miss Jane." a new voice said, where they turned and found a man with a firm stance walking into the tent, dressed more like either a guide of some kind or a hunter, the latter due to the weapon in his hands, something Leon had called a gun when Sombra asked about his weapon, though Goofy and Donald were walking behind him, though as Sora and Donald started to dance and hold hands they remembered the disagreement and turned away from each other, "They are more like a circus of clowns, in all honesty... not much use for hunting gorillas I'm afraid."
"Hunting gorillas? But that... that's so mean and cruel!" Fluttershy stated, as it sounded like the man was hunting them for sport, and purely for that aspect since he seemed to have some disdain for what they were doing right now, and she could see that most of the others weren't too pleased with this discovery.
"Mr. Clayton, we're studying the gorillas in their natural habitat. We are not hunting them." Jane remarked, which made sense when Sombra looked at every inch of the camp, it was designed for a bunch of researchers and not hunters, so the man, Clayton, must have kept his true motives a secret until he let his true goals slip on accident, before she sighed as she found that her guide headed out into the camp.
While Sora and Donald had their feud Goofy revealed that they had found a gummi block, meaning there was a chance Mickey had been here, causing the two torn companions to declare that they were both staying, despite what the other thought, causing Sombra to sigh as she talked to Jane for a few moments. Apparently, as part of their research, they were trying to show Tarzan slides of things that he should have seen back when he was just a baby, back when he was part of society before his family moved here, and they had lost the slides while scouring the suitcases for them. That meant that somewhere in the camp there were a number of slides for them to collect, which was followed by her, Radiant, and even Fluttershy to head out and track them down, choosing to leave Goofy with Sora and Donald so they could mend their now damaged bonds, while Tarzan just watched in interest. As it turned out there were only a couple of slides to find, some on top of the tents and caused Fluttershy to fly around, where Sombra found that Clayton stared at her with shock in his eyes, while Radiant found a few more on top of some crates and another happened to be in the kitchen area, used as a bookmark for a cooking book.
With the slides in hand the trio returned to the main tent and handed them over to Jane, who inserted them into the device she was using and turned it on, revealing a number of images to Tarzan, all of which he didn't seem to understand, save for the gorilla, but there was one Sora seemed to recognize, a large castle that towered over everything else.
"So, what about my friends?" Sora asked, because after a few minutes of showing slides to Tarzan he had expected him to show some sign of understanding what they were asking, but right now he didn't have any answers for them, which meant they needed to check out the rest of the jungle at some point.
"Young man, we've been in this jungle for some time now and haven't seen anyone else until today... which means that, if your friends are really here, they're with the gorillas." Clayton remarked, showing that, while he didn't have the same desire for research that Jane had, and the rest of their team had, he was interested in discovering how to get to the gorillas, and any other creature of interest that might provide a good hunt, "Unfortunately, only Tarzan knows where they are and he continues to refuse to take us to them."
"Yeah, because he knows you might hurt them." Radiant stated, though she intentionally kept her voice low, so only Sombra could hear her talk, since they were standing side by side while watching what was going on, while noticing that Tarzan did seem to glance at them for a couple of seconds.
"Mr. Clayton, you can't be serious. Tarzan would never..." Jane started to say, though the rapid turn that Clayton did told all of them that she knew when to talk and when not to talk, and when the hunter was like this it was best to not get in the way, something most of the group noticed easily while Clayton didn't seem to notice or care for that matter.
"Oh really? Then take us there, Tarzan. Take us to the gorillas... go-ril-las." Clayton stated, intentionally cutting up the word in a way so that someone like the wild man could understand what he wanted, where Tarzan stared at him for a moment before glancing at the newcomers for a few more seconds.
In the end Tarzan stated that he would take them to Kerchek, which had to be the leader of the gorillas in the jungle, and started to move without delay, though the oddest thing about all of this was the sheer lack of Heartless, as Sombra really expected there to be some, especially after Wonderland. The others shared her thoughts on the matter, because if there were no Heartless on this world it either meant that the Keyhole, as Sombra was calling the final lock Sora had sealed back in the previous world, for this particular world had been sealed already or the Heartless had yet to invade this place. Sombra knew that if the latter was true they could save this world rather easily, even if she was hoping for more Heartless to take all of their stolen hearts, but for the time being she guessed she could accept some peaceful moments before clashing with more enemies. The path Tarzan ended up taking was through a nearby river, which had some hippos for them to jump on the backs of for just a few moments, and they didn't seem to care in the slightest, before climbing up to an area that had a large number of vines for them to swing on to reach other parts of the jungle, only to stop outside what appeared to be a bunch of branches forming an area for them to talk in.
Sombra decided that most of them would stay outside, with her magic shrouding them for a time, meaning Tarzan could enter the area with Sora, Donald, and Goofy, where they found two gorillas, a large male and a smaller female, staring at them as they eventually came to a stop in front of them.
"Kerchek, please listen to me." Tarzan said, where it sounded like this might be his gorilla parents, those that raised him after the loss of his human parents, and that they might have had a falling out of some sort after Tarzan started interacting with Jane and the others of her group, as he held a hand out towards the trio behind him, "I know the nesting grounds are sacred and secret, but I trust them. You see, I want to help them because... because... well, they need us."
Kerchek, as it turned out, actually turned his head and glanced to the upper right of where he was standing, almost as if he was showing that he looked down on Tarzan's request, before he departed from the area without even saying a word, letting his actions speak for themselves. The female, on the other hand, seemed sad by this turn of events and even seemed to be disappointed, either in Kerchek or Tarzan, it was hard to tell, before she sighed and followed after her mate, though Sombra could tell that they were heading towards the tree house. That either meant there was something there that they wanted to protect or Kerchek was silently suggesting that it was a good place to speak without Tarzan's human friends coming and ruining the moment, but it hardly mattered which option was right. This meant they had to climb back up to the tree house, figure out what in the world the gorilla wanted, and then do whatever else was needed for them to wrap up their visit to this world, since there was no telling what Clayton or the gorillas might do next.
In the end Sombra could only wonder what they might discover as they explored the rest of the jungle world they had found, and, more importantly, if she and the others would even find any Heartless to fight on this world, causing themselves to brace themselves for whatever might happen next.
While that was going on a black robed figure walked through the white halls of the castle that his group lived in and used as their base of operations, only coming to a stop when he reached the summit, where he found another human standing near the edge of the peak, one who had silver colored hair that reached the middle of his back.
"You called for me, Boss?" the walker inquired, coming to a stop a couple of steps behind his superior, who was standing there with his arms raised towards their ultimate goal, the large heart shaped object that could be seen from nearly every inch of the world they, and the rest of their forces, called home.
"Indeed. Xigbar, your last report said that a new Keyblade wielder had been found. Is that true?" the silver haired person replied in kind, something that was followed by the walker pulling his hood back to reveal a man with dark hair that was tied up in a ponytail, which had several streaks of silver here and there, whose right eye was covered by an eye patch and he had a scar on the lower left of his face.
"You bet the report is true, and I've got even better news: the dusks observing Traverse Town have informed me that there are two wielders, not one." the walker, Xigbar, stated, which was good news for their group as a whole, because having two Keyblades in play meant that things were really moving in their favor and that they might be able to complete their goal a lot faster now that more wielders were on the board, casing him to smile as he glanced at their end goal, "Kingdom Hearts must be overjoyed to have such an abundance of hearts to add to it's current existence."
"That is good news, except for one thing: Kingdom Hearts is starving." the boss stated, as he had been observing the heart shaped object for some time and noticed something that would worry the rest of their group, despite their lack of hearts, and right now the only one he wanted to share this information with was his most trusted ally.
"Man, you must have gained a heart, but that's a... hilarious... joke?" Xigbar said, though as he said that he glanced at what his superior was looking at and realized something as well, that with all the Heartless that must have been slain by now, and all of the hearts that must have been freed along the way, he expected Kingdom Hearts to be much larger than it was, but it looked like it hadn't grown since the dusks delivered their report, "No way... where's the flow of hearts? There should be a large number of hearts gathering in our Kingdom Hearts."
"I do not know. Something, or someone, has halted the release of hearts." the boss replied, where his expression revealed that he was saddened by this discovery, something Xigbar knew he was good at faking since their kind didn't have hearts and that meant he was merely mimicking the motions, but it was pretty convincing in his eye, "Xigbar, I want you to speak with Vexen and assign him to keep an eye on the new Keyblade wielders... if they are unable to release hearts, then we will need the Replica Program to bear fruit much sooner than we intended, and studying the current wielders will help him complete his objective. I will speak with Saix and inform him of the mission myself, and that Vexen is not to be assigned to any new missions until he's completed this task. Also, I want you to go out and see if you can find anything that might be stopping the hearts from reaching Kingdom Hearts... the sooner we solve this problem, the better."
"I understand, Lord Xemnas." Xigbar said, though at the same time he glanced at Kingdom Hearts for a moment, because he honestly couldn't believe what he was seeing right now and knew that if the others learned of this discovery they would be outraged, which was why he had been called in since he was Xemnas' most trusted ally among their ranks, "I can't believe this... just when we're finally able to start making some real progress, our Kingdom Hearts stops growing... fantastic."
Xemnas knew that Xigbar was unhappy with this discovery, just as he was unhappy with seeing the flow of hearts stop all of a sudden, though with two wielders fighting the Heartless now he also knew there was a good chance that Vexen might be able to make more replicas, other than the one they required. If that was the case they could produce a force of wielders to scour the worlds and free an unlimited number of hearts, allowing them to weave together their Kingdom Hearts much faster than what they were currently seeing. Such a thing would please the rest of their group and even the rest of their kind once they reached that point, but for now they had to focus on figuring out what was causing the lack of hearts and stop it, before it did any real damage to their precious Kingdom Hearts. He trusted Xigbar to scour the known worlds, tracking down the one person or thing that was causing this disturbance, he just had to be patient for a time and was sure that they would be rewarded for their efforts, hence why he turned his attention to his Kingdom Hearts once more.
He knew their goal was well within reach, he just had to be patient and wait for the hearts to join the force that was in front of him, and he was content to wait as long as necessary to reap the rewards for completing his Kingdom Hearts at long last.