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017 [Voice]

[It's rather late at night when the journal clicks on. Luke had waited until he had calmed down from the nightmare he had to make the post, and good thing, too. Otherwise it'd catch the tremor he surely had in his voice.

Instead, he merely sounds subdued, and maybe a little hesitant.]

Does anyone have any good stories to tell?

Or... any advice on how to get back to sleep? [Nothing he usually does is working right now.]

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Ready as I'll ever be.

[There's a shifting sound - Luke settles in, arms wrapped around his pillow and chin resting on top of it as he looks at the journal.]

Okay...once upon a time, there was a boy. He was a normal boy who lived a quiet life on an island with his family and his friends. What the boy didn't know though was that he was destined for great things. One night a voice called out to him for help, a voice that needed to be rescued. So the boy agreed to let the soul rest in him and protect him from then on.

A year or so passed and still the boy noticed nothing unusual about himself. The other heart was still resting inside him. Unknown to him though across the galaxy there was another kingdom. A kingdom of light. The garden kingdom was attacked by the power of darkness one day and its residents had to be split up. Most importantly, they had to protect their princess. And so they sent her out across the worlds, sailing among the stars before she landed on that little island and that same boy and his best friend found her there. The boys were skeptical, but they knew they couldn't leave her. And from that day on, the boy agreed to protect her as well.

Years passed as the boy, his best friend, and the mysterious girl grew older and closer. The three of them were inseparable. The older of the boys, the best friend, he was starting to grow bored of their island though and convinced the other two to build a raft and seek other worlds. His curiosity was driven by the mysterious appearance of the girl, and he was determined to find other things.

On the night before they were to set sail though, the same darkness that attacked the girl's kingdom came and attacked their island. The protector boy went to find his friends, only to realize he was too late. His best friend was possessed with the darkness, the princess had lost her heart and soon after his home was destroyed by the darkness. The boy's destiny finally revealed itself, and a weapon of light appeared before him. He was to travel across the galaxy to other worlds, fighting to save them from the darkness. He was determined to be the hero and find his friends, saving them and bringing them all home.

He arrived first in a town where he met a few allies who told him about the weapon. The weapon he possessed was something that drove the darkness to seek him out and stop at nothing to eliminate him. Also in that town he met his two new travel companions. The companions traveled with the boy to all sorts of worlds where they fought to eliminate the darkness, seal the worlds to protect them and saved lives.

But even though they were doing good for the worlds, the boy still only cared about finding his friends and bringing them back to him. They had traveled for a long time, and unknown to the boy, his best friend was going through his own journey down the path of darkness. He too was seeking to find the princess but for a different reason. See, there was this place, kind of like the best of the best. This place was the source of all hearts and all light, and there was a group of bad guys who wanted to unlock this place and take the power and knowledge for themselves.

The boy's best friend? He was now part of that group. An evil witch had taken him under her wing, feeding him lies and telling him things like the boy had been abandoned by his friends and that if he worked for her, he could help save the princess and recover her. Under her power, the other boy found the princess but her heart was still missing.

Meanwhile the boy and his new companions arrived to the evil witch's headquarters. He was prepared to go in and fight, but soon his best friend came from the shadows. The two of them fought and the boy's weapon of light was taken from him. His friend then broke the news to him; the weapon was actually supposed to be his. His companions abandoned him to follow the key--I mean weapon and they disappeared with the boy's best friend, leaving the hero alone and useless.

But he wasn't going to give up. He called upon his courage and strength and entered the dark land anyway. He was determined to find his best friend, reclaim his weapon, and fight. He fought again, this time winning and reclaiming his rightful place. His best friend? He ran away...but unknown to the hero, the boy found himself falling even further to the darkness.

With his friends and his weapon back in his posession, the hero raced in and fought the evil witch head on. She turned into a dragon and she tried to stomp him out and light him on fire. But in the end, she proved to be no match for him. Unfortuantely, he then realized that the witch wasn't his biggest enemy. He met with his best friend for another time, and the worst of the worst happened.

His best friend had his own weapon now, one that unlocked hearts. He wasn't acting like himself either, but rather crazed. As it turned out? The greater enemy, a man driven by the darkness to complete the source of all hearts had taken possession of the other boy's body. So he lead the hero and his companions on, revealing to them the body of the princess. He explains that she is the last princess that they needed to unlock the door that was the source of all hearts. However, she was still missing her heart...but it's because her heart has been inside the hero this whole time. Throughout his whole mission, he had been carrying her heart with him. Without thinking and driven by the desire to stop the darkness, he took the weapon of the dark and stabbed himself to unlock his own heart. The princess's heart was freed, but the boy's was lost. He had become a creature of the dark, something without a heart. With her heart back in her body, the princess had to find the hero and bring him back. It was difficult, seeing how there were several monsters on that world, but the princess just knew which one he was. With the power of her love for the boy, she used her own strength to pull him back to the light.

They raced deeper into the bowels of the world to find the man and stop him from completing his plan. A long battle ensued, and the hero nearly lost, but he managed to defeat him for the final time. However, the man believed that the ultimate source of hearts was driven by the power of darkness. But the hero knew better. The hero knew now that it was light. The door opened and the light flooded in, destroying the man once and for all. His best friend's body was returned to his own control, and there he met a king, a king that had sent the hero his companions. Together, the three of them worked to close the door to the darkness. But closing it meant that the boy's best friend and the king had to be locked inside. The hero tried to save them from that fate.

But it was too late. The boy's friend understood his destiny and smiled at the hero, making him promise to take care of the princess and return home safely. As the door closes and locks them in, he turns to the princess. But the worlds had shifted and they were starting to reconstruct themselves. The princess was pulled away, being sent back to their islands. The hero promised that he would bring them all together someday, and in a flash of light, she too was gone.

It was just the boy and his companions again, just as it had been the first time. But now he knew...he knew what he had to do and he resolved to find the other boy and the king to bring them all home.

...it's not a very happy story, but there is a second part. The second part's happier at the end.

[As Roxas speaks, it slowly beings to dawn on him just what this story is about. Traveling to different worlds, the importance of hearts, that slip of the "key"...

This is the story Xion's from, isn't it? And Roxas, and Riku, and Kairi... and other people he knew. He listens carefully, feeling quite a lot of sympathy towards the end. The boy must've been Sora...]

... What's the second part?

Okay in this second part...it's still about the hero, but there's a second hero. These two heroes? They didn't know that they were co-existing. I'll tell you about the second hero first before I continue with the first hero's story. Trust me, it's important.

So this second hero...when he was born, he didn't know anything. He didn't know his name, he didn't know where he came from and he didn't know hiw purpose. He was lost until a man found him. The man gave him a name and took him away to a dark kingdom back to his castle to have the hero join his group of knights. There were twelve other knights besides the hero himself, eleven men and one woman. The boy didn't know how to behave, how to speak, barely how to think. So he was assigned a mentor. This mentor was in charge of showing him the ropes, assisting him on missions and making sure he didn't get himself killed...for you see, the leader of the knights? He had bigger plans for the hero.

Over the course of the new few weeks, the mentor and the youngest knight worked together, getting the boy acquainted with the other knights and the missions they had to accomplish around the other kingdoms. Things were just starting to settle in...when she came.

She was brought to the dark kingdom shortly after the youngest knight. She was about his age, and she too wasn't sure what to do. But she was special, just like the young hero. They could both wield the most powerful weapon across the kingdoms and that helped them form a special bond. Meanwhile the mentor was sent away with a group of others for months to a lesser kingdom the knights owned. While the mentor was away, the two of them became close friends, best friends even. The female knight slowly started revealing more of herself to him, and even lowered her hood so he could see her face.

But soon things started to change. One day, the young hero fell into a coma and was out for a few weeks. The knights that were sent to the other castle were all killed, except for the mentor. When the mentor returned, the hero awoke and introduced him to the female knight. The three of them...they became really good friends. The best, even. They would tell each other stories and the mentor would tell them all about the world while they shared ice cream.

But again, things changed. The young female knight soon discovered a secret about herself; she wasn't who she thought she was. So she ran away. She ran away to try and find her true identity, and she threw away her friendship with the other two knights. She tried and tried, but the mentor kept bringing her back until she was too strong and completely took charge.

As for the young hero? He too left the ranks to find out about himself, for he discovered his own secret. He and the female knight? They were tied together in ways he couldn't imagine. On her travels when he left, he found his former friend, the female knight. But she had changed. She wasn't how he remembered him, and she attacked him. The hero didn't want to fight her, but he knew he had to or things would get worse. He fought...and he defeated her. She was badly injured, and she wouldn't let him help. Instead she revealed the truth to him, about what their superior was up to and how he had to stop everything. And she died in his arms...the hero merged with her and in doing so? He became even stronger and he became the first to be able to wield two of the most powerful weapons in the kingdoms across the galaxy.

He wasn't going to go back though. He couldn't return to the knights. He had to go out on his own, find out his true identity and find the person he wished to seek. He tried to leave though, but he faced a boy, a boy he didn't know but someone who knew him. The boy was under strict orders to defeat and capture the hero. The hero almost defeated him, too, but the messenger boy used the power of darkness to knock him out. He brought him to his superior and as according to their plans, they wiped the hero's memories and placed him into hiding until they could finish their own mission.

That hero? Remember how I said he was connected to the first hero? Well, they were kind of the same person. Sort of. Two halves of the same whole. But neither one of them knew it at the time. Originally the dark kingdom of knights that the second hero belonged to were using him because of his ability to use the powerful weapon. They created the female knight in case he failed. Their ultimate plan was to have her absorb him so that she could become just like the real hero. It didn't work, of course.

Anyway, while the second hero was blissfully unaware anything was unusual about him, the first hero was locked away in a mansion under the watch of the superior who'd kidnapped the other hero and a witch. The witch was working on fixing the hero's memories so he'd awaken from the coma she had placed him under nearly a year earlier. Or something...I never really understood that. Things were quiet for a while for the second hero until weird things started happening to him. Monsters were attacking him, voices were echoing in his head, people were appearing before him and this strange object kept coming to his aid when he needed to fight. It all lasted a week before he found his way to that mansion. He met the witch there, and she told him the worst news he could ever hear.

"You were never supposed to exist."

He learned that he had to remerge with his true self, the first hero, the original hero. The boy he had been dreaming about for the last year, the boy whose memories kept bleeding into his own, the boy everyone was busy risking their lives for to save him so he could save the worlds. He had to go back. He didn't want to go back, but the witch promised that they'd meet again. Even if they didn't know it was the other, they'd meet again. And with that he sealed his fate, merging back with the original hero.

His summer vacation...was over.

It had been a year since the hero had been awake. He and his companions were being kept in hiding until the witch could finish her work, until they could retrieve the missing half of his heart. When he finally awoke, he was unaware of anything that had happened in the last year. But what he did know was that the worlds pathways had been erased, and he was going to reopen all of them to find his best friend. The last thing he remembered was the other boy and the King locking themselves into the darkness. He had to find him. He had to find him, save him, and return him back to their homeland where the princess was waiting.

He and his two companions set off on another adventure, this time equip with magical clothing to aid them in their fight to save the worlds and find his friend. Along the way though? Well...remember those knights? They weren't too happy that their youngest in rank had taken off. They tracked down the hero all across the worlds, attempting to stop him and defeat him so they could use him. Originally they wanted him because the weapon he possessed was fueling this giant moon.

The moon was a recreation of that door the hero first encountered, the one of the light and dark. The knights created their own that was to be fueled by hearts in hope that once they completed it, they too could be whole. That's what the knights were. They were half-people.

But the hero kept knocking the knights out. Unknown to him, he and his best friend had already eliminated half of the knights anyway. He was doing his best, but he still couldn't find the other boy. What he did find, however, was that the dragon lady he fought before had been revived. He also learned something important. The man they fought a year before? He was a fake, too. The leader of the knights was their enemy now. And so the hero set his sights on him.

Meanwhile, the mentor had a plan. The mentor had switched sides. Well. Not really. Here's the thing. The knights had told the mentor that he had to go get the young knight and return him to their ranks, otherwise they'd kill him themselves. Terrified by that option and kind of mad that his friends both left, the mentor came to the younger knight's hiding spot to try and win him back. It didn't help, though. With his memories of his former life in the knights erased, the boy had no idea who he was. They fought a few times, and eventually his memory was jarred, but by then the mentor chose not to fulfill the mission and fled.

The mentor, though, he was assigned to protect the witch and keep an eye out on the first hero. So what does he do?

The funny thing about knights, Luke? These kind of knights could teleport anywhere, including the original hero's home island where the princess was. He swept in, kidnapped the princess and held her hostage in order to get the hero's attention. The mentor had other intentions, of course, but the princess was kind of awesome. She escapes from the mentor and runs into this town, the same town where the fake hero was hidden and the real hero had been before. She wasn't safe for long though because...okay how...well, another knight came and kidnapped her because the mentor had failed. Again. The mentor wasn't exactly good at his job.

As the hero gets wind that his princess was kidnapped, he fights his way through to the dark kingdom, the kingdom where the knights resided. He and his companions were caught in a tunnel though and they were surrounded by monsters. The mentor stepped in though and--

[There's a small pause. He hates this part.]

...the mentor sacrificed himself to save the hero, to protect his best friend's other half. He knew that the younger knight was reconnected with the hero, and he had to make sure the two of them were safe and able to defeat the superior knight. As the mentor laid dying, he told the hero of a boy. He told the hero he wanted to see the boy, his best friend, one more time...and he opened the passage way into the dark kingdom before he disappeared completely.

Unknown to either of them, the mentor's sacrifice was enough to get to the fake hero who up until then had been asleep inside the true hero. And the fake hero? He was...pretty angry. In fake, he was so angry that he decided it'd be best to put up a fight, determine who the true hero should be. He fought with his original, an intense battle. But in the end the true hero outweighed him....and it didn't matter. The fake realized he was a good choice, and he resumed his sleep.

So you're probably wondering what the heck the hero's best friend's been doing the whole time. Well. To be frank? He was being a coward. A really big coward. Sure he was helping him along the way, kind of stalking him actually, but he was hiding in the form of someone else. And the hero never knew.

When the hero finally reached the dark castle, he met up with a few more knights who stood in his way. With ease he defeated them. He reunites with the princess who swoops in to help him fight, and he learns that she was saved by a familiar face, the man he had previously killed.

But the princess knew better. The princess...has kind of always been the smartest of the three of them. Her heart knew that the man that saved her wasn't an enemy, but a friend. Their best friend. The boy who had let the darkness into his heart. He was atoning for his mistakes.

They all race to the top of the castle, and there they find the superior who was working with the witch. He was a wise man, but at the same time he was foolish. He kept messing with the darkness and basically? He kind of ruined everything. [Nooo he's not bitter at all.] But he did do something good. He ended up destroying the moon, giving the hero a chance to defeat the last of the knights, the superior knight, who was actually the other half of the wise man.

United together once again, the hero and his best friend fought against the last knight, another long grueling battle. They defeated him though...and they were finally able to rest. They returned to their island where their friends, and the princess, were waiting for them.

The second hero? He learned that the witch was right. He was able to see her again...she was the other half of the princess. The pair of them had been born when the hero sacrificed himself to save the princess a year earlier. But they were reunited with their original selves, and they were safe and together.

And with peace in all of the lands once more, they all lived happily ever after.

[Yes he's aware he's missing a bunch of details and the whole story's disjointed but WHATEVER. It was getting long and Roxas' throat was getting tired. Luke should get the basic jist.]

[It was very long, but Luke listened to every word. He could certainly get the basic gist... and the gist of who's who. So that's Xion's story... And Roxas', and Kairi and... everyone. Luke hugs his pillow and looks ahead of him, away from the journal for a moment.]

That's some story...

[Then, he looks back at it with a small, half smile.]

It's yours, isn't it?

[..yeah, he always figured Luke was smart. This just proved that.]

Technically it's Sora's...but yeah. Yeah, you could say that.

It's still pretty amazing how all of you can go to other worlds... I was always stuck on Auldrant. [He stays quiet, thinking about all the roles involved.]

That... soul in the beginning. Did it ever wake up?

I think Sora's been to the most out of any of us, but Xion, Axel and I went to a lot, too. You were probably safer there.

...no. Not exactly, not in a way you'd think.

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