maskormenace | 7th dawn → video

7th dawn → video

[Riku's face, when he appears on the network today, is a little exasperated, and a little apologetic. Behind him, something tiny and black moves, and he picks his hair up and away from it, pulling it over his shoulder for lack of anything else to do with it. A sharp-eyed observer will note that the black thing is a wing. It's small, but it's clearly a pointy, leathery bat wing. Presumably, there's a matching one.]

So... I guess I was ported out.

[His very first port-out after a year and a half. What a strange experience. Riku pauses. He's pretty sure he... owes some people an apology.]

Uh -- sorry. From what I can tell it hasn't been very long, though...? A day or so tops, I think. I saw Kagami made a post, so I thought I should clear things up.

[He's surprised you all panicked, honestly...]

I guess I should thank you all for worrying, though.

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[Riku turns to let her look at them, recounting his tale as he moves.]

Okay, well... they're basically worlds that have been swallowed by the darkness, but they're still sleeping, even after the darkness was banished. We were tasked with waking them up. There are these things called Dream Eaters there -- mostly they look like animals. They're kind of like Heartless, I guess, but not all of them are hostile. Sora and I teamed up with them.

Anyway, I turned out to be one, too. I'm the only one who's a person, though, as far as I'm aware.

[She very carefully touches over the wings, trying to memorize how they look for future reference, and looks up when he pauses.]

So you eat dreams now?

[How...does that work.]

Not literally. According to my file now that it's updated, I can enter dreams and banish nightmares.

[She takes a moment here to beam up at him. She's so, so proud of him for having come so far from the boy he was before. He conquered the Darkness inside him, and now he's capable of conquering other people's darknesses. Naminé gives him another tight hug.]

Keyblade Masters sure are busy.

[Because she knows he passed the test.]

[Ah, she caught him...]

Even non-Keyblade Masters are. To be fair, Sora's gonna be busy again. I'm supposed to help train Kairi and Lea.

Kairi's finally taking her inheritance...good for her. [She is proud of her Somebody. Half of her wishes she could watch her grow into a Keyblade wielder.]

Is Sora on another journey? And who is Lea?

Sora's... okay, well -- Master Yen Sid says we need to find the other Guardians of Light. What happened in the dream world is... we found out about the actual purpose of the Organization, and what Xehanort was planning. We need to gather seven Lights to go up against his thirteen Darknesses, and -- as it is, we don't have all of them. Sora needs to find the others. Lea... is Axel, actually. His Somebody. He came to Yen Sid's when we were in the dream to learn how to wield the Keyblade.

[It takes a bit for her to absorb all that, staring off down the hallway. Sora and Riku's accounts, her work with Ven's memories...subtle words that Xemnas uttered. They're all memory chain links that need reforging, and right now her the one trying to figure out how all the pieces fit together one by one and to other, larger lengths of chain.]

So it really is going to turn into a full out war. Xehanort and his army against you and Sora and the others. Even Kairi...

[She's sure Kairi refused to let anyone tell her she couldn't help. But at the same time...were they so desperately outnumbered and overpowered that they had to enlist and endanger a Princess of Light? Seven to thirteen...a shudder goes down Naminé's spine.]

Yeah. We can't... I didn't want to put Kairi in danger. But she's right -- we don't have enough firepower as it is. There are next to no Keyblade wielders left. So we have to take what we can get. And unfortunately, that means putting Kairi into that situation.

[He hates it. He hates that any of them are stuck in this. But what else can they do?]

Xehanort wants us to panic, I think.

He's good at playing mind games. But all of you have weathered so much of it already. I believe in everyone. And I'll protect Kairi, I promise. I won't let Xehanort have her light.

Good. I'll count on you, all right?

[She gives him a tiny smile.]

I'll do what I can.

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7th dawn → video

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