First Flare

[eternalfrolicbond]

[A lanky redheaded man in a long black coat waves at the screen, apparently already comfortable with how it works. A komory bat is fluttering around above his head.]

Didn’t think I’d see this place again. Hey, everyone, my name is Lea. [He grins.] Don’t forget it, now.

I don’t know how I ended up here again, but does anyone know what’s going on? The moogle said you guys had been trying to work out what was up but that it didn’t seem like anyone had figured out how to get home. Since this isn’t the exam, I don’t think anyone’s going to try to wake me up any time soon.

Comments

[unrecovered]

[He's actually following along reasonably well...for about two sentences, that is.]

...thirteen versions of himself. That...doesn't seem physically possible.

[He's going to try to reason through this. Slowly. Somehow.] So he wanted to get Sora to be one of those thirteen versions by...possessing him? And he used dreams and time travel to do it?

...did any of this shit actually work?

[No seriously what the fuck is wrong with your guys' world. What even.]

[eternalfrolicbond]

He already has twelve hims; Sora was gonna be the thirteenth. It didn't work, though; I stopped him from getting Sora.

[Lea sits back and thinks.]

I dunno his first plan; he did something before running into my world. But one of his plans was to have the heartless take over worlds so that he could use the keyblade to gather hearts and capture them until there were enough to make Kingdom Hearts. Or a way to get to Kingdom Hearts. And his Heartless piggybacked on Maleficent's whole plan to gather the seven princesses of heart and making a way to Kingdom Hearts that way. Sora and Riku and company - the King, yours truly, Namine, Kairi, yanno, people, managed to stop those things, but it was close.

[unrecovered]

[The basic points to remember in this world seem to be that Hearts Are Very Important and Everybody Is Completely Insane. Good to know. He takes a few seconds to process all that, and then a few more for good measure. This is making exactly zero sense without a good understanding of how their world works, but he can get context later.]

You all managed to stop him, but nobody's actually killed him yet, right? Because if you haven't, and he still has twelve hims - which still does not seem physically possible [No, he really can't let go of that one, because seriously what the fuck] - then he'll probably still be looking for a thirteenth, right? Which means if he is the one behind all of this, that makes everyone who's stuck here a potential thirteenth him. What it doesn't explain is why he'd drag in people who've already beaten him before, unless he plans on getting revenge on top of everything.

Does any of that even sound plausible. [Because he's kind of lost sight of logic at this point.]

[eternalfrolicbond]

Oh, well, Sora killed his heartless, and Sora and Riku killed his nobody...which might have been part of the plan, come to think of it. Sora also killed two of his vessels. ...and I never saw the old guy version of him before, so he might have got dead sometime. Besides, I mentioned the plan includes time travel, remember?

As far as a thirteenth him...I'm pretty sure he'll try for Sora again, because Sora's kind of special. It doesn't explain why anyone else is here, though.

[unrecovered]

[Okay, obviously he's not going to get any further in this without a crash course in terminology.] Wait. What's a heartless and what's a nobody?

[Oh. Yeah. That. His next words are muttered but still audible.] Dammit, I hate time travel. [Or time distortion, or anything that messes with time, really.]

Special how?

[eternalfrolicbond]

A heartless is a creature born from the darkness. They go after people's hearts, and if they get you, your heart can end up turning into one. Nobodies are what's left over; the mind and the body, without a heart. Though I guess Nobodies can regrow hearts over time, if they make connections with people.

[He shrugs.]

Sora's got this way of bringing people together; he's made connections with lots of people in lots of worlds. It's not special like magic special, he's just kind of a cool guy.

[unrecovered]

And this is normal where you're from. [No seriously what is your world.]

And you don't think there's anyone else here with those same capabilities?

[eternalfrolicbond]

No, of course it's not normal. It's all Xehanort. Nobodies are freaky eldritch abominations that shouldn't exist.

[Lea shrugs.]

The creepy megalomaniac didn't pick him out of a crowd for nothing.

[unrecovered]

Oh. Well. Great. One more thing to worry about.

So we should probably keep an eye on him too. [Just in case.]

[eternalfrolicbond]

Probably a good idea, yeah.