//------------------------------// // Heartless: Annoying Distraction // Story: Kingdom Hearts: The World's Reluctant Heroes // by Blackdrag-rose //------------------------------// The path that Sombra had felt was back in the hall they had found Maleficent in, which brought them to a short portion of the lift stop and then into another passage, one that happened to bring them to a large door that opened as soon as they approached it, revealing the final chamber of the entire castle. This area was fairly large, as there was a walkway leading up to what could have passed as the grand entrance of an actual grand castle, only this one stopped at something that made her raise an eyebrow, a large force of darkness that felt like a Keyhole. It had to be the one that Maleficent was working on, something they were able to confirm as the group walked down the walkway, as six figures were resting in the walls to their right and left, three on each side, one was Jasmine and one was Alice, though while the other four were unknown Beast approached one in a yellow dress. Sombra assumed that that lady was Belle, where she had to wonder who the other three were, as one wore a white dress, another had a blue one on, and the third had one that was yellow at the bottom with blue on the top and wore a red cape as well, meaning these had to be six of the seven Princesses of Heart. Each one had dark crystals around the lower half of their bodies, keeping them contained in their holding areas so they couldn't escape, not that it mattered since it looked like they were asleep as well, their hearts stolen based on what Sombra was seeing, though for the time being they walked further into the chamber and approached the Keyhole. "Kairi!" Sora called out, as the moment they reached the upper part of the area he spotted his other friend resting on the floor, across from where the dark Keyhole rested, and he rushed to her side without delay as everyone else walked up the rest of the steps, keeping an eye out for their last opponent. "It's no use... that girl will never open her eyes, for she has lost her heart." Ansem commented, where they found that Riku's possessed body was sitting on top of the Heartless emblem shaped frame that was around the Keyhole, thought it seemed odd that he felt that he could just be so lazy in the face of the destructive force that had wrecked the witch he had been using the entire time, before he let himself float down to the ground floor, "So long as the last Princess of Heart stays asleep, the Final Keyhole will remain incomplete... she is the final piece of Light that is required to finish this puzzle. You, Sora, are the one who holds the last Princess' heart and must give it up for her to regain her power." "And now it all makes sense. The random times where Sora was staring off into space, or thought he saw someone who wasn't there, he was seeing the other heart inside him." Sombra remarked, though now she could sort of feel the heart in question inside Sora, but at the same time it seemed like there might be one more even deeper than Kairi's, one that had become dormant and was almost completely buried. "Kairi... her heart's been inside me this entire time?" Sora said, though this wasn't even weird at this point, because due to Ansem possessing Riku he knew that one heart could take over another heart's body, so it made sense that one heart could seek sanctuary in the body of someone else, someone they trusted, something that actually made him smile for a few seconds, as it was a nice thought to have. "Yes, and now I shall release her heart from your body... she will complete the Keyhole with her power and lead me to everlasting darkness!" Ansem stated, confirming that he had been seeking something that was bad for the rest of the World, even though they really had no idea what he was looking for, only that it had to be terrible, causing him to raise his dark Keyblade as he approached Sora. What happened next was what Sombra was expecting, Ansem attacked and Sora blocked it with the Kingdom Key, while at the same time Radiant, Donald, and Goofy got ready for the fight that was about to break out, as this was basically an act of war against their group, even though Ansem did seem surprised that his attack was blocked. "Ansem... I don't care who you are or what you want. There is no way you're taking Kairi's heart!" Sora exclaimed, where he swung his weapon and knocked his possessed friend backwards, though as he did so he could feel a change in his own body, as it felt like Kairi was with him, wanting to keep herself safe from the mad individual and wanting to save Riku from the one who took over his body, "Now, get out of Riku's body before I force you out!" For a moment Ansem seemed to weigh his options, as he had Sora, Donald, Goofy, Radiant, and Sombra standing right in front of him, though before he could do anything the air near him vibrated as an oval shaped opening appeared, where all of them found a robed figure, like the one who took Fluttershy, stepping out of the portal. "You? What are you doing here?" Ansem asked, showing that he knew the figure in question, though at the same time the presence of this particular figure caused Sombra to growl, because she was still angry over what happened not even ten minutes ago and now her target was back, meaning she could punish him at last. "I sensed that you were in need of assistance. Please, allow me to deal with Sombra." the mysterious figure replied, with a voice that seemed both similar and different to Ansem's own, something that immediately caused Sombra to realize that this had to be the other half of their foe, the 'body' that had once housed Ansem's heart, a 'Nobody' following the naming scheme of the Heartless being transformed hearts, all while blue lightning crackled around his left hand. Sure enough the Nobody loosed a burst of blue lightning at Sombra, which she blocked with her Keyblade and found that it was definitely stronger than what one would assume, especially since it moved her back just a tiny bit, before she swung her arm and knocked the attack into the wall behind her, blasting a hole into the stonework. Following that the Nobody held out his right hand and summoned a beam of energy that was as the length of the Kingdom Key, colored red while just being the beam and nothing else, which he was either holding onto the base of or it was floating just above his palm, but before anyone could react he rushed at Sombra. Such a thing caused her to smile as she jumped backwards and swung her weapon, allowing it to collide with the beam, like it was a physical weapon, before wrapping her magic around them for a second and teleported them out of where Sora and the others were located, as she wasn't about to risk letting her foe hit one of the others. With that in mind she warped both of them outside, in the watery area that was far from the rest of the castle, the very area Ansem had stolen the Kingdom Key in before Sora got it back, and as the Nobody realized what had happened she turned her hand and hurled him at the ground, forcing him to land near the ruined fountain. The two stared at each other for a few moments as the Nobody got up and turned to face Sombra, though it wasn't long before they rushed into battle once more, weapons colliding once more as both of them flashed around the area, simply appearing and disappearing around the top of the water as they clashed. Sombra knew she could do this thanks to all of the hearts she had absorbed at once, greatly boosting her power to new heights, but the fact that her foe could keep up meant that her thoughts had to be right, this had to be Ansem's other half, which meant that Ansem himself had to be a strong opponent. The Nobody held a hand out and created orbs of blue energy, which he had to be connected to, and let them fly at Sombra, where she dodged out of the way for a moment and found that when they hit the water they quickly expanded to a larger size and shocked the area that they landed in, though he didn't seem to mind missing. It was likely due to the fact that he could potentially just fire them off as much as he wanted, without draining himself in the process, as if one orb was akin to a single point of mana as Sombra thought about it, and with him being Ansem's other half that had to mean he had far more mana than a normal person did. With that in mind Sombra shifted her stance and knocked the Nobody backwards, though before he could regain himself she made her move, summoning the shadows to her Keyblade as she swung her arm, loosing a wave of dark energy with a red outline right at her foe, causing the Nobody to do something interesting, he summoned a light blue barrier that was made of the same energy as before. The barrier stalled the attack in it's tracks, even though she could see cracks forming on the surface, causing the Nobody to dodge out of the way as the barrier shattered and the wave collided with the water that had been behind him, blasting the area apart by leaving a gaping hole in the water. Sombra paused for a moment, as the power that her foe possessed was very strong, capable of doing many things with the same type of energy, because she could tell that his blade was made of the same energy as the other attacks he had used, meaning it was very versatile, causing her to mentally curse for a moment. The Nobody didn't have a heart, given that Ansem was his heart, meaning that when she beat him there would be no heart for her to collect, meaning it would be impossible for her to gain the power he was using, though she did have to wonder if it was possible for a being like this to form their own heart, and if that was the case she might hold him in stasis or something until she could take his heart. For the time being she shelved her thoughts on the matter while calling forth bolts of dark energy that she sent flying towards her opponent, where the Nobody raised his empty hand and hurled a few more orbs into the air, where they expanded and caught the entirety of her attack in the process, wiping out all of the bolts before they could reach him. Following that a sphere of darkness formed around Sombra and an array of red light appeared all around her, spaced like an attack that was waiting to go off, causing her to shift her stance as she spun around and lashed out constantly, using her Keyblade to parry all of the incoming red bolts that had been sent at her, allowing her senses to take over for a couple of seconds before she tore through the sphere and landed nearby. "I have to admit, your power is as amazing as it is frustrating to deal with. What is it?" Sombra asked, because while she was angry with the Nobody, for taking away Fluttershy and putting her in the shy one's debt, his power interested her and that, alone, was enough to make her pause for a short time. "Nothingness. That is my power." the Nobody replied, though at the same time he summoned a second red blade, which showed Sombra that there was even more the figure could do with his power, before rushing through the air once more as he zeroed in on where his foe was currently floating. As she blocked the attack, however, Sombra found thorns made out of a darker version of the energy rushing at her, an attack that she avoided before kicking the Nobody into the air, only to find his barrier, a smaller one placed in front of her hoof, that stopped her in her tracks. The power of Nothingness was no joke, that was what Sombra was discovering, and it also dawned on her that her foe seemed to know more about her abilities than he should have, meaning someone had to be watching them and the Nobody seemed like the prime candidate. That meant her key ability, the black crystals that had the power to nullify one's magical powers, might not be usable since the Nobody likely knew of it's existence, but that only put a new idea in her mind as she called on another power and loosed a volley of bolts at her foe. As she expected her foe cancelled them out by using the volley of expanding orbs again, which was why she activated her teleportation spell right as the area between both of them lit up from the attack, appearing right behind the Nobody before he even realized she had moved. In that instant, before the Nobody even realized what was going on, Sombra slammed a Silencega into his back, causing him to stagger forward as he turned and thrust his hand out towards her, only to find that nothing happened as a wicked smile appeared on Sombra's face. "No... no you didn't..." the Nobody said, as while he couldn't feel fear, due to his lack of emotions, there was a part of him that seemed to be reacting to that very emotion right now, because he knew the spell that had been used since Xigbar had rapidly informed him of what had happened and he recalled the reports he had been given so far. "Yes. Silencega." Sombra replied, where she shifted her stance and let the dark energy form a sphere around her left hand for a moment, though at the same time she let the look on her face tell her foe how much danger he was in now that she had cancelled out his own power, "Now, time to die!" The Nobody barely had a chance to move as Sombra flashed into the space in front of him and slammed her fist right into his chest, where the transparent sphere ended up expanding in a way where the air around Sombra's fist cracked, causing the water below them to ripple and even shift in places like it was cracking. At the same time he could feel his ribs cracking under the pressure, causing him to cough up some blood in the process, though that only seemed to be the catalyst of an onslaught of blows from Sombra as she laid into him without any sort of mercy or even slowing down. By that he meant that she blasted him with her dark spells, slashed at his body and coat with her Keyblade, an abomination of a weapon if ever he saw one, and blocked all of his kicks and punches as she punished him, to the point where she summoned large dark crystals out of the water and slammed him into them. One of them he was left in for a few moments, causing him to huff for a few seconds as Sombra pulled back, only to cough in pain as his foe kicked him deeper into the crystal with the tip of her hoof, breaking the crystal as she pushed him through several more for good measure. Sombra stopped after the fifth one and the Nobody could only groan in pain, as he was sure that he would need a couple of days to heal from this ordeal, though as he lifted his head, with the hood somehow still in place, he found that his foe was gathering more dark energy around her Keyblade, ready to release a wave of energy at him. "You know, beating you to a pulp has been fun and all, but it's about time I..." Sombra started to say, though in that very instant she felt something about the world they were on change and glanced back at the castle for a moment, where she could feel the awakening of Kairi's heart and the finalization of the Final Keyhole, "Sora... guess I'll have to cut this short and do away with you now." As she turned back towards her foe, however, she found that the Nobody had vanished, as in he sensed the slight change in her attention and had taken that to flee while he could, causing her to mentally curse herself once more as she quickly dismissed the rest of the crystals before teleporting into the castle. Sombra quickly returned to the chamber and found that Sora was nowhere to be seen, while Kairi was up and about, with Radiant and their animal friends were right behind her, while Fluttershy's Shadow seemed to be hauling another one with her as they came towards her. That was when she noticed a tall tan skinned figure standing before the Final Keyhole, possessing long white hair with three spikes on top, with a white coat over his chest that was open to expose his body, a black coat over that with a Heartless emblem linking both halves together, and two black shoulder pauldrons. In the span of a few seconds she understood what was going on, as Sora must have beaten his possessed friend, used the dark Keyblade to free Kairi's heart, thus transforming himself into a Heartless and a Nobody, which had then caused Ansem to manifest at last as he opened the path to the Darkness he was after. In that moment she beckoned the others to her, as right now there was no way the others would be able to stand before the dark forces that were emerging from the Final Keyhole, and teleported all of them to their ship, allowing them to rest for a time as the ship started to warp back to Traverse Town on it's own, causing Sombra to wonder what the future held for them and the rest of the World.