Kingdom Hearts II Vol 2

by Tomoco Kanemaki

  But there was no answer.

  Staring at the sea, Kairi anxiously folded her hands in front of her chest.

  “I bet they’re all right,” said the king from beside her.

  “Your Majesty…”

  He was watching the sea, too, and so were Donald and Goofy. All facing the same direction with the same wish in their hearts.

  Sora, Riku… Please come home.

  We’re waiting for you here at the blue sea, under the clear sky.

  If this wish reaches you… If you’re somewhere out there under the same sky… I want you to know. We’re waiting for you. And we’ll keep waiting.

  She could hear the soft rushing of the waves.

  Kairi thought back to that day when she’d written a letter to the boy she couldn’t quite remember.

  She’d believed that letter would begin something. Why had she thought that?

  It was someone she’d seen in a dream. It must have been Sora—no, Roxas?

  “It starts with an S!”

  “Starts with an S…,” Kairi murmured. “Sora.”

  We made a promise. I know we did.

  Two lights appeared—two shooting stars streaking across the sky. They grew brighter and trailed down into the sea, one after the other, as if reaching the end of a journey.

  And where the stars fell, two faces broke the surface of the water.

  They belonged to two boys very dear to her. The two she was waiting for.

  “Sora! Riku!” Kairi waved to them.

  Sora’s grin was dazzling. He sloshed through the waves, running up out of the water. Riku followed him at a steady pace.

  A smile came to Kairi’s face in answer. Just before she could dash down to the water’s edge, Donald and Goofy ran out ahead of her with King Mickey close behind them.

  Goofy reached Sora first, tackling him in a hug, and Donald joined in, knocking Sora down into the waves. Goofy nuzzled against Sora’s cheek, Donald draped his arm around Sora’s neck, and the water splashing around them sparkled like drops of sunlight.

  King Mickey dodged the flailing trio and made a leap for Riku, who caught him in a hug and spun him around.

  Kairi looked on, smiling ear to ear.

  After hug-wrestling Sora for a decent amount of time, Donald and Goofy turned to her, beaming.

  Sora eventually got up with a sheepish smile and took the thalassa shell charm out of his pocket, his fingers closed gently around it.

  “I’m making them so even if one of us gets lost, we’ll make it back here safe and sound. So the three of us will always be together.”

  “…We’re back,” Sora told her shyly.

  “Welcome home.” Kairi held out a hand to him.

  He took her hand and held it tight.

  EPILOGUE

  YOU’RE HOME

  MY EFFORTS THESE MANY YEARS HAVE COME TO FRUITION, with the world I govern having become a paradise worthy of the name Radiant Garden. Nurtured by the clear, sweet water that gives them life, fragrant flowers bloom in abundance, and the people meet each day with smiles full of hope.

  But where there is light, darkness also lurks. As noted in my earlier reports, I must unravel the mystery of this “darkness in the heart.” The safety of this paradise depends on it.

  I shall perform an experiment to probe the depths of a person’s heart. One of my six apprentices, Xehanort, has volunteered to be the subject.

  The young man has served me ever since I found him at death’s door and nursed him back to health some years ago. At the time, he had lost all his memories, but he displayed a remarkable intellectual curiosity and readily absorbed my instruction, gaining profound knowledge. He wrestles with some emotional immaturity, but surely that is due to his young age.

  If I explore Xehanort’s heart by means of psychological tests, I may be able to awaken the past locked away within. My apprentice Even, too, has shown great interest in Xehanort’s memories.

  But is he really the best subject for this experiment?

  Xehanort does indeed exhibit extraordinary talents… Too extraordinary.

  Perhaps even superhuman.

  I have made a terrible mistake.

  No matter how good our intentions, we are not meant to meddle in the depths of another’s heart.

  The fault is mine, and it has plunged me into despair.

  A visitor from another world soothed my anguished soul.

  A king, small in stature, came wielding a legendary key. He introduced himself as Mickey. And the key—yes, it was the fabled Keyblade, said to bring both chaos and prosperity to the world.

  He was quite well-informed on many different things, and we spoke companionably, forming a fast friendship.

  And now, I have had everything taken from me, banished to a hollow realm of nothingness.

  What is Xehanort hoping to gain with a pilfered existence?

  How long have I been here, exiled in this realm of nothingness?

  Only by relying upon my anger and hatred have I been able to retain my sense of self, here in this void where all existence is negated.

  But I cannot continue to idle away my time. What are Xehanort and the others attempting to do?

  I must solve the riddles of the reports written in my stolen name. I must intercept my apprentices and defeat them. That is my mission—the only way to atone for what I’ve wrought on the worlds.

  The key to it all must lie with the Heartless. The six traitors were operating a laboratory that churned out those cursed shadows.

  The Heartless act only to fulfill their instinctive needs. They detect hearts with single-minded purpose and swarm around them. They would never obey a person’s commands; instead, the Heartless would easily take the would-be commander’s heart to increase their own ranks.

  But what if it were an even stronger Heartless giving the orders?

  As I suspected, Xehanort has become a Heartless. Using my name, he commanded other Heartless in quests to snatch away the hearts of many worlds. And from the core of the worlds’ hearts he has stolen Kingdom Hearts—he seeks to summon an unspeakably great darkness and return all things into its depths.

  While pursuing the truth, I became acquainted with an unusual entity.

  It is the soul and body left behind when a being loses its heart. When a Heartless is born, this entity disappears from the realm of light to be reborn as an entirely new being in another realm.

  The heart is taken, and a Heartless is created; the body and soul remain, giving rise to a different entity. These possess different intentions than the Heartless, and while it is unclear what these sentient things are after, it would appear they are responsible for much havoc across the worlds.

  My erstwhile friend the king, his retainers, and a Keyblade-wielding hero are battling the Heartless even as this new threat approaches.

  And the new threat—they have given themselves a fitting name, I suppose.

  Those who do not exist. The “Nobodies.”

  It appears my betrayers have retained human shape as Nobodies and gathered more followers in hopes of advancing some new scheme.

  This “Organization XIII,” formed of thirteen Nobodies with my betrayers at its core, has split into two factions. They are said to be carrying out some kind of research.

  To discover the organization’s plans, I have decided to head to the place where six of its members are gathered. It towers over the far reaches of the realm between darkness and light—Castle Oblivion.

  It consists of thirteen stories aboveground and twelve below, with the contents of its white rooms transforming in response to visitors’ memories. Organization XIII was conducting experiments on memory here.

  I was reunited with an old friend at Castle Oblivion but could not disclose my true identity. If he knew my situation, he would likely try to stop me from pursuing my revenge. Much as I would dearly like to converse with him as in days gone by…that is now but a hopeless dream.

  My friend has been fighting in the realm of dark
ness. Most likely, he found his way there via Traverse Town. Like Castle Oblivion, that town also rests in the cleft between light and dark. It consists of the remnants of worlds whose hearts have been taken by the Heartless, and it is where those who managed to escape the destruction of their worlds eventually find themselves.

  This realm between is considerably unstable, with Corridors of Darkness opening from time to time. I would surmise that when a world falls prey, some of the inhabitants arrive here through the corridors. Surely Sora traveled the same way when he first came to Traverse Town.

  And tomorrow, Sora will awaken.

  My long-awaited revenge nears its completion.

  Xehanort stole everything from me. While his Heartless form is no more, as the leader of Organization XIII, his ambition once again is to capture Kingdom Hearts—the greatest of all hearts.

  His Heartless attempted to draw out the great darkness of Kingdom Hearts, created from the hearts of the worlds he gathered; his Nobody, however, is now attempting to assimilate himself into Kingdom Hearts, which he created by poaching the hearts of so many.

  That fool of an apprentice!

  Only one mystery remains:

  How did Xehanort manage to open the door that appeared in the basement of my castle…?

  But no…it is useless to posit any theories now, when everything is so close to the conclusion.

  King Mickey, my friend. I believe that in due course you will come across these records—my truthful accounts.

  How I wish I could have spoken with you again when circumstances were better.

  I have been a fool, obsessed with revenge. Forgive me.

  Sora was alone in the cave, their secret spot. Their doodles still covered the walls. The sunlight of the Destiny Islands gently poured in from the opening in the ceiling. It was a quiet sanctuary with no sound but the distant waves.

  And there was the drawing of Sora’s and Kairi’s faces on the back wall.

  It felt like only days ago that he’d etched the image of his hand holding a paopu fruit up to Kairi’s lips. And yet it felt like a hundred years ago that he’d first seen that man in the black cloak here.

  The legend of the paopu fruit… If two people share one, their destinies will become intertwined. Something like that.

  And then Sora noticed that someone else had added to the drawing. He brushed it with his fingertips.

  Now it showed Kairi’s hand, too, holding a paopu fruit up to Sora.

  After a moment, he turned away and strode toward the mouth of the cave—then broke into a run.

  Outside, Sora blinked in the dazzling sunlight, then ran to Riku, who was perched on the sideways trunk of a paopu tree.

  The sky was blue, and so was the sea. The air was filled with the rush of the waves and the cries of birds. The sun was sinking ever closer to the sea.

  It’s real. This is Destiny Island. Our home.

  “Nothing’s changed, huh?” Riku said lazily.

  “Nope. Nothing will.” Sora nodded.

  “Such a tiny world.”

  “But it’s part of something much bigger.” Watching the sunset, Sora crinkled his eyes. This tiny world… This little island. I wanted so badly to come home to this place.

  “Yeah…” Riku sighed. The sun drifted lower and lower.

  Then Sora suddenly turned to him. “Hey, Riku… What do you think it was? The door to the light?”

  Riku hopped down from the trunk with a hint of a smile and looked back at Sora. “This.” He pointed to Sora’s heart.

  “This?” Sora examined his own chest.

  “Yeah. It’s always closer than you think.”

  Just as a grin spread across Sora’s face, they heard Kairi calling.

  “Sora! Riku!”

  She sprinted down the beach to them, a small glass bottle in her hand.

  “What’s up?” said Sora.

  “Look!” She’d been clutching the bottle to her chest, making sure not to drop it, and now she held it out to them.

  A piece of paper was rolled up inside—and in the middle, it bore King Mickey’s seal.

  “It’s from the king?!” Sora hurried to pop out the cork and shake the letter free, then started reading right away.

  Riku smiled as he read it in turn. Kairi examined it anxiously.

  The setting sun shone gold on their faces.

  —THE END—

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