Plot?

[thirteenth_brat]

Who: Sora, Riku, Roxas, Donald (NPC), Goofy (NPC)
What: Discovering something up at the castle
Where: Alexandria
When: Saturday, April 10, rather late at night...
Status: Ongoing



Roxas wasn't a hundred percent sure that this was a good idea, but it didn't look like they had much choice. The only place they hadn't really looked was in the castle. Well, sort of. There were some areas to the castle that the general public could access, but their answers hadn't been there and requesting access to the other areas had gotten them swiftly ejected from the building. So now they were sneaking into the place in the dead of night, the Keyblade easily opening the way for them.

The dungeon seemed like the best place to look for friends who had disappeared against their will and so the heroes were headed there. It seemed a bit odd, though, that the place should seem so dead. Where were the guards?

Roxas looked around as they slipped through the darkened halls toward the lower levels, all to aware that something was just not right, "I have a bad feeling about this..."

Comments

@_@ Long tag is long...

[thirteenth_brat]

Naturally, Roxas didn't like this development either. The reminder of his origins stung and the fact that these foes were harder to deal with than the Heartless complicated matters. He recovered quickly enough from the surprise, though, turning his attention to another group of Nobodies and tearing into them with both Keyblades. Dusks and Creepers may have been some of the weaker Nobodies, but underestimating them was never a good idea. Sora had drawn too much attention to himself by opening with a high level spell and a good portion of the swarm was focusing on him.

Of course, they were perfectly willing to split their attention when Donald starting tossing around some hefty spells as well. Roxas grumbled under his breath and debated on whether or not he ought to try for some defensive magic. Aeroga might be a help at least, since it would knock any enemy within its reach silly, allowing a chance to strike back. It seemed like the best option...

... Or would have, if something didn't interrupt him. Something nailed him across the shoulders, causing him to stagger and flub the spell. When he turned to confront the attacker, there was was nothing save a Dusk that was in no way close enough to have struck him and then gotten out of his reach by the time he'd turned. He gave the unfortunate Nobody a strike raid anyway, eliminating the possibility of it getting a chance to strike him later and tried again to cast a spell, only to be struck again, this time from the left. Lashing out in that direction brought him to almost clock Goofy, who seemed also to have been struck by something unseen, if the fact that he was holding his knee and grumbling was any indication. But Roxas had been aiming high when he'd swung and hadn't contacted anything. Neither of the two had a chance to think on it as some more Nobodies took advantage of the distraction and mobbed them.

------

The unseen watcher-turned-combatant, meanwhile, turned his attention to Sora. Why he'd been ordered to take these fools alive, he didn't know or care, but it would be done if it would help the cause. Although... it was becoming pretty obvious this wasn't going to be easy. Either way, it was time to provide the dork in the big stupid shoes with some costly distractions. If all else failed, there was a nifty little device in this place that would basically cast a wide ranging sleeping spell and he had been provided with an item to keep him from being put to sleep as well. If any of his targets remained awake, he could always make a hostage of one of the others. But that could wait. For the moment, he felt the dork could use a good pratfall and aimed a swipe at Sora's legs.

[rikugasmic.livejournal.com]

The trap should have been obvious, and Riku couldn't exactly say he was shocked when Sora noticed the sealed doors. The swarm of Nobodies, however, wasn't what he had expected. He knew that a small number of the creatures had been found scattered across the worlds since the reappearance of the Heartless, but they had yet to see so many appear at once. The room was filled with the things, and there had to be a reason. He found it unlikely that such a large group would just appear on it's own - not without orders.

He wasn't going to waste time. He attacked carefully, but quickly, trying to keep a careful eye on the movement of the enemy; lesser Nobodies were notoriously slippery, after all, and one wrong move could make him the target of fifty back attacks. There was no reason to waste Potions just because of these guys.

Which was exactly what was happening to Roxas and Goofy, he noticed, finishing off an unfortunate Creeper. He changed course, aiming for the Dusks that were diving for the two. If he could take care of enough of them, his friends would have more then enough time to recover.

He still, however, hadn't noticed the unseen attacker, nor did he have any idea that it was heading for Sora.

[a-total-sap.livejournal.com]

If it had been three, or even two years ago, the resulting chaos that erupted in the dungeon would have startled Sora and left to his hack-and-slash method of fighting. But the boy had long since grown up into a certified fighter - he was certainly no pushover when it came to fighting Nobodies after all - and even as the lightning spell sped down the hallway to slam into a handful of Dusks and a Samurai, Sora was already following it up with half a dozen Firas from a two-handed grip on his keyblade.

Still, even as the blazing magic met their targets, the keyblade master called up a Reflera, and jumped into the mist of the Nobodies, drawing as many of them away from his friends as possible as Roxas and Goofy both took a stumble. Calling his moves graceful would have been very generous, but there was a certain determination and strength in each of the blows he gave.

There!

Sora didn't even have time to react, unsure of where that thought came from but taking it as the warning it was, threw himself backwards and into a roll, slamming into a wall as he did so. He grimaced at the jarring stop - an Aero spell would have helped in that. But he didn't have much time to reflect on it, even as more Dusks headed his way.

While he fought, another part of him was quickly thinking ahead.

Someone shut those doors...someone made sure they led us down here. But where are they now?

[thirteenth_brat]

This was beginning to grate on Roxas's nerves. Many of the Lesser Nobodies were rather good at approaching unseen to deliver surprise attacks, but they could usually be spotted when one turned to see what the hell had hit them... if they survived it. But in this case, there were only Dusks and Creepers and whatever was hitting the heroes remained unseen when one turned to see where it had come from. Roxas didn't know of any Nobodies that could make themselves invisible. There were Heartless capable of such a thing, but there hadn't been any Heartless on this world.

Grumbling in frustration, Roxas roasted a small group of Dusks with Firaga before briefly locking blades with a Samurai. The Samurai... most of the Lesser Nobodies had obeyed the Higher Nobodies of the same kind; Dragoons had obeyed Xaldin, Gamblers followed Luxord, etc. The Samurai? Well... sort of. They'd seemed obedient enough until he left the Organization. Then any that he encountered had treated him like another enemy. Now, it was unlikely that he'd meet any that knew him, since any who had lost their Hearts had been restored after the battle in the Dreaming. But letting one's mind wander when he had bigger fish to fry was foolish. The Samurai was obviously not going to yield and Roxas didn't have time to play. He gave the Samurai a Thundara for its trouble and cut down a pair of Creepers attempting to take advantage of the distraction before checking up on his friends.

He saw Sora stumble and hit the wall and saw the Dusks rushing in. Had their unseen 'company' been responsible for the trip? It seemed likely. Either way, Roxas made up his mind to get his butt over there to help.

----

The watcher backed off a bit. That boy was a bit sharper than he looked. It seemed the device would have to be used anyway. The watcher retreated back up the hall a short way, unseen by even his allies. The Nobodies wouldn't be immune to the sleeping spell, but he could always call in more help or wake a few of the bizarre creature up once the intruders had been put to sleep. All it took was a flip of a switch and a lovely little bit of magical technology hidden within the walls cast a blanket sleeping spell of the area. Anyone who was not immune or holding something that would make them immune would be asleep in short order, though the watcher had been warned of the possibility that at least one of his foes might not be affected for some reason or another. It wasn't a problem really. He doubted that any of these goody goodies would allowed anything bad to happen to their sleep afflicted comrades, so he waited and watched for the first of them to hit the floor.