The End of All Hope
Who: EVERYONE EVER.
What: THE Final Battle, the Ultimate Endgame.
Where: ... you'll see.
When: Following the Assault of the Dreadnought and Castle Ascent threads.
At last, Sora and his companions reached the Altar of Naught. Many of the Refugees had stayed behind in the lower parts of the castle, fighting back Heartless and imploring Sora to go on ahead.
In the end, it was much as the Prophecy had predicted, despite everything else that had occured. On one side stood Sora, Riku, and Kairi, along with Donald, Goofy, and Mickey
On the other, Xemnas.
He stood, still in his black coat, staring up at the great heart of Kingdom Hearts - and here, the first difference from the Prophecy, for the great heart is not shattered, but quite whole, so brilliant as to be almost more a sun than a moon
Slowly, he turned to face them. "Greetings, warriors of the Realm of Light. It ends here and now."
The Keyblade had never been dismissed ever since Sora entered the castle, having done nothing but fight tirelessly all the way to the top. There was no time to be weary, and the feeling never even crossed his consciousness: this was the end, and Sora intended to be the one to END it.
So he crouched down low, not saying a word, not yet, Keyblade poised to tear Xemnas down.
Xemnas, however, simply stood there, not making a move. In fact, he was smiling. "What, no words of defiance? No first strike to take me down? Simply that look of determination... ahh."
"You truly believe you can win, don't you," he said.
"I don't need to tell you I'll beat you to actually do it," Sora retorted. There was a definite sneer in the tone of his voice.
"True enough," said Xemnas. "But there's just one problem."
"What?" Sora was quickly losing patience for talking, seconds from leaping into action.
"You are already dreaming."
And then the world began to end.
The reality before Sora's eyes shattered like so much glass, fragmenting before his very eyes as he was plunged not into darkness, but into light. He seemed to be tumbling head over heels, plunging upwards through blinding white light only
Only not at all. He was standing stock still on his own two feet, beside Riku and Kairi. He could see Donald, Goofy, and Mickey nearby as well.
But something was horribly, terribly wrong.
The light of Kingdom Hearts shone over the city, the same city which they had dreamed of, the White City, the City that Always Is. No moon now, but a sun, brilliant and burning, its light changing all it touched. The city streets were filled with people, thousands, millions, billions, perhaps trillions of them.
And everything was silent.
Each person was dressed in simple white robes, similar in cut to the Organization's uniforms, but with no zippers or pulls, the hoods down. Each person's face was lifted to heaven, each person's eyes closed as if in sleep. Each one had a silvery line connecting their hearts to a floating orb far above them in the sky - indeed, the sky was filled with orbs, glittering in the light of the newborn sun.
Each orb contained a dream.
Some dreamed of simple things, of all the ice cream in the world, or dinosaurs, or dragons. Some dreamed of their families, of lost loves, of triumph and despair. Some simply dreamed that their lives were going on as they had always gone, completely unaware of what had happened.
Each dream was poised to become real, to be cut loose and let out into the universe, but for some reason it had not happened yet. For some reason, the City lay poised on the edge of true existence.
As if waiting for something.
Refugees were there, trapped by their own visions, dreaming darkly of other lives. There was Ryuu, dreaming of Belagael, of Aaron; Ryune dreamed of a beautiful library filled with music; Ray dreamed of the Dreaming itself, perfect and whole; as did Emmy, of a Dreaming which was alive; Rakath dreamed simply of some very lovely women in a hot spring and some rather amusing anime romantic comedy antics.
Others, too, dreamed. Belle dreamed of living happily with her father... and of a library, vast and perfect; Aladdin dreamed of Jasmine, of living a life of both adventure and ease; Ariel dreamed of travels to far-off lands where she could meet many different people. All dreamed, the families of Refugees, and, strangest of all, there was a group of twelve in the main square, the great Spiral Courtyard Song had found in her dream. There was Ienzo, dreaming of an endless library; there was Braig, dreaming of his fair Miranda; there was Even, dreaming merely of being left alone.
Eric Levine, on the other hand, dreamed that he was at the helm of an airship, heading towards an ivory tower which scraped the dome of the sky, the wind in his hair as he flew...
But not everyone was sleeping. In addition to Sora, a few others had awakened.
Across the city, they stirred. First was Brandon, his eyes fluttering open as his clothes changed from white robes to his usual outfit. Next came Aya, followed by Donald.
And last of all was a girl named Robin, who stood just outside the main ring of those who had once been members of Organization XIII.
Far above, there came a terrible, heart-wrenching cry.
"Why?! Why do you not accept?! Why do you reject what I have created? So many of you, you still fight! You know not... you know not what you do!
Why do you still insist on fighting? Insist on keeping to your close-minded, broken reality? Why do you insist... why...
It burns, it burns! This heart, this heart burns, with RAGE. With HATE, I burn! WHY DO YOU NOT ACCEPT?! this is not even your story, this should have been myself, me and the Keybearer, not you, not you, this is MY story, why do you reject it, why? Rage, such rage, such rage, it BURNS.
You don't understand, you can't understand. This world, this world I am giving you, TRYING to give you, this would be, is the World of Light. Such beauty, such beauty that has not been seen since the Breaking of the World and you would reject it?!
... and my heart burns, and he calls. The First Darkness calls to me and I must answer, for I am ever the Vessel and the Slave, I am, I am, I must hear him. I am... I am...
It burns.
...
and what I've seen, the visions I know, and you would deny me this? And I cry not for myself, for you and for the wonder you will never know.
...
Then fine. FINE!
If you will not accept my reality
Then you will have no reality at all!"
The sky darkened, suddenly, the light of Kingdom Hearts wavering. In the largest sphere of all was Xemnas, in a coat striped black and white. He stood upside down on its ceiling, spirals emerging from his feet and coiling out across the sky.
"If you will not give me paradise... Heart of mine! Let us END it! Let us give them not Paradise, since they will not take that, but OBLIVION! And not even the shadows, but nothing itself! No longer... no longer will the stars cry such songs between the void, no longer will heroes ride to save the world from Darkness, no longer. No. No longer. No, there will be NOTHING! There will be SILENCE and BLACKNESS for ALL ETERNITY! COME HEART OF MINE! LET US END IT!"
As he spoke, Darkness began to emerge on the edges of the vast city, as nightmares began to take on solid form, to tear the city apart at the seams...
[[OOC NOTES TIEM HOMG.
Ok. With the exception of Sora, Donald, Brandon, Aya, and Robin (Songbird), everyone is trapped in a dream of their own creation, unaware of the outside world. What WOULD have happened is that the Dreaming would have been created and our dreams would have become real, but obviously Xemnas has gone nuts and is sabotaging that. And yes, that means that the past two battles were All Just a Dream.
However, people can be easily awakened by others who are already awake, simply with a touch. Some may be harder to wake than others, it's up to you really. And others still may wake up on their own. Upon awakening, your clothes turn back to whatever you were wearing in your dream (could be awkward for some of you); furthermore, fragments of the dream manifest in the area around you. So for instance, when Ryune wakes up, there will be a shower of books and perhaps even some bookshelves appearing around her.
Now then, what's going on down below... Xemnas is trying to end reality as we know it. This is manifest as a form of Darkness incarnate, much like the Heartless. The difference is that this Darkness takes on the shape of nightmares, subconscious fears and other terrors. Thus, it can look like anything you're capable of dreaming of, from Rakath's Heartless Snorlax, to a giant evil elementary school with legs, to a squad of velociraptors, to whatever you can imagine. Over the top is key here. The only similarity between all the Nightmares is that all will be black with yellow eyes (if they have eyes), much like the Heartless, and somewhat chaotic/shifty in appearance.
"How the hell are we supposed to fight against THAT?!" you ask? Well, remember, this is the Dreaming, which means that anything you can imagine is real. Thus, just like Mickey in Fantasmit [shot for cheez] we fight back with the power of Imagination. This is where we pull out all stops and do all the crazy shit we've wanted to do since day one, but couldn't. Want to pilot an EVA into battle against psychotic space turtles? Go for it. There is one, and only one rule: No one but the Keybearers can have keyblades. Try to manifest a Keyblade and nothing will happen. Everything else is fair game, however.
The key here is to keep the tide of Nightmare back long enough for Sora, Riku, and co to reach Xemnas (which he will be able to do, via BUILDLING RIDING/SLICING OF AWESOME) and defeat him. Once Xemnas is defeated, the universe will be saved and I will post the first part of the Epilogue.
Other notes:
-All the Somebodies of Organization XIII ARE INDEED HERE. If you volunteered to NPC an Org member, well, you are here. They will wake up INITIALLY without memories of their time in the Org, but as shit happens it will come back to them in bursts and fragments. How your Somebody reacts to this is up to you. It can be anything from "... huh." To "OH GOD WHAT HAVE I DONE?!"
-By the same token, anyone who was EVER killed by either a Heartless or a Nobody is back. That is, DiZ is here; if you lost a family member to Heartless or Nobodies they're here too.
-You may still continue the Assault of the Dreadnought and Castle Ascent threads; those take place BEFORE this :D Esp. since we lurve death star trench run action.
I hope that all made sense. If you have questions, for the love of god contact either Ryuu, Ryune, or Chii. Ryuu probably first.
My email is ryuutenshi[at]gmail[dot]com, my AIM is Book of Mirage. ]]
What: THE Final Battle, the Ultimate Endgame.
Where: ... you'll see.
When: Following the Assault of the Dreadnought and Castle Ascent threads.
At last, Sora and his companions reached the Altar of Naught. Many of the Refugees had stayed behind in the lower parts of the castle, fighting back Heartless and imploring Sora to go on ahead.
In the end, it was much as the Prophecy had predicted, despite everything else that had occured. On one side stood Sora, Riku, and Kairi, along with Donald, Goofy, and Mickey
On the other, Xemnas.
He stood, still in his black coat, staring up at the great heart of Kingdom Hearts - and here, the first difference from the Prophecy, for the great heart is not shattered, but quite whole, so brilliant as to be almost more a sun than a moon
Slowly, he turned to face them. "Greetings, warriors of the Realm of Light. It ends here and now."
The Keyblade had never been dismissed ever since Sora entered the castle, having done nothing but fight tirelessly all the way to the top. There was no time to be weary, and the feeling never even crossed his consciousness: this was the end, and Sora intended to be the one to END it.
So he crouched down low, not saying a word, not yet, Keyblade poised to tear Xemnas down.
Xemnas, however, simply stood there, not making a move. In fact, he was smiling. "What, no words of defiance? No first strike to take me down? Simply that look of determination... ahh."
"You truly believe you can win, don't you," he said.
"I don't need to tell you I'll beat you to actually do it," Sora retorted. There was a definite sneer in the tone of his voice.
"True enough," said Xemnas. "But there's just one problem."
"What?" Sora was quickly losing patience for talking, seconds from leaping into action.
"You are already dreaming."
And then the world began to end.
The reality before Sora's eyes shattered like so much glass, fragmenting before his very eyes as he was plunged not into darkness, but into light. He seemed to be tumbling head over heels, plunging upwards through blinding white light only
Only not at all. He was standing stock still on his own two feet, beside Riku and Kairi. He could see Donald, Goofy, and Mickey nearby as well.
But something was horribly, terribly wrong.
The light of Kingdom Hearts shone over the city, the same city which they had dreamed of, the White City, the City that Always Is. No moon now, but a sun, brilliant and burning, its light changing all it touched. The city streets were filled with people, thousands, millions, billions, perhaps trillions of them.
And everything was silent.
Each person was dressed in simple white robes, similar in cut to the Organization's uniforms, but with no zippers or pulls, the hoods down. Each person's face was lifted to heaven, each person's eyes closed as if in sleep. Each one had a silvery line connecting their hearts to a floating orb far above them in the sky - indeed, the sky was filled with orbs, glittering in the light of the newborn sun.
Each orb contained a dream.
Some dreamed of simple things, of all the ice cream in the world, or dinosaurs, or dragons. Some dreamed of their families, of lost loves, of triumph and despair. Some simply dreamed that their lives were going on as they had always gone, completely unaware of what had happened.
Each dream was poised to become real, to be cut loose and let out into the universe, but for some reason it had not happened yet. For some reason, the City lay poised on the edge of true existence.
As if waiting for something.
Refugees were there, trapped by their own visions, dreaming darkly of other lives. There was Ryuu, dreaming of Belagael, of Aaron; Ryune dreamed of a beautiful library filled with music; Ray dreamed of the Dreaming itself, perfect and whole; as did Emmy, of a Dreaming which was alive; Rakath dreamed simply of some very lovely women in a hot spring and some rather amusing anime romantic comedy antics.
Others, too, dreamed. Belle dreamed of living happily with her father... and of a library, vast and perfect; Aladdin dreamed of Jasmine, of living a life of both adventure and ease; Ariel dreamed of travels to far-off lands where she could meet many different people. All dreamed, the families of Refugees, and, strangest of all, there was a group of twelve in the main square, the great Spiral Courtyard Song had found in her dream. There was Ienzo, dreaming of an endless library; there was Braig, dreaming of his fair Miranda; there was Even, dreaming merely of being left alone.
Eric Levine, on the other hand, dreamed that he was at the helm of an airship, heading towards an ivory tower which scraped the dome of the sky, the wind in his hair as he flew...
But not everyone was sleeping. In addition to Sora, a few others had awakened.
Across the city, they stirred. First was Brandon, his eyes fluttering open as his clothes changed from white robes to his usual outfit. Next came Aya, followed by Donald.
And last of all was a girl named Robin, who stood just outside the main ring of those who had once been members of Organization XIII.
Far above, there came a terrible, heart-wrenching cry.
"Why?! Why do you not accept?! Why do you reject what I have created? So many of you, you still fight! You know not... you know not what you do!
Why do you still insist on fighting? Insist on keeping to your close-minded, broken reality? Why do you insist... why...
It burns, it burns! This heart, this heart burns, with RAGE. With HATE, I burn! WHY DO YOU NOT ACCEPT?! this is not even your story, this should have been myself, me and the Keybearer, not you, not you, this is MY story, why do you reject it, why? Rage, such rage, such rage, it BURNS.
You don't understand, you can't understand. This world, this world I am giving you, TRYING to give you, this would be, is the World of Light. Such beauty, such beauty that has not been seen since the Breaking of the World and you would reject it?!
... and my heart burns, and he calls. The First Darkness calls to me and I must answer, for I am ever the Vessel and the Slave, I am, I am, I must hear him. I am... I am...
It burns.
...
and what I've seen, the visions I know, and you would deny me this? And I cry not for myself, for you and for the wonder you will never know.
...
Then fine. FINE!
If you will not accept my reality
Then you will have no reality at all!"
The sky darkened, suddenly, the light of Kingdom Hearts wavering. In the largest sphere of all was Xemnas, in a coat striped black and white. He stood upside down on its ceiling, spirals emerging from his feet and coiling out across the sky.
"If you will not give me paradise... Heart of mine! Let us END it! Let us give them not Paradise, since they will not take that, but OBLIVION! And not even the shadows, but nothing itself! No longer... no longer will the stars cry such songs between the void, no longer will heroes ride to save the world from Darkness, no longer. No. No longer. No, there will be NOTHING! There will be SILENCE and BLACKNESS for ALL ETERNITY! COME HEART OF MINE! LET US END IT!"
As he spoke, Darkness began to emerge on the edges of the vast city, as nightmares began to take on solid form, to tear the city apart at the seams...
[[OOC NOTES TIEM HOMG.
Ok. With the exception of Sora, Donald, Brandon, Aya, and Robin (Songbird), everyone is trapped in a dream of their own creation, unaware of the outside world. What WOULD have happened is that the Dreaming would have been created and our dreams would have become real, but obviously Xemnas has gone nuts and is sabotaging that. And yes, that means that the past two battles were All Just a Dream.
However, people can be easily awakened by others who are already awake, simply with a touch. Some may be harder to wake than others, it's up to you really. And others still may wake up on their own. Upon awakening, your clothes turn back to whatever you were wearing in your dream (could be awkward for some of you); furthermore, fragments of the dream manifest in the area around you. So for instance, when Ryune wakes up, there will be a shower of books and perhaps even some bookshelves appearing around her.
Now then, what's going on down below... Xemnas is trying to end reality as we know it. This is manifest as a form of Darkness incarnate, much like the Heartless. The difference is that this Darkness takes on the shape of nightmares, subconscious fears and other terrors. Thus, it can look like anything you're capable of dreaming of, from Rakath's Heartless Snorlax, to a giant evil elementary school with legs, to a squad of velociraptors, to whatever you can imagine. Over the top is key here. The only similarity between all the Nightmares is that all will be black with yellow eyes (if they have eyes), much like the Heartless, and somewhat chaotic/shifty in appearance.
"How the hell are we supposed to fight against THAT?!" you ask? Well, remember, this is the Dreaming, which means that anything you can imagine is real. Thus, just like Mickey in Fantasmit [shot for cheez] we fight back with the power of Imagination. This is where we pull out all stops and do all the crazy shit we've wanted to do since day one, but couldn't. Want to pilot an EVA into battle against psychotic space turtles? Go for it. There is one, and only one rule: No one but the Keybearers can have keyblades. Try to manifest a Keyblade and nothing will happen. Everything else is fair game, however.
The key here is to keep the tide of Nightmare back long enough for Sora, Riku, and co to reach Xemnas (which he will be able to do, via BUILDLING RIDING/SLICING OF AWESOME) and defeat him. Once Xemnas is defeated, the universe will be saved and I will post the first part of the Epilogue.
Other notes:
-All the Somebodies of Organization XIII ARE INDEED HERE. If you volunteered to NPC an Org member, well, you are here. They will wake up INITIALLY without memories of their time in the Org, but as shit happens it will come back to them in bursts and fragments. How your Somebody reacts to this is up to you. It can be anything from "... huh." To "OH GOD WHAT HAVE I DONE?!"
-By the same token, anyone who was EVER killed by either a Heartless or a Nobody is back. That is, DiZ is here; if you lost a family member to Heartless or Nobodies they're here too.
-You may still continue the Assault of the Dreadnought and Castle Ascent threads; those take place BEFORE this :D Esp. since we lurve death star trench run action.
I hope that all made sense. If you have questions, for the love of god contact either Ryuu, Ryune, or Chii. Ryuu probably first.
My email is ryuutenshi[at]gmail[dot]com, my AIM is Book of Mirage. ]]