Kingdom Hearts: Aftermath Part 1 - Destiny of the Key

[akasonic18]

This story is an alternate universe of events happening after COM. In this universe, Sora is accidentally killed by Marluxia. Axel kills Marluxia and takes Namine to a safe place. Upon learning that Sora has died, Xemnas and the rest of the Organization decide to use Roxas as they would have used Sora. Roxas leaves the Organization after finding out what they had planned for him. It's now five years after Roxas left and the Organization has decided to destroy any world that gets in there way. Roxas jumps from world to world, knowing that staying too long in one place would bring the Organization there. The warriors of light now all live in Hollow Bastion and defend it as much as they can. Heartless swarm outside the walls, but have not found a way in. The story is from Roxas' perspective.

Chapters 1-5:

Chapter 1
What Has Happened
The worlds have been thrown into chaos. The Organization have decided to take no prisoners and destroy all the worlds. The fighters from the realm of light fight in never ending battles to stop them, but their numbers are wearing thin.

It all happened in Castle Oblivion. Sora and Marulxia's fight went on for what seemed like ages. Unfortunately, Marluxia accidentally killed Sora. Marluxia's plan to use Sora to take over the Organization was destroyed. Axel appeared and was able to kill Marluxia. He then told the other members of Organization about what happened. Even though they were angry, they still had Roxas to continue their plans.

Once Sora died, Roxas was somehow given the memories of Sora. Roxas then left the Organization. Xemnas then made the decision to have each and every world destroyed until Roxas was found.

Axel took Namine Destiny Islands. She decided to stay away from Kairi until the time was right. Soon after Sora's death. Riku learned what happened and went to hunt for Roxas, after he found out that Roxas was Sora's Nobody. Mickey then brought the heroes of light together and told them of the tragedy, then he was one his way, to find Ansem the Wise.

Soon after the king left, the worlds started to disappear one at a time. Without Sora, no one could save the worlds. Now only Traverse Town, Twilight Town, Destiny Islands, Hollow Bastion and The World That Never Was still exist. Traverse and Twilight town are constantly attacked by Nobodies, while Hollow Bastion is attacked by endless swarms of Heartless, only Destiny Islands have not been affected, but soon it will.

Chapter 2
Organization's Plan
"Only Traverse Town, Twilight Town, Hollow Bastion, and Destiny Islands still stand. What should we do with them?" the short blonde haired Luxord said.

"We should do with them what we did with the others?" the long blue haired Saix said.

"Lets not be rash. We still need to find Roxas. With out him we cannot be complete," the man with the long black dreadlocks, Xaldin, said.

"He's right. Doing something totally stupid would be the dumbest thing we could do man. Maybe just terrorized them for a bit more, sounds fun to me," the man with the long black and silver hair, Xigbar, said.

"As long as I don't fight, I'm good with it. I don't want to end up like the others," Demyx, the man with the brunette mullet, said.

"We need to find him. He's our only hope," the man with the long red spikes, Axel, said.

"The worlds are few, which means the amount of hearts we can obtain is few. We need the Key of Destiny to unlock those hearts we have left. Unfortunately he does not seem to care about the Organization," the man with the long silver hair said.

"And why should he?" Axel questioned the man with the silver hair, "He has no reason to Xemnas. We knew why he had the Keyblade and why he had other memories. He asked us why and we lied to him. If it wasn't for you making Marluxia lord of Castle Oblivion, this wouldn't have happened."

"So you blame me for what happened. Why didn't you take kill him like you were ordered to do to all traitors. In fact, Roxas is a traitor. I order you to find Roxas, make him release the adequate number of hearts we need, and then end his life," Xemnas chuckled at the word life.

Xemnas, and the others, knew that they weren't truly alive. They were Nobodies, which mean they didn't have a heart, they were non-existent. In this world, a being is made up of three parts, a heart, soul, and body. When the heart of a person succumbs to darkness, a Heartless is created. When the heart leaves the body of a strong willed person, the body starts to move on its own. Soon it loses it shape and it becomes a Nobody. Organization XIII are made up of special Nobodies that were able to keep their form instead of having the bodies original form return to darkness.

Nobodies have no heart, so they truly do not exist. They have no feelings and have no humanity. There was once thirteen members in Organization XIII, but five have perished. Vexen, Lexaeus, Zexion, Larxene, and Marluxia died in Castle Oblivion, leaving Xemnas, Xigbar, Xaldin, Axel, Saix, Demyx, Roxas, and Luxord. Roxas left the Organization and now only seven are still in the Organization.

"Roxas is an enemy, which means he must be dealt with accordingly," Xemnas said.

Chapter 3
Divided Roads
This whole time I haven't stayed in one place too long. At the most a couple of days, but no longer than a week. It's not that I'm scared. I'm just aware that I'm being followed by the Organization. Staying in one place too long means more of them can find me. The more that find me, the harder I will have to fight to stay alive, or whatever I call my existence.

"The sun's finally going down," I said to myself.

I was in a strange world that only I knew of. It was a world with an endless desert. The sun stayed up for at least two days. The sun setting meant it was time to leave, but where to go. I could go back to The World That Never was, but I would be attacked endlessly by Heartless and Nobodies, especially the Organization. If only Axel would have stayed my friend. He, like the others, turned on me.

"All I want to know is why did you lie to me? I wanted to know who I was before I became a Nobody and you all lied to me. You said you didn't know. Why did you say that?" I remember yelling at the other seven members of the Organization.

"Because it would compromise with our plans. We need not to argue Roxas," Xemnas said calmly.

That's when I left. When I found out that Sora was my other side. All of his memories came out of nowhere, even the fake ones that Namine implanted in him. Sora died not knowing who he really was. That existence was sadder than mine.

I decided to build a small fire. I wouldn't leave for another hour or two. I didn't want to go back to their world. I've been going to other worlds that Sora once went to. I wanted to see what he saw, but all I could remember were the memories I made when I was an Organization member. I was a fool back then.

There are only two places I haven't been. Hollow Bastion and Destiny Islands, and I'm never going to the islands. I can't see Sora's home. For some reason, it would hurt me too much. Why did this happen to me? Why did Sora give his heart to that girl? I have the memories of her, but the way Sora felt about her puzzle me. He would give his life for her, but I wouldn't give a damn if she died. I also thought a lot about Namine. If it wasn't for her and Marluxia, Sora would have never died and none of this would happened.

All that leaves is Hollow Bastion, where the Organization was found. It's twice as dangerous. Xemnas knows that world like the back of his hand. It wasn't like TWTNW(the world that never was), I knew about things in that world that others didn't.

"What are you going to do Roxas? Which danger are you going to walk into?" I asked myself.

"Hollow Bastion has numerous memories from Sora, and I've only been there once. Sora has more memories there than I do. It would be ashame not to revisit it before I disappear, if I ever do," my mind was finally made up.

It was time to visit Hollow Bastion.

Chapter 4
Namine's Decision
"Uh," Namine groaned.

Namine had been on Destiny Islands for three years now. She had been able to seclude herself there, not letting anyone know who or what she was. She didn't want to meet anyone. She knew it was her fault for what happened to Sora. Everyday she lived with the guilt. She had ran away when Sora had died.

"Come back here," Marluxia yelled, "you obnoxious girl. Without Sora, your no longer needed."

She ran as fast as she could, but Marluxia ended up teleporting in front of her. He brought up his scythe, which was dripping with Sora's blood. Before he could slash, Axel slashed him with his chakrams. Axel then set Marluxia on fire, killing him.

"Namine," Axel said, "I have to get you out of here before Xemnas and the others come for you. They'll use you for Roxas now!"

"Take me to Destiny Islands," Namine pleaded.

Axel nodded and transported her to Destiny Islands. He didn't say anything. He left, leaving her alone. That was three long years ago. She was always thinking about Roxas and Axel. She had never met Roxas, but her bond with him was definite. Axel was her only friend in the Organization, and in her entire existance. She was a Nobody, but she had strong feelings of guilt, sadness, and depression. She lived her life for the next three years as a shadow of Kairi. She followed her and made she was okay at all times.

Namine made a promise when Sora died. She promised to never hurt anyone with her ability to change memories. She already knew the consiquences. The only thing she would be able to fix was the memories she had changed when Sora was still alive. That way Kairi would know of the boy that saved her life, but she didn't. Sora also asked her to make sure Kairia was happy. She knew that not letting her know of Sora was the only way how to.

She was tired of hiding. She wanted to be with the other children.

"It's time to meet Kairi," she told herself.

Chapter 5
Warrior's Return
The behemoth was struck down by the Keyblade from the realm darkness. Mickey vanquished the last of the hundreds of Heartless and sighed. He was tired of the endless hordes of Heartless that he and the others had to fight.

"You okay Mickey?" Leon asked.

"I guess, I'm just a little tired. Hopefully that was the last group of Heartless for awhile," Mickey said breathing hard.

Mickey and Leon walked back up to the Bailey. Cid, Aerith, Yuffie, Tifa, and Cloud were waiting for them. They were all war torn and exhausted. They all headed back to Merlin's place.

"Where are Donald and Goofy?" Merlin asked.

"Taking care of the DTD. They should be back in a little bit," Leon replied.

"Too bad Sora isn't around. It would be so much easier with another Keyblade," Yuffie sighed.

"But he isn't," Cloud rebutted, "and there's nothing any of us can do about it."

"Gwarsh, you don't have to be such a downer Cloud," Goofy said while he walked into Merlin's house.

"Yeah you need to look on the bright side," everyone was surprised at what Donald said, 'WHAT?"

"Just doesn't sound like something you'd say Donald," Leon laughed.

Donald muttered something incoherent and walked away. The rest of the others were just sitting or standing around doing nothing. They fought so much in the last three years, there was nothing else they really did anymore. They didn't do much else.

"We should all head over to the lab. That way we can all at least do something," Leon suggested.

They all agreed and walked out of Merlin's house. It was the middle of the day and the air was cool. They all walked down the steps and into the Bailey.

"So is anything new going on with Tron?" Yuffie asked.

"Not really," Goofy answered, "ever since we helped him defeat the MCP, nothing bad has really happened. It's only on the outside world that everything is going wrong."

They arrived at the castle postern and all took a small break.

"So what about the other worlds, what are we going to do about them?" Aerith asked.

"There's nothing much we can do. As long as were being attacked left and right, we can't help the others when we can't even win back our world," Cloud said solemnly.

All of them just stared into the ground, they knew it was true. The worlds that were left were in as much chaos as theirs were.

Suddenly a huge horde of Heartless began to pop up. Hundreds of Shadows and Neo-Shadows. They drew their weapons and readied to attack. Then, a huge Dark Side rose in the canyon. They were outnumbered and they knew they would loose. They would fight though.

Suddenly all of the Heartless disappeared in a second. Standing in their place was a boy with long silver hair. He wielded a Keyblade and said, "Where's Kairi and Roxas?"

[kazukifafner]

Hmm, it's an interesting concept. I haven't seen many stories that start off with Sora being dead, lol (of course, mine does that, so I guess we're just strange like that, lol).

Anyway, as for the writing, it lacks a certain depth to it. Don't get me wrong, it gets the job done in the sense that you know what is going on, and I didn't notice a lot of grammatical/spelling errors. Unfortunately, it feels flat and, quite frankly, a bit boring. You don't show off the characters personality when they are speaking. They just have a generic "this is what I said" feel to them, no real emotion behind it.

Also, you don't give much in the way of descriptions, not only in settings, but in the what the character is experiencing. You are doing what most would refer to as "telling, but not showing". It's like you are explaining it to us, without letting us see it through the character's eyes. We should know what they see, what they hear, how they feel about it, what their thoughts are, etc.

One final thing, I would recommend sticking to a narrative style, instead of changing it between chapters. In chapter 3, you suddenly switch to 1st person narrative from a 3rd person (which was used the rest of the time). This can be very confusing, and the reader won't know what's going on.

Don't get me wrong, the story (as well as your writing) has potential, to be sure. You've got the basics of writing down, but you need to add more advanced techniques, specifically depth. Once you start to get the hang of those, your own personal writing style will emerge, and your works will improve because of it. So keep writing and keep improving!

[akasonic18]

Originally Posted by kazukifafner

Hmm, it's an interesting concept. I haven't seen many stories that start off with Sora being dead, lol (of course, mine does that, so I guess we're just strange like that, lol).

Anyway, as for the writing, it lacks a certain depth to it. Don't get me wrong, it gets the job done in the sense that you know what is going on, and I didn't notice a lot of grammatical/spelling errors. Unfortunately, it feels flat and, quite frankly, a bit boring. You don't show off the characters personality when they are speaking. They just have a generic "this is what I said" feel to them, no real emotion behind it.

Also, you don't give much in the way of descriptions, not only in settings, but in the what the character is experiencing. You are doing what most would refer to as "telling, but not showing". It's like you are explaining it to us, without letting us see it through the character's eyes. We should know what they see, what they hear, how they feel about it, what their thoughts are, etc.

One final thing, I would recommend sticking to a narrative style, instead of changing it between chapters. In chapter 3, you suddenly switch to 1st person narrative from a 3rd person (which was used the rest of the time). This can be very confusing, and the reader won't know what's going on.

Don't get me wrong, the story (as well as your writing) has potential, to be sure. You've got the basics of writing down, but you need to add more advanced techniques, specifically depth. Once you start to get the hang of those, your own personal writing style will emerge, and your works will improve because of it. So keep writing and keep improving!

I do go back and forth between characters I know. The characters get more complex as the story goes on, I've finished the story, I'm just doing a few chapters at a time. This is only part one of three that goes into the whole story. Don't worry about depth because the I do get more in depth about how they feel and what's going on with them. The only reason it was hard is because I've never written with other people's creations, so it's harder to work on them.