Kingdom Hearts - Blades of Three Realms

[[XIII] Roxas]

While Shiro was getting the volleyball net ready and Demyx was out there surfing, the rest of the group got into a huge water fight as the supersoakers were brought into play. It was more or less a free for all, with Sora being Riku's preferred target although he would go after anyone else who targeted him too. Hayner was encouraged by Pence to target the girls in particular as it presented an attractive photo opportunity. This made him a target for the defender of decency, namely Crystal who was wielding two unusually shaped guns that could be stacked together on top of each other to create the illusion of a larger double nozzle gun, but at the moment she used the two separately to give the spray a wider field of motion as she swung them around. Roxas naturally joined in on that front with one of the larger, heavier models that looked more like a cannon than a simple squirt gun. At least they were good enough to keep the water play away from the food and other supplies on the picnic tables.

Once Crystal was low on ammunition she raised both of her weapons to the sky while spinning in place to send a double spiral of water spray into the air to come splashing back down on anyone who was still in close proximity to where she was standing including herself. Instead of reloading after that she decided to hit the shore with some buckets and shovels to start digging out a trench around where she intended to build a sandcastle. Roxas was thinking about joining in on the sandcastle project, but Sora shot him in the back of the head with another blast of water and that naturally demanded immediate retribution.

"Gah! No fair double teaming me!" Sora sprinted away with Roxas and Riku both in hot pursuit as they seemed to have formed a temporary truce against Sora.

"You should have thought of that before you shot at both of us!" Riku called after him.

"You're going down Sora!" Roxas declared as his own sort of battle cry at the moment.

"I can see why you like this place," Xion commented while wandering over to see if she could help with the sandcastle. "It's beautiful."

"I spent some time on the mainland, but then Kid, the leader of the Radical Dreamers, decided she had to come to this archipelago to find the legendary Frozen Flame so we hitched a ride on a ship and never really looked back," Crystal admitted. "I haven't seen her in a good while, but the last I heard she was chasing after some blue-haired boy who doesn't talk much. I wonder if she's found him by now. We never did find the Frozen Flame. Who knows, it might just be a legend after all."

While Crystal focused on fortifying the sandcastle construction site against the large waves being conjured by Roveth's magic, the rest of the girls came over to start helping with the actual construction of the castle. Crystal built a series of moats and compacted walls of sand at the front as a buffer so that the sandcastle being built would remain standing for as long as possible. As soon as she was confident in her fortifications she would begin assisting with the construction of the actual castle. It would be a rectangular construction with rounded towers at the corners and a huge and very deep hole at the center, dug down until one could feel water with their fingers, representing the dungeon. The sandcastle nearly got trampled by the running away Sora, but he did one of his crazy over-the-top triple jumping maneuvers to dodge his way overhead followed closely by similar aerial acrobatics from both Roxas and Riku who were still chasing him.  

[Kuukyo_Fushichou]

Shiro of course stayed out of the mess going on with the water fights, working on getting the net up, using at first the gear they bought, and when it was getting annoyingly hard, he'd toss the stuff aside and smirked a bit lightly "he might kill me if he ever saw what i did using my fakes... but screw it." he would raise his hand in the air, smirking "Trace, On!" with that, two large red spears would shoot down to point bladed end first down into the sand, using a bit of reinforcement on the sand to hold them there, and then proceeded to grip his fist "Saa... Ten no Kusari: Enkidu~!" he called out, the golden chain shooting out, beginning to form into a chain-linked version volleyball net with it's infinite chain length and all. once things were set up, Roveth would notice, and bring out the volley-ball, smirking a bit lightly spinning the ball, before the two would go at it one on one with the volley-ball, though Roveth kept it from going too serious due to the fact that it was only one v one for now, but also the fact that he was keeping mister surfer busy.

Axel of course stayed by the food, since he was not exactly good near water for obvious reasons while eating some chips and drinking some soda in amusement at everyone playing around "too bad i missed the struggle tournament, must've been hilarious to see Seifer go down..." he commented while eyeing sora Riku and Roxas in particular.  

[[XIII] Roxas]

Eventually Roxas, Sora, and Riku all ran out of ammunition for their respective water weapons as the chase continued. And then at some point Riku decided that enough was enough and used his Dark Teleport to vanish and materialize in front of Sora, grabbing him and twisting him around with both hands pinned behind his back so that when Roxas caught up he could pay Sora back for all that mischief by tickling the hell out of him.

"Ah! Cut it out you guys!" Sora squirmed in defiance of his punishment. "Lemme go!"

"Do you promise to behave yourself if we do?" Riku asked him in complete seriousness.

"Er... well..." Sora wriggled and wiggled some more trying to free himself from Riku's grasp. "Um... probably not..."

Naturally, this comical display got Olette demanding that Pence take some pictures of Sora being tickled without mercy.

"You leave me no choice," Riku looked over to where the girls were still working on the sandcastle. "Kairi, could you give us a hand with Sora?"

"Sure thing Riku!" Kairi came over and Roxas immediately stepped aside to let her have free reign on tickling Sora. Along with laughing and wiggling in protest, Sora went bright red before Riku let go of him and took a step back so that Sora toppled onto his back on the sand with Kairi landing on top of him.

Riku managed to get a high five from Roxas as the two boys left Sora to be dealt with by Kairi and headed over to the uniquely constructed volleyball net to join in the game with Shiro and Roveth. Naturally, Hayner wanted in on the game too. Crystal, Xion, and Olette would join in once they were done making the finishing touches on the sandcastle. Namine would join Axel at the food table to sit down to watch. Isa was there too, along with Donald and Goofy who were both packing away snacks like it was going out of style.

"From what I understand, Seifer's defeat yesterday was truly monumental," Isa pointed out. "The town will be talking about it for weeks to come."  

[Kuukyo_Fushichou]

Axel nodded while chuckling as the volleyball game got underway with it being Shiro, Roxas, Crystal, and Xion Vs. Riku, Roveth, Hayner, and Olette, as he took a sip of soda "yeah, Shiro did tear into that one guy... Setzer or alzheimers or something like that, and then epically tore Seifer a new one in one fell swoop. must've been really narked off that day to do something like that at least." of course you can bet seeing Sora be tickle tortured was funny given he was snickering at it with Demyx coming in a good bit wet from his surfing but grinning all the same while smirking "so when do we tell the others to come get some watermelon and cake?" he asked, nibbling on some cheese balls and all.

thankfully Shiro and roveth both weren't into super concentration competitive streak mode so the Volleyball game would stay light hearted and no craziness from either of them via mutual agreement not to go overboard in trying to win and all, hell, they weren't even keeping score!  

[[XIII] Roxas]

"I think we should let them play a while longer and then if they don't decide they're starving on their own we should probably call them over," Isa recommended. "We can let that boy, Shiro, handle the slicing with that fancy swordplay of his."

While the others were playing volleyball, mainly focusing on keeping the volley going since it wasn't a competitive game after all, Sora was KO-ed on the sand as Kairi left him there to reflect on his mischief and found a place to sit at the snack tables.

"It looks like Roxas is really having fun," Kairi observed watching the volleyball game in progress.

"Yes, he seems happy," Namine agreed. "We really didn't know too much about Crystal, Shiro, and Roveth, but it seems like they've been a positive influence on him. And on Xion too."

"I think it probably goes both ways," Kairi pointed out. "I think having the two of them around has probably softened up those three as well."

It was entirely possible in the friendly game of beach volleyball that Riku was not-so-secretly attempting to orchestrate a scenario that might cause certain players on the opposing team to trip over each other to land awkwardly on the sand, but the success of that plan would depend entirely on the cooperation of his teammates, most specifically on Roveth. It was going to be tricky though because Crystal and Roxas were way better coordinated than say Sora or Shiro.  

[Kuukyo_Fushichou]

of course Roveth noticed Riku's plot, and frowned ever so slightly, before deciding to at least end Riku's playing for a moment by jumping up to meet the next bounce for the ball, and proceeded to, with unerring accuracy spike the ball onto Riku's head, and send it back over, due to the bounce however being so odd, Shiro went to try and save it when he twisted his foot on the sand wrong.. and stumbled before accidentally pulling himself but Xion as well to the sand with Xion on top of Shiro.

Demyx hummed a bit in agreement before at least noticing the goings on, and had The musician laughing a bit "Guess the superstar had to be bad at something, didn't think it'd be coordination though!" Axel snorted a bit, smirking "i heard from Crystal when it comes to nothing serious in movements he tends to be as clumsy as a bag of rocks, if not worse."  

[[XIII] Roxas]

Riku rubbed his head with a slight wince while watching as Roveth's attempt to sabotage his efforts resulted in some rather comical aftermath in the form of Shiro's own clumsiness going into effect to put him in a rather priceless position with Xion. "How does he even manage to fall like that?"

"No kidding," Hayner was pretty surprised by it too. "I mean, this is the same guy that beat Seifer. How can he be so clumsy?"

Xion, meanwhile, was immediately afflicted with a good dose of proximity based embarrassment causing her face to turn red, although it was nowhere near as bad as what happened when Kairi landed on Sora earlier. Speaking of Sora, he had finally recovered from that earlier knockout and made his way over to the snack table while still appearing slightly dazed and a bit red in the face behind his usual silly grin. Xion quickly attempted to get off of Shiro to make sure he wasn't hurt at all and also to allow him to recover a bit more easily.

"Are you okay?" she asked him with concern. It seemed like his clumsiness never actually caused him any real amount of pain, but stumbling around like that he still might have strained something.

With the ball out of play the volleyball game had also come to standstill so of course Roxas began to wonder what they were going to do next. "Looks like the game might be over," he observed while looking around at the others who were still standing.

"Now might be as good a time as any to finally break into those watermelons," Crystal helpfully suggested. "Although we need for Shiro to snap out of it to take care of the actual slicing."

"Oh yeah, watermelon!" Roxas suddenly remembered seeing them amidst all the other snacks.

Those had, of course, been a personal touch from Riku because he at the very least remember what an utter troll DiZ had been about not letting Roxas go to the beach in the simulated Twilight Town. So really, it was the least he could do. Seeing the way Roxas perked up, it was definitely worth it. The poor guy deserved to be happy, especially after everything he'd been forced to go through.

So, while Xion was helping Shiro to get back on his feet the others started to gather over by the snack table. Crystal would have stuck around to help Shiro, but the sight of her in the silver bikini while he was already dazed from his own clumsiness might just cause another accident.  

[Kuukyo_Fushichou]

Roveth sighed at his light half before smiling a bit "well, in the case of Shiro's left two feet, i've seen him do some wicked acrobatics, and then not even 5 minuteslater trip over air when trying to walk normally. though his reaction timing and his hand-eye coordination is still top notch despite the fact that, in his words, that the universe is out to get him for being so good in athletics that outside of it he has two left feet." before following the others to the snack table chuckling.


Shiro of course took a moment to get up due to checking his ankle, which was a bi th painful to walk on but he compartmentalized it and smiled with a bit of a blush to Xion "sorry about that, forgot i have two left feet and the worlds out to embarrass me outside of official competitions." he said, of course he would glance towards the tables, and move in that direction on a slight limp to keep the weight off the hurting foot for the moment and once there, traced out some large kitchen knives, and proceeded to show off a bit on his slicing skills by using two swipes of the knifes, then some quick chopping motions, before the first watermelon split into proper slices all evenly on the platter without losing a drop of watermelon juice being accidentally pushed out during the slicing method "Watermelon's ready!" he'd call out, with Roveth, Demyx, and Axel taking a slice each to nibble on.  

[[XIII] Roxas]

It was no use worrying over Shiro's limping while he was trying to play it off all cool like so Xion and Crystal both let him get away with it for now. And then, of course, once the first watermelon was sliced everyone would start to dig in with great enthusiasm. It was especially refreshing for everyone who had been doing a lot of running around since their arrival at the beach. Talk about a tasty way to stay hydrated! Of course, after they had indulged in the watermelon for a little while, Hayner once again noticed the cake there on the table with its multi-hued frosting practically calling out to him to be thrown at someone. Hayner couldn't resist the call as he declared, "Food Fight!" and lobbed two separate fistfuls of frosting, one aimed at Roxas because it was more or less his party and the other aimed at Pence who'd had the foresight to set down his camera when he'd come over to have some watermelon. Before long this erupted into total chaos with the colorful frosting being flung everywhere and becoming spattered onto basically everyone, much to the ire of Isa who was just too close to the situation to have any chance of evading it. Suffice it to say, the cake itself had been specifically engineered for this purpose as it turned out beneath the thick layer of frosting was even more frosting and not a bit of actual cake to be found. Someone had planned this from the start, but who had supplied the cake? Oh, that would be Sora and Riku, of course.

Fortunately, once they had all gotten this food fight nonsense out of the way the frosting was nothing that wouldn't rinse off in the ocean and that got most of the group out into the water. Naturally, Roxas had been singled out more than the rest, but that was to be expected and he made a good show of not letting it bother him. The sea was also calm now that Roveth wasn't using his magic to make large waves for Demyx to surf on so finally being out on the water was actually pretty nice. Of course, these peaceful moments were inevitably disrupted by splashing from Sora which naturally got Riku chasing him again. Kairi laughed as the two went at it, which was probably the point of the whole routine. Roxas was a little concerned when he didn't see Crystal anywhere, but his worries were alleviated when she returned from some other part of the island on her boat that she had apparently wandered off to fetch for everyone to use as an anchor point further out. Naturally, this meant they could climb aboard and jump back in with relative ease and Crystal did just that to rejoin the mayhem in the water. Of course, the boat would also be an ideal position for launching fireworks once the sun went down.  

[Kuukyo_Fushichou]

Shiro of course did look a bit off-putting about the fact the cake was really nothing but a prop for a food fight, and just sighed, doing like everyone else and working to get cleaned off in the waters, eventually just working to laze/lay on the water without moving much, letting himself drift a bit, though he made sure to stay close to shore at least for the while. of course if Sora and Riku did try to come by and disrupt his peacefulness, he'd retaliate by going under... and pulling sora underwater by the feet, and holding him long enough for riku to catch up to him and administer punishment, then he'd go back to lazing about.

Roveth, actually swam around the boat, playing with a fake shark fin and pretending to be a shark circling the boat, even when no one was in it, though once the sun began to set, he would get onto the boat, and shook his body a bit before pulling out his cards, two of them floating into the air as they formed into monster form, and the number one and 9 floated right underneath them, a pendant of sorts appearing between them swaying like a pendulum "Sway... pendulum of my very soul! draw an arc of Light across the Aether! Pendulum Summon! now come forth, my monster partners!" he had used the method to actually call out the Red-Eyes Black Dragon, Four Level Four monsters, two of which looked odd, Two Blue-Eyes White Dragons, and a Dark Magician and Dark Magician Girl on top of that, and adding in three dichromatic eyed dragons of the same make. (Odd-Eyes Pendulum Dragon) of course, he pointed to two of the level four monsters "next, i tune my Level 4 Witch of the black Rose to my Level 4 Alexandrite Dragon!" with that, the witch would light up her staff, slowly starting to break down to form four green rings which went around the Spear dragon as it burst into four star-lights in the sky "burst forth from the depths of the shadows and lead us to the path of the light and tomorrow! Synchro Summon! i call upon you, Level 8... Stardust Dragon!" with that, a mighty dragon had roared out into the skies to join the other monsters, its wings guiding a sparkly aurora of sorts before it started hovering next to the others. Roveth then would look to the next two monsters "next, i tune my Level 4 Dust Lord Ash Gash, to my Level 4 Evocator Chevalier!" with that, the two monsters would rush into the air, Gash quickly turning to ashes and reforming into the green energy rings, with four fiery stars forming after Chevalier went through the created 'tunnel', and once the stars doubled, a very large pillar of red light and fire would form "arise from the darkest depths of the Shadows and blaze forth to usher in a bright Tomorrow! Synchro Summon! Blaze forth on the path to Tomorrow! Level 8... Red Daemon's Dragon!" with that, the massive black and red dragon would appear with comparable stats to the blue-eyes white dragons ready and waiting, unleashing a burst of embers which flew around him in a harmless spiral creating more cool effects in the night sky "Laaaaadies and Gentlemen~! prepare to feast your eyes on this spectacular display soon to be showing, i do have two more stars to bring out to play however so bare with me folks!" Roveth's voice would echo out somehow, probably using a bit of minor magic to work with things as he brought up four cards, but selecting two of them first "first off, i will fuse one of my Odd-eyes Pendulum Dragons to the Dragonpit Magician in my hand!" he called out, as the left-most dichromatic dragon would jump up into the skies, and join side by side with the magician in name "Draconic Wielder of mystic Artes, become the light shining in the eye of the Dragon!" he then would raise his hands up in the air, before clasping them together and bringing them down in front of his face "Fusion Summon! Come forth, Arcane Dragon, Wielder of Ancient Magics! Rune-Eyes Pendulum Dragon!" with that, the dragon would roar out, taking up next to the front stage with the Synchro Monsters and all in a burst of light and colored runes floating into the air "almost done folks, can i get a round of applause for my friends out there? either way, next, i will be fusing my Silver Fang with the third Odd-Eyes Pendulum Dragon!" he called out, as the right-most dragon that was of three would jump forward next, joining from what looked to be a silver furred wolf with amber-eyes "Prideful Wolf, Become one with the Dragon of Mystery and form a new primal power! Fusion Summon! Come forth, Ferocious Dragon with luminous Feral Eyes! Beast-Eyes Pendulum Dragon!" with that, the new dragon bursted forth, unleashing a large show of flames which came like a beast's mouth, before landing in front with Rune-Eyes Pendulum Dragon next to it. "And Now.... IT'S SHOWTIME!" he called out, raising his arms, as his monsters knew what he had in mind, sure some of them looked a bit huffy on it, but given it was for kids, they started firing out their attacks, creating pretty fireworks into the night sky that would be seen from all around the area.  

[[XIII] Roxas]

While Roveth was making preparations for his fireworks display, summoning the requisite monsters and all, the others would have been gathering on the beach to watch as well as finally breaking into that cooler of sea-salt ice cream bars, leaving at least one for Roveth for once the show was over. It seemed like the first time that whole day that Roxas finally got to sit down with Crystal on the beach and Pence took full advantage of the photo opportunity thoroughly embarrassing the both of them before the fireworks spectacular got fully underway. They were definitely going to have to consider coming back again sometime with a smaller group so it would be less chaotic and they could explore more of the outlying world, but the party had been a fun excuse to hit the beach at least.

Once Roveth really got going though he certainly had everyone's attention, but most especially Hayner, Pence, and Olette who hadn't been treated to quite the full extent of what Roveth's card based magic could accomplish. It was an amazing spectacle to see and Pence was cursing himself for not having a better camera to capture the moment with because he knew for sure that the photos he was taking of the magnificent monsters were going to look entirely fake. Even more-so once the world's twin moons began to rise on the horizon once again reiterating the fact that they were presently residing on another world altogether different from Twilight Town.

"Two moons, huh? It's a good thing you lot didn't have to face me on this world," Isa mused to Lea. "I might have become invincible."

Even Sora had settled down to watch the fireworks display, sitting between Riku and Kairi, although Namine was clearly by Riku's other side. Xion had taken the spot on the other side of Roxas, leaving plenty of room for Shiro to sit himself down too. Donald and Goofy were of course not far off from Sora in general, forming a second row behind the rest of them as it were.

"I've got to hand it to Roveth, he really throws himself into his work," Roxas had to appreciate the showmanship of the whole presentation. Roveth was clearly going all out on this.

"Give him a stage and he can't help going all out," Crystal had to agree. And there were some rather extraordinary monsters, particularly all those different varieties of dragons, that she was sure Roveth had been itching to show off for a while now.

Of course, once the fireworks were over it was going to be time to take Hayner, Pence, and Olette back to Twilight Town so they could return home to their families and all. So, it was nice that Roveth was finishing things off with a bang.  

[Kuukyo_Fushichou]

Axel just snorted a bit at Isa's noting of the moons "i wonder what you'd have done if you had to face us on a world that had no moon?" he teased in amusement while at least enjoying the fireworks with splendor. Demyx just shook his head chuckling a bit lightly "he has you there Isa, though.. facing me near a body of water is usually bad for my opponents." he said in a smug tone, which got Axel to poke Demyx's cheek "do we need to have this talk again, mister -i suck at fighting-?" he said with a deadpan, causing Demyx to chuckle nervously at that.

Shiro meanwhile had settled down next to Xion, thankfully he did think to eventually pull out a potion, and while sipping on it, ate his own ice cream bar "well, i'm impressed he's managing to do all this and not pass out immediately." he said, knowing just from the size and power of the monsters as well as what he guessed their levels, that they were all high powered monsters "though the fireworks are top notch." of course, a Kuriboh floated by him and landed in Xion's lap cooing cutely, thankfully though Shiro only managed to sport a raised eyebrow and then staring out to the water at Roveth, who showed mirth in his glowing amber eyes ".... show-off." he said with a mild bit of exasperation and amusement mixed together.

Roveth of course would've summoned a Baby Dragon to sit in Shiro's lap, but he felt he was pushing it even with that Kuriboh, as he looked to the other partners with a nod "alright everyone, one more for a send-off, then you guys can dismiss yourselves." he said with a nod from the monsters, and they all charged their blasts at the same time, with Roveth having set up a special camcorder to catch this last 'finale' of sorts, so he could at least make photos for Pence if he'd like and all, as well as small little movies to watch the last one on say a video picture frame and all, and once the blasts were fired, Roveth would add a blast of his own, tossing a dark black ball into the air, which turned quite the royal purple sucking up all the other attacks, clearly being the 'Black Hole' Spell he learned from Spekkio, before Roveth smiled, clapping his hands, and burst the orb, unleashing into a prismatic rainbow-looking crown symbol as the finisher firework crackling and hanging in the sky (its design being similar to Sora's Necklace.) before it'd eventually fade out, with Roveth bowing as each monster left in their own flashy way, except for the last remaining Odd-Eyes Pendulum Dragon, which moved over to nuzzle Roveth, who chuckled "you want to carry me to shore?" he asked the dragon, and with a nod, he'd jump up to mount the dragon, and using the dragon's tail, they would 'run' back to shore, a gentle enough pace so as to not break Crystal's boat in the process, leaving it moored in the sand enough to be pushed back out when need be and yet far enough inland it wouldn't drift off into the ocean "and that's what i call a show folks!" he said cheekily to everyone who had been watching, grinning all the while.  

[[XIII] Roxas]

There was certainly plenty of applause from those gathered on the beach. And, of course, who was Xion to ignore a cute cuddly creature on her lap that seemed to want to be hugged and petted at the moment? It was quite a contrast to all the other monsters that Roveth had summoned for his performance.

"Point taken," Isa chuckled a bit at Lea's mention of a world with no moon. Yes, that would certainly have put him at a huge disadvantage. The idea of Demyx posing a threat near a body of water was similarly laughable given it didn't really account for much when typically Demyx lacked the motivation to put his skills to good use. Well, his combat skills at any rate. At least he took his talents as a musician seriously. Donald and Goofy were helping to pack up the supplies from the party while getting the Gummi Ship ready for departure so that Hayner, Pence, and Olette could be given a ride home to Twilight Town. This naturally meant that Sora, Kairi, Riku, and Namine would all be leaving too. "Well then, perhaps we had better get ready to head on back too," Isa suggested to Lea and Demyx.

"Come on," Crystal got up off the sand once the fireworks were over and waved for Roxas to follow her.

"Um... where exactly are we going?" Roxas wondered while he accompanied her to the boat. It seemed a bit weird considering it looked like most of the others were packing up to leave already.

"We're going to get a better look at the moons," Crystal answered simply as she readied the boat to set sail.

"Okay... if you say so," Roxas climbed onto the boat after her and realized a moment later what Crystal had really meant because he recalled that story she had told him about the flying boat. This was that boat. There was an odd machine tucked away underneath the rearmost bench and when the switch was flipped it turned out to be an anti-gravity device. Then, slowly but surely the boat would begin to rise up off the surface of the ocean and into the night sky. It was a little bit hard to notice at first because it happened so slowly and gently. It was impossible to know when the boat left the water, but it became increasingly apparent as they began to rise higher and higher against the backdrop of the twin moons, luminous in their respective blue and crimson glows against the night sky. Roxas wondered how high Crystal was planning to go, but eventually she adjusted the settings on the anti-gravity device so that the boat started descending back toward the water again. She couldn't leave the boat parked at Opassa Beach so Crystal would land it at a small stretch of a beach adjacent to the main beach so it wouldn't get in anyone's way after they left the world for a while. But, in the meantime, she was getting to enjoy the view with Roxas so she was having a pretty good time of it.

"So, that story about the flying sailboat, that actually happened. I can see why you like it here," Roxas spoke up again after a while.

"Next time we visit I'll show you around the rest of the island and maybe a few of the others that are nearby," Crystal assured him as she guided the boat along with practiced ease. "There are plenty of neat places to see and some rather unique monsters to come across."


Meanwhile, back on shore, Sora was looking profoundly jealous as he watched the aerial voyage of Crystal's boat. "No way, her boat flies?! I thought it was just a regular wooden sailboat!"

"It is remarkably subtle," Riku had to agree. He hadn't realized it either. "But I don't think it's really anything to get so worked up about."

"Lucky Roxas! I wanna fly on it!" Sora was definitely showing his profound lack of maturity at the moment.

"Maybe next time," Kairi attempted to calm him down.

"Right now we need to get everyone back on the Gummi Ship," Riku added as a friendly reminder.  

[Kuukyo_Fushichou]

Axel and Demyx would help, well, in Demyx's case by help we mean he'll kidnap some of the snacks to eat for himself as some last minute night time food, while Axel would just roll his eyes at the musician and all, before glancing back a bit towards Shiro and Roveth, who had been talking with each other, of course the Kuriboh stayed with Xion, so it wasn't really draining Roveth any extra power to keep it around, meaning Axel would at least usher Xion onto the gummi ship as well so he could have some quiet time with his other best friend of the trio as well as assuring people to leave Shiro and Roveth behind, they have their methods of getting back once Crystal and Roxas were ready to go.

Roveth and Shiro of course were chatting as things pretty much took off from there with pokings at Shiro about the show as well as making sure Roveth downed an ether, which the dark-half did reluctantly while telling Shiro it's only a stopgap measure until he got some actual sleep, while they waited, once Roxas and Crystal returned from their flight, Shiro looked over and smiled "ready to head back to Twilight town?" he'd ask while huming a bit "and did you like the party, Roxas?"  

[[XIII] Roxas]

"You know, it was pretty alright," Roxas had to admit. He had sort of dreaded it at first, but it turned out to be a lot of fun and it didn't hurt that he'd spent the past few minutes aloft with Crystal on that weird flying sailboat getting to see a rare and amazing sight of the world's twin moons at an impressively close distance. He wouldn't soon forget that view.

*~Twilight Town~*

Not long after that they would return to Twilight Town and to the mansion to rest up for the night. During the days before the party Riku had become a regular visitor as Namine had quite predictably reclaimed the infamous white room as her own, immediately decorating the walls with new drawings that she had been working on. Hayner, Pence, and Olette would show themselves home while Sora and Kairi were, of course, escorted back to Master Yen Sid's tower by Donald and Goofy. Otherwise, after some much needed showering to get rid of the sand and sea water, most everyone had gone to bed for the night at some point or another.

It was all kind of a blur. Xion had gone missing. Axel was avoiding Roxas day-in and day-out to the point that Roxas suspected he must at least know something, but he didn't even have a chance to ask him about it as he spent the next several days going to the clock tower in Twilight Town and eating his sea-salt ice cream out of habit. Eventually, even though he wasn't really supposed to, Roxas had decided to try to look for Xion himself and the first place he thought to look was in and around Twilight Town.

Somewhere along the line a girl had approached him asking if he was looking for someone. She had been about Roxas's age, maybe a little older, and she wasn't exactly alone. There was a crowd of younger kids surrounding her as she walked along with a book in hand that seemed to be open to an entirely blank page while being held deliberately upside down.

"That's one of the scary people!" one of the children had pointed rather rudely at Roxas who really should have found a reason to slip away since he was supposed to remain covert while outside the Castle That Never Was.

"Really now?" the older girl leading the group looked him over and gave a slight shrug. "He seems okay to me. Come on, let's see if we can help to find whatever it is he's lost."

And so, rather reluctantly, Roxas found himself touring the town with the odd procession of smaller children and the older girl leading the way as though she found nothing at all peculiar about the whole arrangement. Why was she helping him anyway? It didn't seem like she had anything to gain from it and she looked like she must have already been pretty busy with keeping tabs on all those other kids. Was this what it was like to be human? The situation changed somewhat abruptly when they entered the woods near the mansion on the outskirts of town and were ambushed by Heartless. Nothing special, mainly just Shadows creeping about, and while it would certainly boost his quota for the day, it was going to be really awkward having to fight in front of this group of children that had been towed along with him.

"Okay, nothing to worry about, just a few Heartless," the girl leading the unusual procession spoke first. She immediately flexed her hand at her side and materialized what Roxas recognized as a Keyblade (World's Rift), although it looked pretty different from the ones used by himself and Xion. "You kids want to see some fireworks?" She flexed out her other hand and there was a second Keyblade (Time Warp). This declaration was met with cheering from the group of younger children. She tapped the tips of the two blades together, "It's time for a little Fire & Ice!" Casting Fire and Blizzard magic simultaneously, the girl unleashed a flurry of powerful magic explosions that utterly annihilated any nearby Heartless.

Roxas summoned his own Keyblade to help smack down the few Shadows that remained in the vicinity, but the girl had already done most of the work for him. The funny thing was, she was just as surprised to see him wielding the Keyblade as he was at seeing her prowess with her two. She didn't wear the coat so she wasn't with the Organization. Just who was she?

"Right then, let's get you kids back home to your parents before anything else happens," the girl dismissed her blades as though nothing unusual had happened. "And don't any of you breathe a word about this to anyone or I shan't be telling you any more of my stories. Seriously, don't, it'll blow my cover with the omniscient council of vagueness!"

The assembled children pouted and promised to oblige her request. Before she left she said she'd come back out to help Roxas look for his friend once she was done taking the other kids home. Even so, Roxas really didn't figure he was going to see that girl again that day or ever really. He was very surprised, then, when not more than a half hour later she'd managed to track him down again.

"I said I'd be back," she was grinning now. She didn't make any mention about the Keyblades or anything like that. In fact, she didn't say much of anything as she helped him search the town from top to bottom. Roxas had to wonder whether or not she should have also been heading home since that seemed like the normal sort of thing kids did around Twilight Town, but she brushed him off saying that didn't really apply to her situation. She would occasionally lag behind to procure snacks and beverages from the vendors around town, asking if they'd seen anyone matching Xion's description and all, and then she'd catch up again. Eventually, though, Roxas did have to report back to the Castle That Never Was.

"Okay, well I'll keep an eye out and I'll let you know if I find out anything," the girl had told him before he left.

"I still don't get it," Roxas couldn't take it anymore. The question had been burning on his mind the whole afternoon. "Why are you even helping me?"

"Huh?" the girl seemed to puzzle it over. "I don't really need a reason to help someone," she scratched behind her ear and looked kind of embarrassed as she did so. "But, you did seem pretty sad so I thought it wouldn't be right to leave you all alone today. Try to cheer up, okay?"

She took off after that and Roxas was left to wonder what all that had been about. Unfortunately, there wasn't anyone at the Castle That Never was that Roxas could really talk about it with since Axel had been avoiding him and the only other person who might listen was Demyx and Roxas wasn't sure he'd get a helpful answer out of him. It was going to be bad enough having to report to Sai'x about his actual mission progress.

Roxas woke up the following morning with an odd sense of deja vu as he vaguely recalled the dream he'd had while asleep. It was strangely familiar, like he was remembering something that had actually happened to him at some point during his time with the Organization. That girl who had stuck it out with him that day in Twilight Town, those two Keyblades she'd summoned in the woods, Roxas recognized them easily now because he'd seen them so often since then. Of course, thinking on it now, who else could it have been? Come to think of it, he was pretty sure he had neglected to report that whole incident to Sai'x because, of course, he wasn't supposed to have been there looking for Xion in the first place. Talk about blind dumb luck. If he'd said anything about Crystal to the Organization back then she'd have been in all sorts of trouble with them. She'd really risked a lot by wanting to help him and knowing her the way he did now, she'd probably have done it again.

As luck would also have it Crystal was also still asleep and it was something of a rarity for Roxas to be awake before her so he just kind of relaxed a bit and smiled appreciatively while waiting for her to wake up on her own. That didn't last long, however, as pretty soon Riku was pounding on the outside of the door to Crystal's room yelling at them.

"I know you're both in there because I already checked and Roxas wasn't in his room!" Riku called through the door. "Anyway, we need you out here because there's a bit of a situation we're going to have to deal with!"

Riku left just as suddenly as he'd come along, probably going from door to door of the bedrooms that were in use to get everyone out of bed to consult on whatever big emergency had him on high alert. "Was that Riku?" Crystal grumbled groggily. Apparently he'd spent the night again.

"It definitely sounded like him," Roxas confirmed. "He said something about there being a situation we're going to have to deal with."

"Well, there isn't any alert from the Dimensional Distortion Grid or security program that Roveth integrated with the computer system," Crystal frowned a bit at that. "So, I guess that means Riku must be sensing something that our technology can't detect."

She rolled over and swung her legs over the side of the bed. Obviously, since she was with Roxas, they were using the bottom bunk as it folded out into a much more spacious bed than the upper one. Crystal headed for the dresser to rifle for some clothes and then disappeared into the closet for the finishing touch. A moment later, getting changed in her usual record time, Crystal was decked out in her 'battle outfit' which hadn't been seen in a good while with it being so peaceful. She tugged on the pockets of her orange hoodie vest, adjusting it into place, and then gave herself a good stretch.

"You sure do get ready fast," Roxas was vaguely amused by how quickly Crystal could assemble her outfit. Her assortment of casual outfits was cute and quite charming to see, but there was definitely something distinct about Crystal's 'battle outfit' that just really seemed to suit her. "Guess I'd better get ready too," he slipped away through the walk-in closet and through a secret trap door into his own walk-in closet to get changed out of his pajamas. Hopefully it wasn't anything too serious. Although, coming from Riku with such urgency, Roxas wasn't confident it was going to be that easy.

Once Roxas was dressed he would regroup with Crystal down in the lobby area of the mansion with whoever else Riku had managed to drag out of bed at this ungodly hour of the morning. Xion appeared not long after the two of them, although she seemed well rested enough so she might forgive Riku for this whole rude awakening thing.

"Any idea what's gotten into Riku?" Xion inquired.

"Not a clue," Roxas shrugged. "He yelled at us through the door and then he wandered off somewhere."

"Something really must have spooked him because he's going to be earning the ire of at least Roveth by waking us all up so early," Crystal spoke with a tired yawn.