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“You’re… Vanitas?” Riku asked, confused. “I thought you died in the Keyblade Graveyard, back when Xehanort first tried forging the χ–blade?” As he spoke Vanitas’s name, a face flickered into being over Ven’s, but it was still too dark in the candlelight to make out its features.
“I did die. Is something wrong with your ears?” Vanitas snarled. “Aqua and Ventus killed me.”
“But… you’re here?”
“My heart stayed with Ventus. It’s where it belonged, after all,” Vanitas spat.
Riku understood what must have happened. When he had removed Ven’s heart from Sora, it had been brighter than Sora’s, Roxas’s, and Xion’s. The same thing had to have happened that had happened when he tried to remove Naminé from Kairi; Ven’s light had been so bright it had hidden Vanitas’s heart from view, and he had transferred both of them by accident.
While he realized this, Aqua pressed her Keyblade into Vanitas’s neck. “Get out of him,” she ordered, hatred matching Vanitas’s in her eyes.
Vanitas rolled his eyes. “Aqua, don’t be an idiot. It doesn’t work like that.”
“He’s right,” Riku broke in. “If his heart was transferred along with Ven’s–”
“Take it out of him,” Aqua demanded, turning to Riku.
“And do what with it?” Vanitas asked, mocking. “Just let it go and let me die? Then you really will be a murderer, Aqua. You and…” he frowned, looking at Riku. “You’re one of the ‘Rrrr’ ones, right? Not ‘Roxas’, you were talking about him earlier. Riku? That your name?”
“Y-yes?” Riku said. “How do you know my..?”
“She talks in her sleep,” Vanitas said, disinterested, jerking his chin at Aqua.
The look in Aqua’s eyes turned to fury. “Excuse me?” she hissed, but Riku was starting to piece it together.
“You’re only awake… when Ven is asleep,” he said.
“Bingo!” Vanitas crowed. “You really upgraded from Terra, didn’t you?” he said to Aqua. “This one’s much less of a dumbass.”
She pressed her Keyblade into his neck again. “Careful!” he coughed. “This is still your precious Ventus’s body. Hurt me, and…”
She withdrew the Keyblade, still furious. “So Ven… hasn’t been sleepwalking,” she ground out.
“Nope. All me,” Vanitas said. “Should’ve expected this, honestly. Was only a matter of time.”
“What do you want?” Riku asked. “Why steal food?”
“Cause I was hungry, why else?” Vanitas said, glaring at him. “As for what I want… Well, no fucking clue. To be me again, that’s a start.”
“We’re not letting you have Ven’s body,” Aqua started to hiss, but Vanitas shook his head.
“I don’t want Ventus’s body. I want mine. My own. I want to be me.”
“And if we say no?” Aqua said, with an expression Riku would call a smirk if it wasn’t so harsh.
Vanitas tilted his head, and smiled beatifically. “Then you’re stuck with me here, in this body, for the rest of Ventus’s life. Do you really want that, Aqua? To look at him every day, and know that as soon as he falls asleep, there I am?”
Riku was pretty sure he could hear Aqua’s teeth grinding. “Tick-tock, Aqua,” Vanitas taunted. “Which is worse?”
“Why do we have to decide now?” Riku interrupted.
They both looked at him.
“Why do we have to decide now?” he said again. “We should consult the others, see what they think. Especially Ven.”
Aqua shook herself. “That’s… right,” she said, logic breaking through the anger for the first time since Vanitas revealed himself.
Vanitas, for his part, growled. “Fucker.”
Riku shrugged. “What, did you think we could just take you right to a new body if you strong-armed us now?”
Vanitas ignored him. “And how exactly are you planning on getting dear Ventus’s opinion? He’s asleep, moron. As long as I’m here talking to you, he can’t–”
“Actually,” Riku interrupted again, “That’s the easy part.”
“What do you mean?” Aqua said, confused.
Riku leaned over and placed a hand on Vanitas’s head. “Sleep,” he said, casting the eponymous spell.
“Oh, you motherfuuuuuuu….” Vanitas’s head drooped down and a light snoring echoed through the room.
“Why did you do that?” Aqua asked, frowning.
Riku shrugged. “If Vanitas is awake while Ven is asleep, then when Vanitas is asleep…” he said.
Ven’s eyes flashed open. “Huh? Aqua? Riku? Where am I and why am I tied up?”
Aqua looked at Riku, who sniffed, and nodded. She crouched down in front of the chair.
“Ven,” she said. “We have some… unfortunate news.”
The most surreal part of the experience was seeing Yen Sid out of his study. A strong contender was the pink dressing gown he was wearing, but nobody was in the mood to comment on it.
Aqua, Riku, and Ven had gathered the rest of the Tower’s denizens in the common room, and explained the situation. Naturally it didn’t have quite the same personal impact on everyone else, save Yen Sid and Mickey, though they were able to get across how serious this was.
Now, they were deliberating on what to do with him.
“He wants his own body?” Sora asked again, to confirm.
Riku nodded. “That’s what he said. Doesn’t want to be in Ven.”
“I don’t blame him,” Roxas muttered, and Xion nodded.
“I don’t want him in me, either!” Ven said. He had been oddly silent while Riku and Aqua explained the situation.
“We can’t just remove his heart, though!” Kairi protested. “He’s right, it would essentially be murder!”
Lea looked at her. “You do realize how this whole shebang with Xehanort is gonna go down, right?” he asked.
Kairi shook her head. “That’s different. That’s necessary to stop him. This isn’t. There’s no way we can rationalize this as being necessary. Or at least,” she added in an undertone, “I can’t.”
Yen Sid nodded, slowly. “I find myself agreeing with Kairi. The removal of Vanitas’s heart from Ventus, without a body to place it in, would result in Vanitas’s death. I would like to believe that we are not that callous.”
“And what’s the alternative?” Aqua demanded. “Give him a body and let him loose to spread havoc – spread Unversed – throughout the worlds again?”
“Giving him a body doesn’t mean letting him go wherever he wants,” Donald pointed out.
“So we would move him from one prison to another?” Naminé said, quietly.
There was a moment of silence as they considered this.
“Well, we wouldn’t have to have him locked up,” Sora offered. “We could just… keep him?”
Roxas raised an eyebrow. “You wanna try that one again, Sora? He’s not a dog.”
Sora shook his head. “No, that’s not what I meant. He’s a Keybearer, right? Don’t we need as many of those as we can get? We should ask him to work with us!”
There was another round of silence punctuated only by Aqua slowly starting to laugh. “Sora… are you serious?” she said, incredulous. “He’s Xehanort’s apprentice. He’s not going to work with us!”
“Did you ask?” Sora countered.
“That’s preposterous,” Aqua started, but the way Riku looked down gave Sora the answer he needed. “Thought so,” he said, smugly.
“It didn’t really come up,” Riku offered.
“And it wasn’t going to!” Aqua insisted. “Sora, he’s a monster–”
There was a soft clearing of the throat from both Kairi and Naminé. Aqua glared at them. “Fine. He has actively tried to kill both myself and Ven in the past,” she said, voice tight. “Fair?”
Kairi and Naminé glanced at each other, then back to Aqua, and nodded.
“And I have no reason to believe he isn’t going to go right back to doing that if he gets a body again,” Aqua finished. “Xehanort’s still looking for a thirteenth vessel! We’d be practically handing him one on a silver platter!”
“Well, gawrsh, if he was gonna leave to join up with Xehanort, wouldn’t he have done that already?” Goofy asked.
Everyone in the room turned to look at him. “What are you talking about?” Donald asked.
“The way I figure it, Vanitas could’ve left whenever he wanted. We know he managed to avoid Riku at night after that one time, so nothin’ was stoppin’ him from just leavin’ the Tower,” Goofy said. “As long as Ven was asleep, he could do what he wanted with his body. And if there was a way to keep Ven asleep forever…”
“There are,” Kairi said. “There’s at least one spell that I’ve heard of that does that. Snow White was under one for a while, and so was Aurora. They can only be broken by…” she reddened and turned away from Naminé slightly. “…true love’s kiss.”
“Wow, how vague and nonspecific,” Naminé said, sarcastic. “But Goofy’s right. There are ways Vanitas could have escaped and trapped Ven in his own body. But he didn’t. So the question we have to answer is, ‘why not’?”
“Which brings us back to what he said he wanted,” Xion said. “His own body.”
“And back to where we started,” said Aqua. “If we give him his own body there’s no telling what he’ll do. Right, Ven?”
Ven was staring at his hands. “Aqua… I think Sora’s right.”
“What?” said Sora, but he was overpowered by Aqua’s own “What?!”
“I was Xehanort’s apprentice, too, Aqua,” Ven said, quietly. “Vanitas was what Xehanort made him. But now… he has a choice.”
Aqua rolled her eyes. “He’s not going to just change, Ven!”
“Maybe not,” Kairi said, quietly. “But… if he isn’t given the opportunity to change, he never will. All we can do… is give him that chance.”
Lea nodded. “Hey, two years ago Riku and I would have fought to the death if we’d crossed paths. I met Kairi by kidnapping her ‘cause I thought that would make Sora succumb to darkness and bring Roxas back. Do I deserve the place you’ve given me here? Honestly, all things being equal, probably not. But you all took a chance on me. So why me and not this guy? Speaking as someone who has actually successfully committed murder in the past,” he added, offhand.
“I can’t believe this,” Aqua muttered.
“Aqua, like Goofy and Naminé said, if Vanitas wanted to go back to Xehanort, he could have,” Ven said. “I don’t remember much of what Xehanort was like when I was his apprentice, but from what I do… I wouldn’t want to go back, either. And who knows? Maybe he would help us fight him. It’s worth a shot.”
Roxas raised an eyebrow and said nothing. He knew that Ven was holding something back, but it was his business. If Ven didn’t want to go into the “who could Vanitas have been” aspect of his feelings about his other, it wasn’t Roxas’s place to bring it up.
“I’m sorry, Ven, but I don’t agree,” Aqua said. “And all of you sound like you’re going along with it,” she added, glaring at the assembled room.
Riku shrugged. “Aqua, half the people here started on the ‘wrong’ side. I was taken in by Ansem, Lea was one of the founding members of Organization XIII, Roxas and Xion worked for them, Naminé took Sora’s memory apart… We all got second chances. It doesn’t feel right not extending him the same opportunity.”
“And if it doesn’t work out, if he is the monster you think he is… well, we have ten Keybearers to him on his own,” Ven said.
“And us!” Donald grumbled.
“Right, sorry,” Ven apologized, smiling at him. “My point is, we can take him, Aqua. If it comes to that. We have nothing to lose here.”
Aqua pressed her lips together. “I don’t like this, Ven.”
“I know you don’t, Aqua. But… If Vanitas can’t be more than he is…” Ven trailed off.
“…He’s not like Terra,” Aqua said. “Terra would never be like him.”
“That’s not the point,” Ven said, quietly. “Like Lea and Riku said. What makes him so different?” He looked down at his hands, then back up at her. “…Aside from this grudge you’re carrying?”
Aqua stiffened. Her eyes narrowed, and she stood up. “Do what you think is right. I’m done discussing this.” She walked out of the room, and they could hear her boots on the stairs.
Kairi shot to her feet. “I’m going to talk to her. But, for the record, I agree with Sora and Ven.” She left the room.
Yen Sid sighed. “Though I do see Master Aqua’s point, I feel the only respectable course of action is to fulfil Vanitas’s desire. Though, while any helping hand would be welcome, I do not put much hope in the idea that Vanitas shall repay us by joining us. However, as Ventus says, the possibility will not exist at all if we do not take this first step. Thus, I request that Lea return to Radiant Garden, to discuss the possibility of acquiring a new body for our… guest.”
Lea nodded. “Will do. Your Majesty, would you mind popping back home and asking Data-Riku if he’s got anything on Vanitas for Even to work off of?”
Mickey nodded. “We’ll send him through the link to Space Paranoids. He’ll meet ya there.”
“Please and thank you.” Lea stood up and stretched. “Gonna change out of my PJs first, though, if nobody minds,” he quipped. Yen Sid managed to convey the concept of an eye roll without moving his eyes whatsoever.
“Mind if I come with you?” Xion asked, rising as well. “I have some things I need to ask Even. Personal things,” she added at the quizzical look on Lea’s face.
“Don’t see why not,” he said, shrugging. “Meet me outside.”
Sora moved over to sit next to Ven. “How are you feeling about all this?” he asked, concern in his voice.
Ven shrugged. “I’m not, I don’t think? I’m kind of running on autopilot in terms of how I feel. It’s too much to process all at once. I just didn’t expect Aqua to…” he trailed off.
Sora put a hand on his shoulder. “You’re friends. You’ll make things up.”
Ven shook his head. “But, if she’s right…”
“Then you looked for the best in someone and didn’t find it,” Roxas said, sitting down on Ven’s other side. “And like you said, if he does stay an… a bad person, we can handle him.”
Sora nodded. “But, somehow, I don’t think he will!” he said, smiling.
“Why’s that?” Ven asked.
Sora shrugged. “Dunno. Just a feeling I get. This might go better than we think!”
Kairi knocked on the door of Aqua’s room. It was locked, but being alone wasn’t what Aqua needed right now. They were both aware of this.
“Aqua!” she called through the door. “I’m respecting your privacy by knocking but asserting my role as your friend by unlocking the door with my Keyblade and coming in anyway!”
“Go away, Kairi,” came a muffled grumble. Kairi shook her head, tapped the door with her Keyblade, and walked in.
“Were you not listening?” she asked Aqua, smiling.
Aqua wasn’t smiling. She was sitting on the edge of her bed, arms wrapped around herself, staring at a spot on the floor with a dark expression on her face. “Weren’t you?” she said, not moving to look at Kairi as she entered. “I told you to go away.”
“And under other circumstances I’d respect that,” Kairi said, moving the divider between Aqua’s and Ven’s beds so she could sit on Ven’s bed to talk to her, “but right now sitting alone and stewing won’t be good for you.”
Aqua didn’t respond. Kairi sat on the bed and looked at her. “Come on,” she said. “Did we go through all of that shit in Castle Oblivion for nothing? Talk to me, Aqua. Tell me how you’re feeling.”
“This is wrong,” Aqua said, simply. “We have nothing to gain from Vanitas being alive.”
Kairi nodded. “Yeah, maybe him joining up with us is unlikely. But someone who was ‘dead’ will be ‘alive’ again. Isn’t that a victory, in a way?”
That made Aqua turn to glare at her. “Not when it’s Vanitas.”
“All right,” Kairi said. “Then that brings us back to Ven’s question. What makes him different from the other people working with us now? What is it about him in particular that’s making you this angry?”
Aqua’s eyes somehow found room to narrow further. “You saw what he did. In the Graveyard. I’m sorry if I don’t like his voice coming out of Ven’s body.”
“You beat him, in the Graveyard.”
“And I almost killed Ven doing it!” Aqua shouted.
There was silence, punctuated only by Aqua’s heavy breathing. “I never want to have to fight my friends again, Kairi. I… can’t.”
Kairi shook her head. “I understand that. I can’t imagine fighting Sora or Riku, or Naminé, or any of them. But doesn’t giving Vanitas his own body again remove that from the equation? Even if he is just as much as an asshole as he was twelve years ago, he won’t be wearing Ven’s face this time.”
“That’s not the point,” Aqua insisted. “I wouldn’t have had to fight Ven at all if not for him. Ven would never have left the Land of–”
“Oh, who gives a shit?!” Kairi demanded.
“Excuse… me…?”
“Who. Gives. A. Shit?” Kairi repeated, slowly. “That was twelve years ago, and we can’t change it. Did you learn nothing in the Castle, Aqua?”
“I…”
“Looking back like that is only going to hurt you. You can’t pin the blame on one person alone, even if Vanitas is convenient. It’s too big for that.” Kairi shook her head. “And sure, it’s reason to be distrustful of him. But look at it like this, Aqua. Vanitas has spent the past twelve years asleep in Sora’s heart, just like Ven. Isn’t that punishment enough? He’s lost twelve years, too.”
“So he’s been ‘punished’ for what he did back then?” Aqua asked. “And does that excuse what he’s going to do?”
Kairi spread her hands. “What’s he ‘going’ to do, Aqua? Can you see the future? Cause that’d be really useful if you could!”
Aqua pressed her lips together and turned away. “I can guess based on his past behaviour–”
“From when he was operating under Xehanort’s plan, following Xehanort’s orders,” Kairi interrupted. “The fact of the matter is, Aqua, we don’t know what he’s going to do, how he’s going to act. Hell, from what you told us it sounds like even he doesn’t know! For the first time in his life he’s not being ordered around by the sociopathic old bastard! We don’t know what he’ll be like. And if he’s anything like Ven–”
“Kairi, he’s made from pure darkness. He’s nothing like Ven!”
“And since when was darkness inherently evil?!”
That brought Aqua up short, because the knee-jerk reflexive answer was “always”. However, after her talk with Riku earlier in the night…
She sighed. “I don’t want to believe that Riku is the exception that proves the rule, for Terra’s sake. But Kairi… he acted like he enjoyed every horrible thing he did. I can’t…” She trailed off, and started again. “It’s hard for me to conceptualize the idea that there’s more to him than that. Even that brief talk Riku and I had with him… He’s horrible. I can’t imagine him otherwise.”
Kairi sat back. “I get that, Aqua, but look at it this way. You don’t have to like him. You don’t have to be friends with him, even if he does agree to work with us. I would ask, for your own sake, that you try to let go of your hatred, but nobody’s asking you to welcome him with open arms.”
Aqua grimaced. “Fair point. I’m still not happy about this.”
Kairi smiled, gently. “No one’s asking you to be.” She stood up. “Do you want to talk to Ven about this? I can send him up.”
“No. No, I don’t think that’s a good idea yet, but… tell him I’m sorry.”
Kairi nodded. “Will do.” She moved towards the door.
“Kairi?”
“Yes, Aqua?”
Aqua bit her lip. “What makes him different… Riku fought his way back to yours and Sora’s sides tooth and nail. Naminé was forced to rewrite memories against her will. Roxas and Xion were duped, Lea had no moral compass… And all of them are still bothered by what they did. It’s too early to predict this, like you said, but… Vanitas hasn’t done anything to show he even wants to be different. Much less that he regrets what he did. If he doesn’t show that…”
Kairi nodded. “We can’t save everyone. Especially if they don’t want to be saved. But that’s a choice that’s up to him, not us.”
Aqua looked down at her hands, but smiled. “And Kairi? Thanks for being an… intrusive friend.”
Kairi laughed. “Anytime.”
“What do you mean you need another body?! Did you miscount or something?!”
Lea shrugged. “Apparently, yeah.”
Even massaged his temples. “I expect this sort of thing from you and Sora, but I would’ve assumed the Keyblade Masters knew what they were doing.”
Lea grinned. “Harsh. I’m still better at taking care of children than you are, though, right, Ienzo?”
“Debatable. I never murdered my best friend. Although, that was because I didn’t have any friends my own age, so…” Ienzo deadpanned.
“That wasn’t Lea’s fault,” Xion said. “And it’s beside the point. You have the spare bodies you made for us, right, Even? So all you need to do is implant the data once we have it, right?”
Even actually smiled a little. “That is true. Though they’re in the long-term storage area, we’ll need to bring them out.”
“And when he says ‘we’ he means…” Ienzo muttered.
“Actually…” Xion broke in, nervous. “I have some… personal questions, that I need to ask you about,” she said to Even. “I’m not sure if this is normal, or a thing about having a created body, or…” She broke off, embarrassed.
“…All right, let’s go get that body,” Lea said, clapping Ienzo on the shoulder. For once, Ienzo simply nodded without a sarcastic quip, and led the way out of the room.
Lea followed him down a flight of stairs to a familiar room. It had not originally been a storage room. “Oh,” he said quietly. “Here.”
“Yes…” Ienzo said, and sighed. “I’m sure it means nothing to you, but… I am sorry, for the role I played.”
Lea waved his hand. “You were six.”
“Still.”
“Still,” Lea agreed. “Look, you did stuff that lead to me dying, I did stuff that led to you dying. Can we agree to call it even and let it go?”
Ienzo nodded, and to Lea’s surprise, actually smiled a little. “All right. How have the new bodies been holding up?” he asked, changing the subject as they started to walk through the room.
Lea shrugged. “As far as I was aware, no complaints. Whatever Xi’s asking about, it’s not something she told me. Roxas is a bit mad he can’t live on ice cream bars alone anymore, but, fair trade, I’d say.”
“No difference from the bodies they had initially?”
“Well, again, not that I’ve heard. We had a bit of a surprise a couple of weeks ago, apparently when Even said “perfectly functional” he meant “I’m dropping you in the middle of puberty and everything it entails”, but that’s how things should be, right?”
“So I’m told,” Ieno deadpanned. “I seem to have skipped that period myself.”
“Lucky bastard,” Lea said, chuckling. “Ain’t fun.”
“Neither was being a Nobody.”
“No, but we didn’t give a shit. Which was unfortunate, but…”
“It does seem easier to have gone through that developmental stage without a fluctuating metabolism and emotional state,” Ienzo mused.
“Though you did moody teenager pretty well. Still do, in fact,” Lea said, mocking. “Hell, you had the moody teenager look even way back when. Ansem should’ve hired a hairdresser, I swear. Not that I’m one to talk.”
“You aren’t,” Ienzo agreed. “This is the one.” He pointed to a large chest-shaped container a ways further down. As they reached it, he undid a lock and raised the lid. The remaining three “spare” bodies lay within.
“Doesn’t matter which one until the data gets put in, right?” Lea asked, walking over to a nearby cart.
“No,” Ienzo confirmed. “The features are decided by the morphological field of the person’s heart, shaping the body into whatever the heart believes it should be inhabiting.”
“I heard ‘it’s magic’.”
“I said, ‘it’s science’.”
“Consider it sufficiently advanced, then,” Lea quipped. “I’ll take the shoulders.”
Together, they lifted one of the bodies out of the container and onto the cart. Ienzo shut the lid and locked it again, and they wheeled the body out of the room. Lea took an anxious look at the staircase, but Ienzo shook his head and walked the cart over to a nearby elevator.
As they approached Even and Ienzo’s laboratory, they could hear Even saying, “So, no, I don’t believe you have anything to worry about. It’s how your heart believes your body is supposed to be, like the scars that carried over from your first body. And Roxas doesn’t have a problem with it, correct?”
“No, he doesn’t think there’s anything wrong with it,” Xion’s voice said. “But it’s not… normal, right?”
“Why should that matter?” Even said, and to Lea’s surprise there was actually a note of kindness in his voice. “We already knew you were one of a kind. But if it bothers you–”
“Having it doesn’t,” she said. “I’m just worried that people are going to think I’m weird.”
“I don’t see why anyone other than Roxas has to know,” Even said.
“I suppose you’re right,” Xion said, in a tone Lea knew she usually paired with a smile.
“Though… I suppose I should thank you, for trusting me with this. It won’t go beyond me,” Even said. “You’re just the way you’re supposed to be.”
“Now, that’s a weird tone coming from you,” Lea said. “Is that compassion?”
They both looked up. Xion was sitting in one of the chairs, and Even had crouched down to be at eye level with her. “Xion is effectively my patient,” Even said haughtily, straightening up. “It’s only right that I show her proper consideration.”
“Uh-huh. Everything all right?” Lea asked Xion. “What was this about?”
“…Everything’s fine,” she said, not looking at him. “Uh… I don’t really want to…”
“It was a puberty question,” Even broke in, glaring at Lea. “And I hope that’s all you need to know.”
“Aight, gotcha,” Lea said. “Sorry for prying, Xi.”
“It’s okay, Lea,” she said, smiling at him. “Did you get what we needed?”
Lea nodded, tapping the body on the cart. “One empty shell for data implantation. I don’t suppose Mickey and data-Riku got through yet?”
“Not yet,” Even said. “Tron?”
One of the lab’s desk-mounted computer screens flickered to life. “He has not arrived yet, Even. I will let you know,” said Tron, visible on the screen.
“Nifty,” Lea said. “Nice to see you again, Tron.”
“And you as well, Lea,” Tron said, smiling. “Did the rebodying go well?”
“See for yourself,” Lea said, indicating Xion.
“Ah, hello!” Tron said. “You must be Xion?”
She smiled. “That’s right. Thank you for what you did for us.”
Tron bowed. “Assisting Users is what I’m here for.”
There was a faint buzzing behind him, and data-Riku walked into the frame. “Hello, Tron,” he said, and looked out. “Hello, Lea, Even, Ienzo… and you’re Xion?”
“That’s right.”
“Nice to meet you,” he said. “Sorry I’m late, Mickey only just got back to Disney Castle.”
“Yeah, that figures,” Lea muttered. They had left simultaneously. “Do you have what we needed?”
Data-Riku pursed his lips. “Actually… I’m afraid I have some bad news.”
“In retrospect, I’m not sure why we’re surprised,” Roxas said. “Naminé was the one who programmed the body data into the journal to begin with. It only makes sense that there isn’t any data in there on Vanitas.”
“It wasn’t really programming, per se,” Naminé said. “And I didn’t really have control over what went in. It was all memory-based.”
“Which does explain why data-Riku said there was data on Aqua, Terra, and Ven in there,” Lea said. “I guess Ven’s heart must have osmosed into Sora’s or something?”
He and Xion had returned to the Tower with the bad news. However, they’d also brought the body, and a very emphatic warning from Even and Ienzo that what Lea was thinking of trying instead was a terrible idea.
“So where does that leave us?” Ven asked. “If your friends can’t make a body for him–”
“Makin’ a lot of assumptions with the whole ‘friends’ thing,” Lea interjected. “And, well, there is one other thing we can try, but it’s dangerous.”
“And what is that?” Yen Sid asked. The entire group had reconvened, after their return and Aqua’s return from her room. She had, quietly, apologized to Ven, and was now sitting beside him.
“Welllll….” Lea drawled. “Even did say, once upon a time, that if someone was ornery and pigheaded enough–”
“If you’re talking about what I think you’re talking about, he actually said it ‘would be extremely painful’ and ‘take great strength of will’,” Riku cut in. “Also, holy crap is that a bad idea.”
“What are we talking about?” Aqua asked.
“We could just drop his heart into a not-prepped body,” Lea said. “If he agrees to it. Cause like Riku said, it would hurt like all get out and it might not even take.”
“He’s nothing if not strong-willed,” Ven murmured, half to himself.
“That could kill him, though, couldn’t it?” Kairi asked.
Lea and Riku nodded. “It could,” Lea confirmed. “But, we don’t have any other way. Unless we want to use the Ventus body data–”
“That probably wouldn’t work,” Xion broke in. “The heart would want one thing and the body another. In the extremely unlikely event that it worked, the heart and body would be in constant conflict. It would be… unstable.”
“Wait, but we’re forgetting something important,” Sora said. “What does Vanitas think of all this?”
“Why does that mat–” Aqua started saying reflexively, and shook herself. “Right, yes, it does matter. I’m sorry, Sora.”
Sora smiled. “No problem.”
“Sora is correct,” Yen Sid said. “Risky as this procedure is, we cannot undertake it whatsoever without Vanitas’s consent. With your permission, Ventus?”
Ven nodded. “Put me under.”
Aqua squeezed his hand, but then got up and stepped away, not wanting to be next to Vanitas when he woke up. Apologetically, she summoned her Keyblade and bound Ven to his chair once again.
Once he was secured, Yen Sid placed a hand on Ven’s brow, and cast Sleep. Ven’s head gently slumped downwards.
And Vanitas jerked their head back up, alert and aware. “Fuck’s sake, you haven’t even untied him yet? Assholes.”
“Hey now, be nice. We are working on getting a body for you, after all,” Lea said. “I’m Lea, got it memorised?”
Vanitas looked confused, and affronted. “Do I look like I give a fuck?”
“And I thought Larxene was up her own…” Lea muttered. In a louder tone, he continued. “We’ve hit a bit of a snag and we need your input.”
“My… ‘input’?” Vanitas asked. “What about?”
“We have an empty body, but we don’t have the data to customise it for you. We could just put your heart right in it, but according to the guys who made the bodies for us, it would hurt like you wouldn’t believe, and there’s no guarantee you’d survive.”
Vanitas was silent, weighing his options. “But this is still the only option?”
Lea shrugged. “Unless you want to wait for us to figure something else out–”
“Do it.”
“Huh?”
Vanitas leveled a steady glare at him. For once, it wasn’t full of hatred, or anger.
Just determination.
“Put me in it.”
It burned.
Every pore, every cell, every atom of his body was on fire.
And somehow it still wasn’t the worst pain he’d felt in his life.
That had been the first time he’d been ripped out of his body. But he’d survived that.
He’d survive this.
He’s seen the looks on their faces, before the transfer had begun. The hatred on Aqua’s, the fear on the blonde girl’s. The concern on the boy that looked like Ventus but wasn’t Ventus. The bravado on the redheaded man’s (Lea’s) the redheaded man’s. The alarm on the redheaded girl’s. The distrust on the silver-haired boy’s (Riku’s) the silver-haired boy’s. The… what was that on the black-haired girl’s face? (It was sympathy. He’d never seen it before.)
And the other boy. The brown-haired boy. The boy with the face.
The boy that looked excited.
They wanted him to fail. They wanted this to kill him. Aqua wanted this to kill him, it was plain from the way she looked at him.
Fuck that.
He’d survived having his heart ripped in half.
He’d survive this.
He’d survive this because they didn’t want him to.
He’d survive this on pure spite if he had to.
The burning sensation slowly faded, and for the first time in twelve years, Vanitas opened his eyes.
“How is that possible?” Kairi murmured.
“…It’s likely the same reason why I look like Ven,” Roxas said. “Ven knew about this, but when he mentioned it I never really thought it would come up again.”
“Why didn’t he say something earlier?” Aqua wondered, sounding confused.
“He didn’t think it was important, since we all thought Vanitas was dead,” Roxas said.
“That makes sense, but…” Aqua closed her eyes and shook her head.
Before them, the body had writhed painfully, completely unlike the gentle movements of Roxas, Xion, and Naminé’s bodies when their hearts were introduced. A dark blue and red skintight suit formed and clung to the body. A shock of black hair in a familiar spiked pattern framed an equally familiar face.
Vanitas’s eyes snapped open.
That was another difference. Sora’s eyes had never been that colour.
“Take it easy,” Riku said. He’d been the one to perform the transfer again. Vanitas rested on a bed conjured by Yen Sid, next to Ven on another. Ven was blearily blinking his eyes, Aqua holding one of his hands. He’d been awoken once they were sure Vanitas’s heart had linked with the body. “Give yourself time to get used to–”
Vanitas sprang out of the bed and away against the opposite wall. “Get away from me, all of you!” he snarled. “I can’t believe you were actually stupid enough to agree to this. But, my gain is your loss!” He raised his hand in a familiar stance, and summoned a Keyblade.
It was grey and red, and the shaft was encircled with chains. The teeth and guard were both formed by cogs. At the crossguard and where the teeth met the shaft gleamed aquamarine eyes, which took Riku aback for a second when he realized they were the same eye that once adorned Soul Eater and Way to the Dawn.
Stormfall flashed into Aqua’s hand, and Destiny’s Embrace fell into Kairi’s. Riku already had his Keyblade summoned, and Roxas stepped back to be between Vanitas and Xion. Sora and Naminé looked back and forth between the parties, unsure if they should summon their own Keyblades.
But something odd was happening with Vanitas.
As he stood in his stance, Keyblade raised over his head, his breathing suddenly turned harsh and ragged. His eyes flicked upwards, to his own Keyblade; rather, to the aquamarine eyes. He began breathing faster, his free hand flying to his face in search of a mask he wasn’t wearing. His hand started shaking, and with a cry, he tossed his Keyblade away. It vanished before it hit the ground.
“What’s wrong?” Sora asked, and both Vanitas and Aqua glared at him.
“Doesn’t matter,” Vanitas muttered, entirely to himself. “Then I’ll just…”
Dark energy started leaking off of his shoulders like smoke, drifting down to pool at his feet. He winced, as if in pain, and concentrated.
Nothing happened.
“…Where are my Unversed?” he demanded, sounding equally furious and confused. “What did you bastards do to me?!”
“You can’t summon Unversed?” Aqua asked, and slowly smiled. “Good.”
“Fuck you!” he shot back. “Stay away from me! I can still–!”
There was a loud thump, and Vanitas’s eyes dimmed slightly. He fell forwards onto his face, collapsing to the floor.
Behind him, Lea lowered his Keyblade, the pommel of which he’d just used to hit Vanitas over the head. “Sleep…za…?” he said, sheepishly, waving his free hand.
Yen Sid sighed. “It appears that the rebodying has been, ultimately, a success,” he said, sounding very tired. “Now, it falls to us to decide what to do with Vanitas.”
Ventus stared at Vanitas’s prone form. “Well…” he murmured. “Let’s see how this goes.”