Kingdom Hearts fic: Potentials - Chapter 8

[mistressofmuses]

In chapter 8: Radiance, Corridor, and Keyblade have an altercation...

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Excerpt from a Defenders of the Light internal report regarding the appearance of a superpowered child, apparently from an alternate dimension. The report is not signed, but it is speculated to have been written by Ansem, the then-leader of the organization.

At the height of the meteor shower last week, a girl, appearing about six year old, was found wandering down the beach west of the city. At first people assumed she was lost, having been separated from her family in the excitement, since the area was crowded as a popular viewing spot. But the girl was glowing, light dancing over her skin in a rainbow of colors.

When asked where she had come from, she didn’t have an answer, and she could not provide any information about where she lived, or about her family. She could speak perfectly well, and did not seem distressed about her lack of personal knowledge. The family that found the child brought her here, to the Defenders of the Light.

This may be the youngest manifestation of a power we have ever seen. While there has been a slow uptick in superhuman ability manifestations over the last decade and a half, they’ve almost all been among teenagers and pre-teens. Additionally, these abilities almost always manifest in an understandably untrained state, and require practice and refinement to bring under control.

This girl’s light is almost fully under her control already, and she was happy to demonstrate her talent with it when we set it up as a game. She was willing to “hand me” some of her light, to throw it at targets, to make it bright enough to read by, or to dim it down so she didn’t give herself away during a game of hide and seek.

The meteor shower was the only known physical evidence of a brief connection between our dimension and another. I believe this girl is also from that dimension.

Thirteen years ago, a similar event happened, which brought my young apprentice Xehanort to this world, so it’s not without precedent.

We will keep the girl here for now, continuing to study her powers as she’s willing to let us, and making sure she experiences minimal negative effects of being the only known person in her age range to have powers.

Perhaps if she can learn to keep her lights sufficiently suppressed for extended periods, she will be able to be adopted by an ordinary family and attend a public school. As it is, I worry too much about how she would be treated, as children can be cruel about things that mark someone as different. There’s the additional concern that if her abilities became public knowledge it could make it nearly impossible for her to ever decide in the future to have a low-profile life.

For the time being, she’s become everyone’s favorite, the whole of the Defenders of the Light doting on her. I admit it’s rather funny to see that sweetness coming from some of the more stoic and “tough” young adults and teenagers who make up this organization.

We’ve taken to calling her “Starchild,” a nod to her appearance seemingly from the stars. Though I suppose we should give her a more proper name.

---

Radiance ran along the hallway, looking for any exit. The only door was far behind her, and the white hall in front of her stretched on like it would never end.

She knew that was impossible, which meant this was absolutely some kind of extraordinary… something. An illusion, or a dimensional bend, or some kind of psychological manipulation. Something. And since there weren’t currently any supervillains on the known rosters that had that as part of their powersets, it was a good bet this had something to do with the Organization.

Radiance slowed, forcing herself not to keep running, even though every instinct urged her to flee, to move as fast as possible, to escape.

How had she gotten here? The fact that that was a question she couldn’t immediately find the answer to was another point in the “some kind of something unnatural” column. Though after a few moments she thought she’d reconstructed it.

It had been a patrol, all three of them again. And then something had pulled them through a portal and into this place, whatever it was. At least she assumed Corridor and Keyblade had been pulled through, too. But for now she was here alone. She couldn’t tell how long it had been. It felt simultaneously like she’d been running through white hallways forever and like it had been minutes at most. It wasn’t a comfortable feeling.

She tapped the mic by her ear. No response, and she couldn’t tell if it was still transmitting or not. But no matter what it felt like, she knew she hadn’t really been in this blank space forever.

As if that realization was enough, suddenly there were stairs, cut out from the middle of the wall where there’d been nothing before.

She sighed. It was probably a bad thing to follow the mysterious, possibly-illusionary staircase, but… well.

Climbing the stairs took her to another level, all the same gleaming white. The first hall had been almost claustrophobic, urging her to hurry along, as if the walls would close in at any moment. Now the ceilings were vaulted, and not totally featureless. There were architectural flourishes, arches and carvings up high, but they were all the exact same shade of white. The lack of true contrast made the heights even more dizzying.

It was impossible not to make some connection between the unending white of this place and the Nobodies they’d been facing. She already knew this had to be the Organization’s doing. But what did it say about a group that seemed to prize stark, impersonal white, and then decked themselves (with the exception of Naminé) out in black? Was it for contrast? Drama? Afraid they’d lose each other in the halls if they blended in?

She kept walking, still not letting herself run. It would be too easy to let running creep into blind panic, or to miss a detail, or to exhaust herself. She tapped on the earphone again, but there was still no response.

The next corridor brought her to another set of stairs, now heading down. But for the first time, there was a sound other than her own footsteps. Ambient noise, the sound of a fireplace—why? This is summer—but compared to the nothing of before, it stood out.

These stairs led down into a library, a shocking contrast to everything she’d seen so far. This space was warm and personal and inviting. Floor-to-ceiling shelves were full of books, mostly old leather-bound volumes. The shelves created their own paths through the space, sometimes opening onto sitting areas with overstuffed leather armchairs, or finely polished wooden tables perfect for studying at.

The fireplace she’d heard was there and very inviting, with plush loveseats set up in front of it.

As she kept walking, she reached a taller atrium in the middle, revealing just how large the library was.

Maybe strangest of all, it felt familiar. Radiance had no idea why. The only library she’d spent any time in was the public city library, which while wonderful, was almost nothing like this. This seemed much more private and personal, books organized by some system she couldn’t start to guess.

It was tempting to pull a book from one of the shelves, to sit down in one of the comfortable looking chairs, to take a break…

“Absolutely not.”

Her own voice startled her, since she hadn’t planned on saying anything out loud. But now that she had:

“This is a great setup, and I appreciate how you’ve managed to make it especially appealing after all your awful hallways. But I’m not interested.”

She clenched her hands and walked through. She didn’t even venture onto the mezzanine level that circled the open central area. She did glance out the two-story window, but couldn’t focus on anything beyond the glass, so she didn’t try.

The shelves could easily turn into a maze, and yet she knew the way to the door. Another thing she couldn’t spend too much time thinking about yet.

The double doors were locked. Wait here, they seemed to say. You can’t go yet anyway, so what’s the harm? And then another push of temptation: Maybe you’ll find answers here. Maybe you’re supposed to be here, to find out the things you need to know.

Usually she wished they’d just let her have a damn knife, but right now she’d have settled for a blunt instrument.

She knocked on the door, faux polite. “Hey! I already said I wasn’t interested. I really do appreciate all the impossible architecture stuff you’ve got going on, so it would suck for me to have to rig a battering ram out of one of those lovely chairs just to get through the door.”

If the click of a lock disengaging could sound sullen, this one managed it.

“Thank you,” she said brightly, opening the door onto yet another obnoxiously white hallway. The door closed behind her, but the lock didn’t reengage. Leaving it an open invitation.

A few steps out into the empty hall—another built on the "dizzying heights” model—and she was already sick of it.

“I appreciate you unlocking the door for me. I’d appreciate it more if you’d just show yourself so we could get whatever this is over with.”

She was sure there was something listening, paying attention, but it didn’t answer. She hadn’t really anticipated it would, but it still would have been nice.

Another arched hallway, leading to another uncomfortably small passage where the ceiling was barely above her head. It felt like she’d doubled back to areas she’d already been, and yet none of it looked completely familiar, despite everything looking the same. It was very disconcerting. She wasn’t sure if she should be glad or worried that it all seemed to be pointing her in a single direction; no branching paths, no maze to try and map her way through.

And finally, a door opened into a wide space, something of a cross between a room and an arena. Still all white, but at least she wasn’t alone.

“Keyblade! Corridor!”

The other two had just come through doors of their own, all converging on this one space.

“Radiance!” Keyblade called.

He was about to break into a run to join up with her, when ice crackled across the floor, slicking the entire center of the room.

An Organization member stepped forward out of nothingness. This hadn’t been accompanied by the feeling of one of the dark corridors, just suddenly they were there where no one had been before.

The Organization’s “uniform” had a hood, but this member’s was pushed back, showing the man’s narrow face, framed by long pale hair. The way his hand was flared out meant he was the likely source of the ice. The fact he had no trouble walking on it seemed like further support for the theory.

A second Organization member appeared behind him, also with his hood down. His hair was a striking blue-purple, hiding part of his face from view.

Now should have been the time for more posturing. They were past the initial introduction, though Radiance didn’t recognize either of these two from the group they’d encountered in the square. But they weren’t saying anything, and she found herself at a loss for words.

The quiet still present from her earphone—she should at least be able to hear Keyblade and Corridor, now that they were right here, but she couldn’t—made her question whether there would be any record of this at all. That worried her.

“Where did you bring us?”

Of course it would be Corridor to ask, straight to the point.

The second Organization member replied, “You don’t like it?”

“It’s not really to my taste,” Radiance answered.

He gave her a cool look, as if he knew something she didn’t, and she found herself thinking strongly of the oddly-familiar library.

“You could at least introduce yourselves,” Corridor suggested.

The Organization member who’d iced over the floor said, “Oh, You’ve met the Organization before. But my name is Vexen, and this is my associate Zexion.”

Corridor reached down for his knife. “I do like to know, specifically, whose ass I’m about to kick.”

Vexen sneered. “How crude.”

And that was apparently the cue.

Vexen cast his hand out again, fingers splayed, and the ice in front of him fragmented, spiking upward in a snaking trail toward Corridor.

Corridor stepped to the side, avoiding the attack, though he was limited in motion by the ice still covering the floor.

Keyblade was ready to charge, probably counting on momentum to be enough, even on the slick floor, to let him close with their opponents.

Lights sparked off Radiance’s skin as she tried to assess her best move.

Zexion made some sort of complicated gesture, and the rest of the room vanished, replaced by more white walls, only the two of them left standing there.

She took a deep breath. He was either a reality manipulator or an illusionist. It was hard to tell the difference, if the illusionist was skilled enough.

Zexion rushed at her, in the suddenly narrowed room, leaving her only a moment to decide, to dodge left or right. So she didn’t. She squared her hips, shifted her weight to plant herself as firmly as possible, and she lunged into the rush.

He hadn’t been expecting it. Her elbow caught him in the chest, and she felt it jar her all the way into her shoulders and neck, staggering back a step, but not overbalancing.

The walls around them dissolved—an illusionist then, she noted in some detached part of her mind—as Zexion fell back, gasping.

Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Keyblade had completed his rush toward Vexen, and the two were engaged in combat, Vexen holding the keyblade at bay with a shield that seemed at least partially made of his ice. Maybe the fight was dividing his attention, because the ice on the ground had begun to melt, the thin layer growing patchy.

The final person she needed to keep track of was Corridor, and he was coming at her, and at Zexion, who had retreated a few steps to recover. Corridor’s knife was out, his expression focused and bordering on angry. The walls Zexion had put up must have hidden them, or made them vanish entirely.

“Are you all right?” Corridor’s words were clipped, short. He didn’t alter his course.

“He’s an illusionionist.” She answered the unspoken: You disappeared.

Zexion had already turned back toward her, his fingers twitching toward whatever pattern he used for the illusions he created.

Corridor was faster. He reversed his grip on the knife, striking forward with the hilt instead of the blade, lending extra weight to an already powerful blow. It connected with the side of Zexion’s head, the kind of hit that should have sent him to his knees, probably with a concussion. And he did fall to his knees, hand going to the place he’d been struck.

Corridor danced back a couple of steps, out of range if Zexion had an immediate counterattack, while he flipped the blade back around. Radiance kept her stance ready, waiting to see if Zexion was going to get back up.

He didn’t. His hand slipped away, and where Radiance expected to see bright blood, a strange kind of smoky shadow boiled. Not the clinging, liquid-dark of the Heartless, more like the vapor of dry ice if it were made of darkness.

She felt herself draw back from the wrongness of it. Zexion made a choking sort of noise, maybe in response to the dark not-blood. She stepped forward before she even knew what she planned to do. At the very least it was their responsibility to get him out of this place and back to where he could be given medical attention as well as be arrested.

But in the time it took for her to take that step, the dark vapor had spread. It was like his entire outline was starting to blur, some necessary cohesion lost. He looked at her, expression a sickening mix of rage, fear, and sorrow.

She was still moving forward, but by the time she’d taken her second step, he was gone, the darkness wisping away into the air.

A shattering noise drew both her and Corridor’s attention across the field, where Keyblade had landed a blow that destroyed Vexen’s shield, sending fragments of ice flying. The momentum continued, and the keyblade struck Vexen full force. Radiance had seen that sort of strike break bones before, so it was no surprise that Vexen fell to the ground.

But as Keyblade pulled back, a wisp of black vapor trailed his weapon. More of it bubbled up from the line of Vexen’s chest where the keyblade had struck, spilling to the floor and dispersing as the body itself disappeared.

They barely had time to stare at each other in horrified shock when the impossible castle faded away from around them, leaving them standing in the city square.

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Radiance felt sick as she gave her report. Bad enough that it was considered serious enough that all three had to give said reports separately, and she was the last. But it was immeasurably worse because they had to give their reports directly to Xehanort himself, which was practically unheard of.

He wasn’t an overly-present figure in the Heroes’ ordinary routines, mostly sticking to the behind the scenes administrative work the Defenders of the Light required, and they were comfortable with that. She’d interacted with him directly more times in the last few weeks than she had for months before that.

She described everything from the moment she’d come to in the strange maze-like corridors, up through the fight with the Organization members, and then suddenly finding themselves back in the city. She strove for some kind of credible impartiality, rather than numb shock, but had no idea how well she succeeded.

It was expected that there would be casualties in fights that involved superhumans. It was terrible, but generally accepted as an inevitability. But fatally harming a human opponent was supposed to be an absolute last resort. Certainly not in the first engagement with a new enemy, and certainly not twice in one altercation.

They hadn’t meant to, that was what Radiance was most desperate to get across. Especially for Corridor. As long as he was being forced to walk the anti-hero/villain line, she couldn’t risk anyone believing he’d intentionally killed an opponent.

“I saw both of the engagements,” she said. “Both of the… finishing blows should have been incapacitating. I wouldn’t have expected either to be fatal. Corridor had specifically attacked with the hilt of his knife, not the blade, in order to prevent a fatal wound.”

Xehanort held up a hand. “Relax, neither of your fellow heroes is on trial here. We’re just gathering information. You said that neither of these Organization members left bodies?”

“No.” She described the black vapor that they’d seemingly turned into, like it had leaked out of them, and they’d dissolved. The thought still made her queasy. The Heartless and the Nobodies disappeared when they were destroyed, but they weren’t people.

“They must have had a weak grasp on their forms,” Xehanort said, making notes on the tablet in front of him.

“What?”

“Nothing for you to be concerned about, Radiance. It’s valuable data for us. I’ll pass it along to our researchers, and we’ll see how we can improve going forward.”

She nodded a bit numbly. Valuable data. Of course. If this could help limit the danger this group presented, that was a good thing.

“For now, I’ll recommend all of you for a counseling session, though I don’t believe you should allow this to disturb you overly much. These weren’t humans. They were creatures. And if damage done in a standard fight was enough to kill them, that isn’t your fault.”

“Yes sir. Thank you.”

He waved a hand to dismiss her. She was grateful to leave Xehanort’s office, a space she’d seen far more of recently than she’d wanted to.

Corridor and Keyblade were waiting for her in the hallway. They indulged in a quick hug, the kind that was acceptable for teammates who’d just come through a fight to share.

They had to withdraw sooner than she would have preferred, but she knew they’d meet up at the apartment later, and they’d have at least a little time together.

---

“So, what did you see when we were in the castle?” Sora asked, settling back into the couch cushions.

“Besides the endless white?” Riku asked.

“A library,” Kairi answered. “I mean, mostly it was the weird all-white maze of hallways and rooms, but then I was suddenly in this ornate two-story library. It was beautiful, and the kind of place I would have really enjoyed exploring. But it was like it knew that, and was trying to force me to stop and stay there.”

“It was elementary school for me,” Riku said. “Maybe not as appealing as your library, Kairi, but it was kind of the same. It was like… weaponized nostalgia. My old classroom, the playground… all of it wanted me to go back, to spend time there. It’s sort of embarrassing how tempting it was. And like if I did stop, I might not ever remember to leave.”

“What about you, Sora?” Kairi asked.

“I was on the beach we used to go to when I was a kid. It was the weirdest thing, to go from one of those big white rooms to like… sandy beach and sun.”

“The beach?” Riku asked. “The one to the south that we’d go to over the summer?”

“Yeah, that’s the one! You, me, and Naminé… I remember piling in my mom’s car at like 5:30 in the morning just so we could get there and still have the whole day.”

“What?” Kairi asked, a bit more sharply than she’d intended.

Sora just looked at her. “Oh, it was a beach we used to visit on summer vacation. It’s a few hours away, but—”

She cut him off. “No, I know where it is, we went there every year.”

He smiled, though he looked a little confused. “You went there too?”

“What? I went with you.”

Sora blinked. “Oh, yeah. Of course. So you know which one I mean, then. That was the beach I saw in the castle. I really wanted to just like, lay down and sunbathe or wade in the water, but I knew I couldn’t. How did the castle do that, do you think?”

“Do you think it was pulling things from our memories?” Riku asked. “The beach was a strong memory for you. Elementary school for me. It’s like it was finding something that would give us that desire to stay and explore. I don’t know why, though. All three of us made it through without getting trapped. If it had been merely to delay us, they could have just kept us looping through the white hallways.”

“Why did you say ‘Naminé’?” Kairi asked. “When you were describing the beach. You said that you, Riku, and Naminé used to go there.”

A crease appeared between Sora’s eyebrows. “I don’t know. I know it was the three of us. I must have been thinking about her, with the whole Organization thing.”

The answer didn’t make her feel any less troubled. “But we still don’t even know how you knew her name in the first place. And then it was like you still didn’t remember that I’d been there.”

“I don’t know.” Sora shook his head. “I’m probably just stressed, y’know? I know it was you, me, and Riku who went there together.”

“Did you recognize the library?” Riku asked. “If the castle was conjuring up places we remembered.”

She shook her head, and tried to forget about Sora having misspoken. That happened to everyone sometimes, right? “No, it wasn’t the city library. I don’t know that I’ve ever seen it before, except… it felt familiar. Like I did know my way around. But I can’t imagine that I’d ever actually been there.”

“Maybe we’re wrong about the memory thing, then,” Riku allowed.

An alarm sounded on her phone. “Ah, crap.” She made a face. “I have to go. Promised to spend the evening with my parents. They’re going on a trip in a couple weeks, so they want to spend some quality time before that.”

“Are you on shift tomorrow?” Riku asked.

“No, they have me scheduled for another medical appointment. One of the extra sessions that’s supposed to help me ‘cope’ with the alternate dimension thing.”

He made a sympathetic face. “I think Keyblade and I are being assigned some extra counseling after what happened today.”

Impulsively, she pulled him in for a hug. “I know the Defenders of the Light’s counseling is sort of a joke, but if you need anything…”

This time they didn’t have to quickly let go for propriety’s sake, and he held her just tight enough and just long enough that she knew he’d needed the hug. “Yeah, thanks. I’m glad…” he faltered. “It’s awful to say, but I’m glad it wasn’t on camera. That it happened in their dimension where our tech was knocked out. Because I don’t want anyone to see it.”

She pulled him into a second hug, and nodded against his shoulder. It did feel like a terrible thing, to be relieved that no one would see what had happened. They were always on camera, and it was largely for marketing, but it also meant that none of them could abuse their powers. Being relieved no one could examine their actions felt wrong, but the idea of everyone seeing Corridor and Keyblade apparently accidentally kill their enemies… that felt worse.

Riku let her go, and she turned toward Sora. “You too.” She opened her arms.

Sora pulled her close, and kissed her forehead. “Thank you. We’ll be alright.”

She smiled. “I know you will be, but that doesn’t mean you don’t ever need help.”

“We’ll let you know if we do,” he assured her.

“Need a ride home?” Riku asked, hand already up to summon a corridor for her.

“You know, that would be great.”

---

The “medical” part of her appointment the next day was over quickly—checking her vitals and drawing just one vial of blood this time—and the rest of the time was given over to the “counseling” that was the real goal of the day.

This was probably one of the most traditional counseling appointments she’d ever had. It didn’t take place in the exam room, for once. Instead, she was shown to an actual office, with a chair padded enough to even be comfortable.

The therapist, or whatever her official title was, was another one that Radiance had seen before, but she didn’t remember the woman’s name.

The woman glanced over Radiance’s file before smiling warmly and asking, “So, Radiance. How have you been doing?”

She hated open-ended questions like that. It always felt like there was a right answer that she couldn’t hope to give, so she stuck to the safe answer. “I’ve been all right.”

“There was some concern from the research department that dimensional Heroes might start to experience distress now that we’re in the middle of… dimensional contact, you could call it. Have you noticed anything strange?”

Radiance shifted in her seat. “Not beyond the dimensional contact itself. We had an encounter yesterday that didn’t exactly go well.”

“Ah, yes. I heard about that.” And then, as if that was of no concern, “The notes indicate you were going to continue working on memory recall from the time before you arrived here. Have you met with any success on that front?”

Radiance shook off her irritation at the obvious subject change, and opened her mouth to say no, the now-habitual response every time they asked. Except... she did have something she could share. “Maybe. When we were pulled into that other dimension yesterday, both Keyblade and Corridor said they encountered places that had been modeled after things they remembered from childhood. I also encountered something like that, but for me it wasn’t somewhere I recognized. Except, well, it felt like I did.”

She went on to describe the library, how she thought she’d known more about it than she’d actually seen. Even now, she felt like she knew exactly where to find little reading nooks she hadn’t explored, shelves that held books she loved, even though she hadn’t stopped to look at any of them.

The therapist took notes on her tablet, until a small unobtrusive chime played, warning that their time was almost up.

“Well Radiance, that sounds extremely promising. It sounds likely that this was a successful reconstruction of a buried memory from your childhood. I think everyone will be pleased.”

“Everyone?”

“Your therapy team,” the woman said with a smile. “We all enjoy celebrating successes like this. For now, I believe you should try to explore this. Perhaps some visualization exercises. See if you can visualize walking through this library, maybe seeing what is behind any of the doors. Or think about events that may have occurred there, or people you might interact with.”

Radiance smiled, though it felt stiff on her face. Of course the information was shared between the many different people she saw, but she wasn’t sure how this could really be considered a ‘success’ for them. It hadn’t been their ‘exercises’ that had jarred the memory loose. It had been constructed by an enemy.

She wished she’d had a chance to maybe bring up the fact she thought one of the Organization members had been in her apartment, but maybe it was for the best she hadn’t had a chance. She’d half-convinced herself it had just been a dream, and even if it hadn’t been, there was little the Defenders of the Light could do. Maybe they could make her stay somewhere else, but she didn’t want that. And if it had been real, she had a feeling uprooting from her apartment wouldn’t actually help. Better to wait, and remain careful.

She thanked her therapist, and left the Headquarters building, feeling even more unmoored than she had before the session.

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