Winds of Connection Chapter 8

He looked back. He wished he hadn’t. Even as he and his student rocketed away from the all-consuming dark he felt the gravity of that abyss trying to drag them back. To swallow them up with everything else.

Darkness had swallowed the world and all he could do was flee. For all that he wished he hadn’t seen it, he was glad he told Kairi to shut her eyes. She didn’t need to see this.

It was too late for that world. It wouldn’t do anyone any good to look back. He needed to look forward, to figure out where they should go now. The easy answer was to find the nearest world. Find somewhere safe, rest, recuperate, figure out next steps. But as he looked ahead to their intended path he realised it wouldn’t be so easy as that. He cursed under his breath as he beheld something. It defied explanation, looked like some sort of deliberate magic above and beyond his comprehension of the subject. Something reaching out to snatch them out of the air. He dodged it. Once. Twice. But it was unrelenting. And every attempt to escape it took precious time to escape the pull of the collapsing world. He was left with only two choices. Keep dodging and hope it would give up or let it take him and figure it out from there. Certain death or probable death.

With a sigh of resignation, Ventus grabbed Kairi and held her tightly to him, then returned his keyblade to its natural state. Using it to cast a single protective shell of wind around them, he then coiled the blade around them as another layer of protection.

As he had predicted, the grasping magic immediately snatched the two of them up. Suddenly Ventus was compelled to imitate his student in shutting his eyes as the magic dragged them at ludicrous speeds. Not into the darkness as he had feared but through the Lanes Between, yanking them straight to another world. Both blond and redhead opened their eyes as they felt themselves slow down. They didn’t know where they were but they could feel the force guiding them suddenly vanish as they broke through to this new world. With no time to reshape his keyblade again, Ventus shouted, “Hold on!” tucking Kairi’s head into his chest and covering her head with an arm.

Their landing was neither soft nor immediate, first striking and smashing the brickwork of a building, bouncing off to drop, bounce and roll through a cobblestone plaza, inhabitants scrambling away from the metallic roll cage.

Both teens panted for breath, wide-eyed with their hearts pounding as the adrenaline ran its course through their systems. “You okay?” Ventus asked, trying to keep his voice steady.

She found it difficult to speak in that moment. Her mouth opened but words wouldn’t come. Failing that, she nodded. Some bumps and aches but she would live.

Ventus breathed a sigh of relief. With an effort of will, his keyblade vanished, letting him drop the extra couple of inches to land fully on the cobblestones with a grunt. Carefully, he pulled her up with him, making sure she was steady on her feet. He noticed she was favouring one leg. He wasn’t exactly one hundred percent himself. “Cure.” The two felt the soothing green light wash through their bodies. “Healing magic. Best remedy you could ever ask for,” he said, hoping to lighten the mood a little.

“Right,” she laughed weakly, rolling her ankle around and brushing over previously aching spots to check the pain was fully gone. Looking around, she saw the mild destruction of their landing, the architecture alien to her and the people giving them strange looks. “Where are we?”

“Congrats, you officially travelled to another world,” Ventus decided to give her the silver lining before he would inform her of the cloud.

“I guess you guys are new here,” one of the onlookers spoke up. A woman wearing a metal breastplate and a red headband to hold back her brown hair. On her belt she carried what looked like a gun and a few vaguely round objects neither keyblade wielder could identify. She looked at the dented wall above. “Your arrival was a little more destructive than most though.”

Ventus winced. “Sorry about that.”

“Don’t worry about it,” she waved off his apology. “Trust me, it’s not even close to the worst thing we’ve had to deal with. Everybody here’s got a story of the worst day in their lives and they all go pretty much the same. Welcome to Traverse Town, ‘where everyone saw the end of the world’. Name’s Jessie,” she introduced herself, giving a jaunty salute. “Me and the boys keep things safe here in District One.”

“Umm,” Kairi spoke, “Nice to meet you. I’m Kairi.”

“Ventus. Call me Ven.”

“Good to meet you, too. Now let me give you the rundown. For a community thrown together by rough circumstances we’ve got all you’ll need to get yourselves situated. If you’re looking for the essentials you’ll want the general store over there,” the brunette guard pointed to one building, “Looking to eat, we’ve got a restaurant over there,” her arm moved to point at another building with an outdoor sitting area in front. “People pitch in when they can to do some cooking. Lent a hand myself more than a few times. Then we’ve got the equipment store.” She pointed to a two story building that dominated the plaza. “A friend of mine runs it, a grumpy old guy named Cid. If you want weapons and armour, he’s your guy. And... You kind of do. Want them, I mean. The heartless have been getting feisty lately. We do what we can but you’ll want a way to protect yourselves.”

“How about a place to stay?” Ventus asked.

“I’m sure you’ll manage,” Jessie gave her less than helpful answer. “Plenty of places that are vacant right now. Find a place and move in. No one’s gonna stop you.”

The two teens glanced at each other in a moment of confusion at that casual suggestion of squatting. “Alright, well, thanks.”

“Not a problem!” the woman smiled, “You two run into any trouble just gimme a holler.”

They watched her go, stopping to talk to a slightly overweight man dressed similarly to her before she slapped him on the back of the head and dragged him off with an arm over his shoulder. “Ventus,” Kairi began, bringing his attention back to her, “What did she mean by everyone seeing the end of the world?” He didn’t answer. For an uncomfortably long time, he didn’t answer. “Ventus?”

“I’m sorry,” he answered solemnly, “The islands are gone.”

“Gone?” Her voice cracked. “What do you mean, ‘gone’?”

There wasn’t an easy way to say it. For something like this there never could be. “It was consumed by the darkness.”

Her breath hitched. “Those things we fought on the beach? The things Riku–” She couldn’t say it. Couldn’t vocalise the idea that her friend would so casually destroy their home, put an end to everyone they knew. “Why? What could have brought him to do something like that?”

He couldn’t answer that question. Not now. Not when it was still so raw for her. He would tell her one day. She could hate him for it then. But for now they had more important things to worry about. “We should get ourselves settled. Get some rest. We can figure out what’s next after that.”

His redheaded apprentice closed her eyes, gathered herself with a force of will and nodded slowly. “Okay.”

They first stopped in at the general store to get some supplies. It was staffed by three young ducks. Kairi had trouble not staring. Then next door for the equipment shop. It wasn’t a necessity for them with keyblades but it was at least worth a look.

“Hrmph,” the blond man at the counter grunted in response to the bell on his door ringing. He was older, dressed plainly save for the goggles on his head. Looking to the entrance he said, “New in town, eh? Looking for anything in particular?”

“I guess we’re just browsing for now.” The wares on offer at least serve to distract Kairi slightly by Ventus’ estimation. It really is an impressive display. Staves, shields, swords, guns, armour, jewellery. “Did you make all of this yourself?”

The surly man puffs himself up a little at that. “Not all of it but a lot of it, sure. Name’s Cid. Engineer, mechanic, craftsman, handyman. You name it, I can build it better.”

“So what’s your story?”

“Careful askin’ that about town, kid. Answer’s usually not a fun one.”

Ventus winced. Yeah, Jessie had said something like that. “Right, sorry. I wasn’t thinking.”

“Nah, don’t worry about it. Count yourself lucky, mine ain’t as bad as most folks’. My world got took over by some crazy old bat. A bunch of us made a run for it in a ship I built. Found this place by chance.” The old mechanic shrugged. “Guess we’re not as bad off as most folks, but with all we’ve been doing to keep this place in one piece I don’t think anyone’s complaining.”

So it was one group that basically ran the place. If Ventus had to guess, Jessie was part of that group. Unable to really afford anything after gathering supplies at the general store, the pair bid polite goodbyes and moved on to looking for a place to stay. The entire town seemed to be arranged in a fairly haphazard fashion. Despite being called districts, the different regions didn’t seem to be put together with any particular goal in mind. District One seemed to be all things to all people, just a section of the town. As Ventus and Kairi moved through the only entrance to District Two they found it was rather the same. Places just taken over by whomever to become whatever. As Jessie had said, it seemed like everyone simply moved into whatever place they could find that was available.

“No! Please!” A panicked voice rang out through the near empty streets of District Two. Ventus’ attention locked onto the source. A man further along being chased down by–

His eyes widened, seeing more monsters of the darkness chasing down a man in a shopkeeper’s garb. The blond flew into action, summoned his keyblade and launched himself with wind magic in hopes of saving the man. He was too late. As he flew through the air at the gathered creatures they claimed the man’s heart. A heart that almost immediately turned into another creature like them. They were more elaborate than the ones that overran the island, almost taking the appearance of armoured soldiers. He crashed headlong into one, crushing its helmet with the force of his wind-assisted strike. Landed. Spun with his keyblade to strike each of the three remaining monsters once before returning to lay into the first struck until it was destroyed.

“V-Ven!” He heard Kairi shout.

She was still where he left her, four of the creatures encircling her. But she wasn’t fighting them. Hadn’t even summoned her keyblade. But as he saw how terrified she looked he realised it wasn’t that she hadn’t, it was that she couldn’t.

Feeling nearly tapped of magic, he had to go the long way. “Kairi, snap out of it! Fight back!” he commanded in a vain hope she would do just that. He spun and launched his keyblade at the armoured monsters to keep them distracted as he ran for his apprentice, leapt up to her and recalled his keyblade to cut a fireball launched by a flying creature out of the air before cutting the creature down with a backswing.

He felt a rush of magic rejuvenate him as the keyblade absorbed the energy of the magic-using creature. Spinning as he landed he threw his keyblade and guided it with wind magic, first to strike down the other mage, then lay into the soldiers. He left them to deal with the magically propelled weapon as he put his hands on Kairi’s arms and shook her. “Kairi!”

“Master,” she sounded so meek, so afraid. She was on the verge of tears. “It’s happening. It’s happening again! Just like on the island!”

“It’s not,” he told her, his tone firm. “Look at me,” her unfocused eyes cleared enough for his satisfaction. His expression softened. “I know how you feel. The details aren’t the same but I know what it’s like to be where you are. I wish I could give you the time to process everything but I can’t. Just for now, I need you to be strong, okay? I’m here for you.”

She grimaced. It was a lot to ask given the circumstances. She expected a life of adventure travelling to different worlds and yet it started with her losing everyone she ever knew, with the possible exception of the boy who caused it. But as filled with grief and fear as she was, she was a girl with a strong heart. If she weren’t, she wouldn’t have a keyblade at all. “Okay,” she said, trying to psych herself up. “Okay, I can be strong.” Ventus had trained her, he was there for her, so she would be there for him. She wouldn’t let herself be a burden. Not now when they were both so lost.

The soldiers had been defeated while the two spoke, but the ones Ventus had left distracted came to join them, bringing a couple of new friends along. “Get ready,” Ven warned his apprentice.

“Right!” Kairi nodded.

But before she could summon her own keyblade an explosion engulfed two of the soldiers. Before the smoke could even clear, a flare of light swept through it. “So,” a deep, masculine voice cut through the smoke, “It’s you.”

Ventus squinted, trying to see through the slowly clearing smoke cloud. On making out the silhouette, his eyes widened. “Terra?!” But as his view cleared, his shoulders slumped. “No, you’re not.” Though the similarities were somewhat striking.

“Sorry to disappoint,” the man offered, not sounding at all like he meant it. “So, you’re the chosen one. Didn’t think you’d be so scrawny but beggars can’t be choosers. Now,” he stepped forward with his free hand out, “Let’s see that keyblade.”

“Okay buddy,” Ventus spoke warningly as he readied the weapon behind him. “I don’t know who you are but you kind of look like a friend of mine,” except paler and with a better fashion sense, “so I’m gonna be nice. Back off.”

“Hmph,” the stranger grunted, raising the sword he had slung over his shoulder. “Hard way it is.” Even with the movement of the blade to ready it, it gave off an ominous glow as though readying an attack.

Ventus wasn’t keen to let him use it, not when Kairi’s heart was still wavering and she would be in the line of fire. He leapt up, smashed the blade not up or aside but down with the momentum the stranger was already moving it. With that strike he forced the tip of the blade to point directly in front of the stranger’s feet. The attack fired directly at the pavement, a fireball that did nothing more than scorch the concrete.

The stranger shoulder checked Ventus to knock him away, earning himself room to raise and twist his blade for a horizontal slash. The blade whistled through the air as Ventus flipped over it, let it swing beneath him, struck twice quickly while the stranger readied his heavier and slower weapon. Whoever this man was, he didn’t just look like Terra, he fought like Terra. Big, powerful swings and using his strength to his advantage. So when he lashed out at Ventus with a rising knee to catch Ventus by surprise, the blond was expecting it. Speed and agility were Ventus’ nature. He twisted away from the knee, rolled under the stranger’s sword arm and struck him in the back.

“Heh,” the stranger chuckled, grinning as he performed a half-blind swing behind him that turned him around. And once again Ventus evaded, this time sliding underneath the wild swing, planting his feet and jumping to attack the man’s jaw. The swordsman barely managed to lean back and out of the way. If he had had stubble, a spot on his chin would have suddenly been clean-shaven. It had been that close.

The energy and adrenaline rush was rising. When he had heard of the keyblade master, he had hoped they would be a good fighter but this surpassed his expectations. The stranger was enjoying himself.

“You’re open!”

The feminine voice from behind him startled him. Looking behind, his eyes widened on seeing the terrified girl from before jumping at him with another keyblade. Reacting to what was clearly a threat on the same level as the boy, he took hold of his sword with both hands and swung.

“Guh!” Kairi grunted as she was knocked out of the air by a home-run swing, sailed into a wall and dropped.

“Kairi!” a horrified Ventus shouted, dashing past the confused stranger to check on his student.

Unseen by the keyblade wielder, another girl appeared, dropped to sit on an awning over the street. “Smooth, Squall.”

He could only look away, rubbing his neck in embarrassment.

-(-)-

Kairi was experiencing true bliss. She was relaxing, spending time with Ventus on his island. They had done a bunch of training until she was sore all over but then he had offered to give her a massage to help her recover. Somehow this had led to her ending up fully naked and laying on her front. It should have been embarrassing but all she could feel was the comfort, the support that her teacher’s presence provided. She looked his way, letting him know she was ready for him to get started. She tried to hide her eagerness to feel his touch.

She felt his hands run over her naked body, soothing her various aches and pains as his fingers kneaded tender flesh, working stubborn knots out of her muscles. She smirked up at him as she felt his hands stray close to her butt. It was like he was asking permission. She wouldn’t ever say no.

He smiled in response, not even pretending it was all about making her feel better anymore as he rubbed and squeezed her cheeks, pulled them apart to get a clearer look at her most intimate places. Her legs parted just a little more so he could see more clearly. There was no more obvious invitation for him to push his luck even more. Save for how she rolled onto her side, feeling his hand slide around her hip and onto her tummy as she fully settled onto her back. She found she couldn’t speak but she didn’t need to. What other message would he take from her actions? He had done her back, now it was time to do her front.

And so her teacher continued his ministrations starting at her thighs, applying wonderful pressure as his digits dug into her leg muscles. She was proud of how her body had started to tighten up from her training. His firm touch travelled upward, around her slickening womanhood as if to tease her, up to her abs. He was more gentle as his fingers danced with varying pressure over her core muscles, loosening them up. Once again his hands travelled to intimate areas, taking handfuls of her soft breasts, rolling, almost milking them. And as that thought entered her head her belly started to swell slightly. She smiled down at it. Yes, she was going to have his child. Her teacher. The wind that carried her away to adventure had given her yet another wonderful gift.

She rolled onto her side, feeling Ventus settle in behind her, one hand settling on her swollen belly. The other sliding around it to finally work at her desperately needy slit. She gasped silently as she felt his fingers enter her.

Like a voice on the breeze, she heard him whisper. “I’ll protect you, no matter what.” Yes. “My precious student. My love. We’ll be together forever.” Yes, please, she wanted that. So badly. “Do you hear me, Kairi?” Yes, she could hear him but it was hard to focus on his words with the wonderful things he was doing to her body. “Kairi?” She pleaded silently for him to say her name again. Just like that! So filled with love!

“Kairi?”

She blinked. Twitched. Cringed away from the lights of the... Room?

A dream. She was with Ventus, but in Traverse Town. She wasn’t on the island. The island was... Gone. A significant part of her wished she could go back to sleep and go back to dreaming of more peaceful times.

Was at least her thought until she realised the dream she wanted to go back to was a sex dream about Ventus. One she was having while he was in the room. As were... Other people. Her face coloured bright red.

“Oh good, you’re awake,” Ventus breathed a sigh of relief.

She found herself laying in bed, her master leaning over her. Two strangers with them in the room. The big guy from the fight and another girl sitting on a table and kicking her legs back and forth. “What happened?”

Ventus pointed, glancing at the dark-haired man. “The broody guy over there knocked you out.”

“Ha!” The girl snorted with laughter. “Broody! He’s got you there, Squall.”

“Leon,” the man corrected as he half-heartedly glared at the girl. He looked Kairi’s way, suddenly sheepish, “And... Sorry. Guess I got carried away.”

“Nnh,” the redhead grunted as she sat up, trying not to think about her damp panties. “That’s okay,” she said with her best reassuring smile, “I’ve probably had worse from Ven’s training.”

Her teacher tried to hide his wince. He had two examples for how to teach and one dominated his experiences far more than the other. He had tried to adhere more to Eraqus’ methods but if he said he never slipped to the harshness of Xehanort’s from time to time he would be lying.

“Still,” Squall or Leon or whatever his name was continued, “To think there are two keyblade masters. The way I heard people talk about it, I thought there was only one keyblade.”

“It’s reassuring that you know so little. You probably shouldn’t know as much as you do,” said Ventus. If he was that ignorant of how keyblades worked it was less likely he was secretly a scheming adversary. Probably. Maybe. Or maybe it was just wishful thinking, being glad to have actual allies and preferring not to worry about their true allegiance for the moment. “Also it’s ‘wielder’. Or ‘bearer’ if you wanna sound fancy. Neither of us are masters.”

“I call him master sometimes anyway though,” Kairi volunteered.

“Ha!” the other girl barked out a laugh. “Kinky.”

The redhead’s eyes widened and blushed in embarrassment. “No, no! Because he’s my teacher!”

“Kinky.”

Ventus squinted at her. “Who even are you?”

“Me?” the girl asked as though the question were unexpected. As though they should have already known who she was. “I’m the great ninja Yuffie!”

The blond looked her up and down, noting her outfit and demeanour. “Chatty, dressed in bright colours announcing to everyone she’s a ninja. Yeah, okay.”

“Maybe I’m using reverse psychology!” Yuffie countered. “Making you think I’m not ninja-like at all so I can strike when you least expect it!” She giggled. It seemed ridiculous to Ventus, like she was messing with him. But maybe that was the point. Maybe it was a double bluff! Announcing she was a ninja, then making it sound like a joke, that it was a fake out when it really was a fake out!

... Or maybe he was just being a paranoid idiot too used to people messing with his head.

“We’re wasting time,” Leon cut in, pushing himself off of the wall he was leaning on to face Ventus directly. “So you’ve faced the heartless.”

“Heartless,” Ventus echoed. That was the second time someone had mentioned them. “Is that what you call the creatures of darkness? It’s not really accurate.” After all, Eraqus talked about them as corruptions of hearts that fell to darkness and Xehanort said they were the hearts of ‘fools who failed to harness their inner darkness and were instead consumed by it’. Either way, they were the exact opposite of heartless, being hearts themselves. “Guess it’s easier to say though.”

“It’s what Ansem the Wise called them,” Yuffie supplied. “He was the ruler of our world. He was studying them when our world was taken over.”

“To be honest,” Leon continued with a contemplative expression, “It’s probably why Maleficent attacked in the first place. To get hold of Ansem’s research.”

“Maleficent...” Ventus tasted the name. It was familiar. His eyes widened. “Wait, Maleficent?!” he demanded. “Big black cloak, pale, horns, Maleficent?!”

“I never got a good look with her army of heartless in the way,” Leon shrugged, “But sounds about right.”

“I got a good look!” Yuffie announced, pulling an eyelid down and sticking her tongue out mockingly. “Because I’m a ninja! And yeah, you forgot evil laugh but the rest of it’s spot on.”

The displaced boy’s blood ran cold as the implications struck him. “How long ago...?”

Leon looked confused at the question. Why would this kid care about that? “She showed up on our world about...” He looked to Yuffie. “Eight, nine years ago?”

“Little less but right around then, yeah,” the ninja confirmed. “We escaped here on Cid’s ship a few years after that.”

So it really was her. The same woman who had messed with Terra’s head, the woman he and Aqua had fought in her castle. And in the time he had been gone she had become a world-travelling, world-conquering tyrant using the powers of darkness. It was the kind of threat to the world order that keyblade wielders would have put a stop to before things could get anywhere near this bad. And they hadn’t. Which meant... “No...”

Before anyone could comment on Ventus’ haunted expression, the door to the room was slammed open by an enormous, rotund heartless. It couldn’t fit through the doorway but it let a swarm of shadows and soldiers stream into the room. “We’re out of time!” Leon shouted, “Yuffie!”

The girl flung a brace of shuriken at the swarm of heartless before flipping off the table and kicking her way through the other door. “Follow me!”

“Why are they coming after us?!” Kairi asked as the group rushed out to the alleyway behind the hotel they were hiding in.

Ventus flipped off the balcony to smash one of the big-bellied heartless, roll over it and then carve its back to pieces. He looked up to see Kairi jumping down to join him. Settling her with one arm he pulled her along to keep moving. “Keyblades,” he answered her question. ”They’re powered by the heart so we’re like beacons to them.”

“And that’s why you need to leave,” Leon barked, pointing the way forward before taking a rear guard position of the group. “There’s some people who’ve been looking for you, trying to put an end to the heartless problem. We get you and them together and you find a solution.”

Ventus had no idea where Leon’s optimism came from for thinking it would be that easy. The group kept running down into the central plaza of District Three, a place dominated by technicholor neon lights. And more heartless. “They just don’t stop!” Yuffie complained, out of breath.

“Where’s Aerith?!”

“I don’t–!”

“We’re not afraid of you!” another voice interrupted, loud and garbled. “Let’s take ‘em down, Goof– WACK!” Suddenly from an overlooking balcony, two figures plummeted down into the horde of heartless. One, with the appearance of a white duck, riding the other who looked vaguely like a dog-man who led with his shield as he fell, flattening a soldier heartless with their landing. “Wah-ha-ha-ha-” the duck laughed victoriously as he saw the cloud of what used to be a heartless. “Ohhh,” he moaned as he looked around himself to see a lot more of them. But also something else. Beyond the ring of heartless he saw exactly what he was looking for in the hand of a girl with vibrant red hair. “The key!”

“The key!” his companion shouted at the same time, pointing at the key in the blond boy’s hand. “Uh... Huh?” he muttered, looking between them. “Two keys?”

Ventus couldn’t believe his eyes. Familiar faces! “Donald? Goofy?”