Fall from Grace

[Marmadue]

Twilight Town never seemed to change. The night never ended, the sun never rose. If the weather ever changed, well, it hadn't happened yet. The sky stayed dark and starless, the pieces of the broken moon still hung above giving out some light to the ruins of what used to be a nice, bustling town at some point in the past. The buildings looked very much like the moon, many having collapsed entirely. Some had only managed to loose their roofs or a few parts of their walls, the best still looking quite cracked and unstable, as if any tremors could cause them to collapse. An unbroken window was a rare sight.

But one thing that did change was the people, strangely enough. Had they been given a choice, they most likely would have chosen not to travel to such a town – if it could even be called as such anymore. But most, if not all, did not get the luxury of such a choice. Whether they liked it or not, they had all ended in Twilight Town like the rest. Often alone, usually injured, penniless and with nothing more than the clothes on their backs. There were many questions. There were some answers, but some answers weren't accepted by everyone. Some answers were too tough to accept, had they been true. Some wanted to keep hoping.

Marmadue hoped, too. Of course he hoped that his home was still fine and it was just a freak accident that had sent him where he was. At the very least, he hoped he was not alone. He longed for his family, his friends – but they were nowhere to be seen. He hadn't even seen anyone – or anything – familiar, either. There had not been a single other Yuke among the refugees he had seen or helped. No one else seemed to have seen anyone like him, either. It was… Depressing, to say the least. But could they just give up?


At the very least, the Yuke had a roof above his head. One that only leaked a little. And as the self-appointed healer of some sort, he tried to share that with others, those who had even less than him. It was a small two-story house by the market street – an old, abandoned store it seemed like. Nothing too big or grand, but it certainly was too big for just a single person and thus, there were some temporary bedrolls for people to use. It was important to make oneself useful, and as a healer Marmadue definitely had an important position. He helped and was helped out in turn, lest a healer perished due to the lack of food or other supplies. Once again he was walking back to his home, carrying a small box of various things he had managed to scavenge or had been gifted…

When he heard a strange sound coming from the small alleyway beside his temporary home, he froze. It almost sounded like… Something falling over. Something metallic, perhaps – a bucket and something else, maybe? But it didn't continue. It was eerily silent, the soft murmurs of the people mingling about in the distance behind him feeling even farther away now than a moment ago. Marmadue swallowed. Was there someone there? Or something? If a Heartless had managed to come so close to them…

"…H-Hello?" He called out, his voice shaky as he peered into the alley. There was no response. It was still deathly quiet. The Yuke glanced behind him, as if to hope that he would see someone else coming to investigate with him, but there was no luck. He was still alone. But he couldn't just leave it. Not like this. It could have been someone in need of help… Or if it was a Heartless, they would have to know right away!

Slowly, Marmadue inched his way further. Luckily he did not have to go too far to see what was the suspected source of the voice, a sigh of relief passing through the airholes in his helmet. That was, after he realized that this was no time to be relaxing and tensed up right away. There was a person. Not a Yuke, but a relatively large creature just like many others in Twilight Town. A male, probably. Sprawled out in the middle of garbage and some loose, rotten planks, unmoving.
"A-Ah, oh dear, are you alright?" The Yuke asked as he put down his cardboard box and knelt beside the man. There were injuries – and at the very least, he was unconscious. Seemed to still be breathing, however. Luckily. He could remember going through something quite similar himself. Whatever had ripped through the man's clothing seemed a lot larger than the Heartless he had seen, though…
"Ah, hello?" He tried out again, reaching out and grabbing the stranger's shoulder and giving it a gentle shake with one of his large hands.

[Shaizen Latross]

Shaizen's dreams were filled with deep darkness, showing him nightmares of things that never happened. Despite his shield, the darkness was still able to pierce him. Visions of his parents' deaths haunted his dreams, everything moving slow as Shaizen would stand there, unable to move as he would fall deeper into the darkness of the nightmares. Flashbacks revealing his first time in battle showed everyone falling to the hands of the Darkside, Gil rushing out to save the day like he had, only to be taken by the darkness. As if to taunt him, the Darkside held Shaizen in its hands as the nightmare went on. He would watch as the cities of Luniel would crumble, one by one as though in a domino effect. Tireal, standing last, would seem to try to fight back the darkness. The city would grow brighter until the darkness would envelop it, the city's light vanishing and putting Shaizen in complete darkness, seeming to float endlessly. 

Shaizen would feel the darkness crushing in on his dreams as he would begin losing himself, curling up within his own mind. He would remember his home, his city and his friends that had been left behind, possibly left to the darkness, as he believed he now was. Were they reliving horrors that never happened, losing themselves to the madness he was trying not to fall into? Or were they perhaps already gone, taken by the darkness and turned into Heartless? Were they already being set out into the unknown that lies within the darkness? Perhaps they were running about a destroyed Luniel, rummaging through the ruins as their sanity was draining, forcing them into a state of panic and chaos.

These dreams and thoughts were soon to disappear, fading into nothing as the nightmare was shattered. Hearing a strange voice, Shaizen would slowly regain consciousness as the horrible images would fade and disperse into nothing. Soon afterwards, he would feel the hand on his shoulder, then shaking him, repeating 'hello' and asking something he couldn't yet quite make out. As soon as he was able to, he would slowly open his eyes, now awake enough to realize he was in an unknown area, perhaps a bandit fortress? Maybe this had all been a strange trick by the bandits, and he was still in Luniel. One look at the sky, however, proved that wrong. The constellations and even the moon itself were wrong, far different from home, especially since the moon was shattered. 

Once fully awake, he would see the stranger above him trying to wake him. Shaizen would close his eyes again before attempting to sit up, a sharp and intense pain in his lower ribs and right leg forcing him to stop and lay back down. Gritting his teeth, he would fight not to pass back out from the pain, looking at the stranger as his hair would slightly obscure his vision

"W-where.... where am... I?"

These words were all Shaizen could manage at the time, his ribs feeling as though they were breaking at that very moment just from speaking. He would lift his head just enough to get a look at himself, seeing his clothes torn to shreds, leading to obvious wounds underneath them. The worst were where his ribs and leg were searing with pain, the clothes in those areas almost completely gone with large holes replacing the fabric. His swords were beside him, both damaged badly, looking as though a single use would break them. Their opposing power seemed to mist in an unstable way, rather than merely glistening within the metals themselves. Seeing this caused Shaizen to feel worry, as he had forged these with Gil's help, and they meant a lot to him.

Laying his head back down, he would close his eyes again and try to think, try to remember what had happened that caused this. He remembered speaking with the Council and leaving the city. After that that... nothing. He couldn't even remember anything after the gates closed behind him anymore. Nothing except for the darkness that is. His memory showed a clear image of the darkness after the gate would close, surrounding and enveloping him , obscuring his vision before a giant humanoid Heartless would appear. After that, he only remembered waking up here, with the stranger over him

"How di... did I get here?"

With those words, he would fall silent, waiting for an answer from the stranger as he tried to wraps his head around everything that was happening

[Marmadue]

The man's eyes opened. That was a good sign, being conscious. Him trying to sit up was also understandable, but not exactly advisable in his condition – something he surely realized himself when the pain stabbed through him.
"Ah, please try to not move! You are injured," Marmadue instructed, stating the obvious but it seemed like it was a good idea at this point. It seemed like the man was confused – and understandably so. Marmadue knew how it felt. He… He had been through something quite similar. It wasn't easy for anyone.

"Please stay still. I shall attempt to heal you," he was forced to ignore the questions for now. They could wait, when there were more pressing matters. The Yuke brought his hands over the man's body, letting them hover a slight distance away. With the helmet, his face was obscured, but he closed his eyes and his his chest puffed out as he took in a deep breath. His hands took on a soft glow, the warmth spreading over to the man's skin, into his flesh. Slowly but surely the injuries started to heal – though compared to just waiting it out normally, the rate was obviously accelerated greatly.

"…Twilight Town. That is ah, what they call this place," Marmadue spoke up after a while, opening his eyes as the healing process was still underway. The large rips in the clothes the man had at least made it easy to see most of the injuries. It was going to be fine. They just needed a little bit more time… But there was still another question to answer. A more difficult one, though.
"I ah… I cannot say I am entirely sure what the details of the process are, but… Can you remember what happened before you woke up here?"

[Shaizen Latross]

Hearing this stranger say he was going to heal him, Shaizen would lay his head back downs, staring into the sky. The sky itself was different, he realized as he stared into the night sky. The very color was different, darker so that the stars would shine brighter against that black canvas. The stars were also fewer and not quite as bright as he had ever remembered from Luniel. If he wanted, he might even be able to count the few that were here compared to what he was use to.

Tilting his head, he would look around best he could, seeing the state of the few building he could from within the alley. Cracked, broken, almost not even able to be considered houses, he saw that this place was in ruins. Windows were all shattered from what he could see, and almost everything was in a state of disrepair. The town, if that is what this place was, appeared to have gone through a war, or something more destructive even. He wandered if this is what his world now looked like. Was it in ruins as well, shattered into pieces?

"What happened before I woke?"

He would close his eyes and think for a few seconds before answering the question

"I- I was leaving for Yolin, another city. I had just left Tireal... and... the darkness just... swept in. It was followed by a... I think it was a heartless. I had only ever seen one once before, but... we had no information on it. It was giant, humanoid... had a large hole in the center. That is about all I can remember"


As he spoke, he didn't think that the stranger might not know about Luniel. He actually completely forgot that he wasn't even there, that he didn't know where he was. He just spoke as his mind would flash back to the moment he was describing, remembering each second in the darkness before he had woken

[Marmadue]

"Mh," Marmadue let out an agreeing sort of hum as he listened to the man tell his story, doing his best to stay neutral. It seemed like this one had gone through the same things as the rest of them. Of course, by now, almost everyone seemed to have the same story. Every time he hoped he wasn't, just so there would be good news. But every time, it seemed like that hope was in vain. He continued to heal in silence, obviously not having any idea what the places the man named were. But he had been the same, too. Maybe he had hoped he was still somewhere nearby, even if nothing looked familiar. Maybe this man did, too.

As the man's injuries healed, the scratches and wounds on his skin were the last ones to close up. The Yuke's magic came to a stop, the warmth dissipating and the soft glow easing up until it too disappeared completely. As far as it came to the man's body, it should have been good to go now – at least, it shouldn't really be hurting anymore…
"Many of us… Have ah, had something similar happen to us. With our own worlds," Marmadue turned to look at the man's face, still knelt beside him,
"…And I suppose some have theories as to what happened. They could of course be wrong, but ah… Please do not assume the worst…"

Oh bother. How was he even going to say it? The Yuke's helmet was slowly drifting to the side as his gaze started to look somewhere past the man, like he couldn't quite make eye contact with him. This was always the worst part…
"Some ah… Figure that the Heartless might have ah. Done something to the world to make it… Ah, not exactly habitable…"

[Shaizen Latross]

Shaizen would let the words sink in as the stranger explained the theory of what had happened, letting it set in of what could have happened. As far as Shaizen knew that IS what happened to his home. As far as he knew it was nothing more than what his dream was; smoldering ruins of a destroyed civilization. While he was thinking this, he would realize something this man had said, a single word that set the gears in his head on full power

"Wait... your own worlds? What do you mean... worlds?"

As he waited for an answer he would sit up, marveling at how quickly his ribs had healed. With no pain or open wound that he could see, he gently pressed on his ribs, making sure they were healed properly and releasing a sigh of relief when he felt no pain. He would check his clothes, noting their horrible condition and wondering to himself how he was going to get them fixed. Which lead to his next question; what was to happen to his weapons? 

Lunar and Eclipse, the two swords he had forged of opposing metals. Aided by Gil, his mentor and father-figure, these blades were made and mastered by Shaizen, unique in both appearance and power. They were in many ways a representation of himself, of his balance and of his own species. He had put so much sweat and blood into their creation, using anything else would be a complete insult not just to them, but he felt to himself as well.

"That theory you told me... is that what happened to this place?"

[Marmadue]

"Ah, well" Marmadue seemed to be taken aback by the sudden question, the knowledge of other worlds quite common knowledge with the people of Twilight Town these days. But it hadn't been that way to them always. It made sense, to question it. Perhaps he had jumped a bit too far ahead in his explanation…
"That is, there seem to be different… Places that aren't quite connected the way we are used to. We would not cross the boundaries by foot, nor by a drawn carriage nor ah, nor a boat. This place, Twilight Town… It might have various curiosities you have never seen where you are from. Perhaps they just ah, plain do not exist or could not exist in your world. You… Might not have seen a creature like me, for example?" The Yuke tilted his head slightly. To many, his visage was strange. Perhaps even frightening. A creature like this man in front of him fit better with the rest. But Marmadue? He stuck out. He was different.

"As for the fate of this world, ah… I am not entirely sure. It looks quite ruined, but… We are here. Yet we have been whisked away from our worlds. If this was their fate, why wouldn't we be able to stay there?" The helmet looked downwards. These questions he couldn't quite answer. He wasn't entirely sure if he even wanted to figure out an answer. Twilight Town was a mess. Who would want to imagine their own home being somehow worse?
"…I have seen a world that was worse off than this one. So, perhaps this is not it."

And perhaps the other ruined world wasn't bad enough, either…

"T-That is ah, of course, if the theory is correct. There could be something else we do not know about."

[Shaizen Latross]

Shaizen was confused by the man's words at first, having not actually looked at this stranger. Now, as he would turn his head to do so, he noticed that this stranger was indeed different. Just the shape of his helmet told Shaizen that much. At first, he wondered if he could be a more advanced species of something from Luniel, changed by the darkness. But then he realized nothing from Luniel looked even remotely like this person. He would put his head in his hand and work to soak in all of this, trying to make sense of it all.

"Other worlds... with different creatures. And some possibly being destroyed... like... mine?"

He looked up and sighed a little, looking up again at the few stars in the sky. He had more questions about all of this, but he felt as though this stranger had answered enough for now, having also healed him of his wounds. He would slowly stand to his full height, carefully picking up his broken swords as he did so and lifting them up to examine them a little better. There could still be a chance to fix them... hopefully. The supplies that were in his bag had some Lunar Steel and Darkened Iron within it. But... where was the bag?

He knew he had it when the darkness took him away, he had a tight hold on it during the entire thing. That bag was, in a few ways, his way to survive. Without it, he was going to have a very difficult time living outside of the cities, and it would be impossible to fix his swords. 

"Um... you haven't seen any bag around, have you? And... I don't think I ever caught your name. It would be nice to know the name of the man who helped me"

[Marmadue]

"…Well ah, there certainly are creatures and other objects I have never seen before in my life, until I came here. The theory is that, ah, when a world is destroyed, we are ejected elsewhere… Like here, in Twilight Town," Marmadue nodded carefully to confirm the outcome the stranger had come to. Well, it was the outcome most of us them had come to. Others accepted it, some didn't. They still didn't have definite proof of their worlds being destroyed, but… But perhaps that just was a good thing. A way to keep up their hope.
"…A conclusion I have come to is that some would have to ah, go elsewhere. We cannot access all the areas in this town, but I do not think the people of many worlds could fit in here. Perhaps there are others worlds where others end up in," he continued to bring in some further speculation. After all, many of them showed up here alone. Marmadue was no different. This other man… Well, he was in the alley all by himself, but it was possible someone else he knew had showed up elsewhere.

After all, who wanted to consider the possibility that perhaps they were the sole survivors of their whole world…?

As the man stood up, Marmadue did the same – mostly just to make sure that he wasn't going to fall over right away, but perhaps he wouldn't really be able to stop that from happening. The Yuke might have been tall, towering at least a good foot above the man, but his limbs were weak and feeble. They did not have the strength in them to support a fully grown man. Bending over, he grabbed his little box he had been carrying with him, not wanting to leave it behind with him.
"Ah, a bag?" Marmadue blinked as he turned to look at the man, giving a quick glance around the two. Well, there were some bags in the alley, but he was quite sure those had been there before. Trash, most likely. Some ripped apart and whatever useful had been in them long gone.
"…I do not think so, if you are looking for a particular bag. How ah, should it look?"

"Oh, ah, my name, yes. I am called Marmadue…"

[Shaizen Latross]

He looks around as well, eyeing all the bag within the alley in disappointment as none of them were his. That bag had been given to him by the Grand Scribe for his journey and was rather important to him. A gift from one of the heads was considered a huge honor, and should never be taken lightly. He would slowly begin walking out of the alley to see what else there was to see around them while listening to Marmedue's explanation. His mind would soak in the information, accepting it a little easier now that he knew this was indeed another world. 

"I will not lose hope that some from my world survived... whatever it was that happened. There are some there who are much stronger than I, meaning they would definitely survive. Where they would go though... I do not know"

In truth, he hoped he would find them, either here or somewhere else. Perhaps Gil knew more about this than he did, perhaps he was already set out to look for survivors. It is what he would do, that was for sure. Shaizen hoped Gil was alright, that he was maybe on some other world like he was. 

"The bag is tan, with darker designs in the seams. It has a symbol on the front. Two keys crossed with an energy orb behind them. I know I had it with me... I held on to it before waking up here"

He looks up at the man as he hears his name, placing it firmly in his memory. It was a strange name, one he had never heard before. Despite this, it seemed to fit the man. 

"I'm Shaizen Latross. Friends call me Shai"

[Marmadue]

"Ah, yes. It would be ah, a good idea to take a look around. There… Could be someone you can recognize somewhere," Marmadue nodded and offered a suggestion – after all, it wasn't a good idea to just think one was alone without even taking a look! The man just got there. Someone else could have just as well, just obviously not where the two now stood. It seemed like the search for the bag continued, but unfortunately the Yuke couldn't be of much aid – until he was actually told how it looked like. But no, nothing like it caught his eye. It definitely sounded a lot more… Ornamental than the simple bags thrown about in the alley. If the bag had made it, it seemed like it too had appeared further from the man…

Though suddenly, Marmadue stopped as the explanation of the bag's design sunk into his head. He would have brushed it off before as nothing special, because well, it wouldn't have sounded very special to him before. But after everything that had happened and the mention of those mysterious keyblades… A key in a design certainly caught his attention.
"Ah, mister… Shaizen Latross, wasn't it? When you say there is a design of keys on your bag… Do they ah, mean anything? Symbolize something? Are they meant to… Represent something? Anything special?"

[Shaizen Latross]

Shaizen would start walking around a little, keeping his eyes open for his bag as he wandered. As he walked he would slowly and carefully sheath his weapons. He made sure they slid into their scabbards with causing anymore damage to them. Along with everything else going through his mind at the moment, this was among the most important thing to him, besides the bag. He wanted to find it, needed to find it. 

He heard the question about the bag and the symbol on it. In reality, the Scribes were very secretive about most of what they did, with ranks in their own system of who knew what. Those in the higher ranks actually were almost never seen, except for the head of each city. The only reason they were seen was because they had to supervise so much. Very few who were not a part of the Scribes knew anything about what they did. 

"It is the mark of the Scribes, a guild on my world. They were in charge of certain technology and magics that powered the city. Or... as far as anyone is concerned of that is what they do. In reality, that isn't even the surface. The head of the guild I was part of told me they worked on things that were too dangerous for the rest of the world to know. All I know. Never looked farther into it"

He started thinking a little into what he had just said, and how he was questioned about the symbol. He wondered why this man asked about the symbol. Shaking off the question for now, he would start looking again for the bag. After a few minutes of looking, he would turn to the man, asking his own question

"Why do you ask? You don't think it means something do you?"

[Marmadue]

Marmadue hadn't exactly been invited to come along, but he still ended up following the man as if he were a leader of some sort, no words even had to be exchanged. After all, Shaizen was new. He shouldn't just be abandoned like that to a strange new world! The Yuke was still carrying his box in his hands, realizing now that the alley where he had found this other man was right beside where he stayed, so he really should have dropped the box there when he had the chance… But by now it was too late, their journey going in the wrong direction. And still he walked after him, not objecting.

The keys… Were the sign of scribes. Not exactly the kind of a symbol he would have picked for something like that. Keys did not suggest information to him – though Shaizen seemed to know more, secrets that hid behind the surface. Keys… Did not exactly suggest secrets, either. Keys unlocked. A lock he would have understood. A key… Well, perhaps it was nothing. Perhaps it was something. He didn't know. This was a world he had never seen that they were talking about, it probably had nothing to do what it was they were going through. Even if it did, it didn't seem like the man was going to know anything about it.

Marmadue had grown quiet, getting more and more lost in his thoughts as he tried to figure out how to solve the puzzle – or if there even was a puzzle in the first place, in case he was just over-thinking it. Shaizen's own question snapped him out of it, the Yuke's head jerking upwards from its downwards gaze and looking at the man.
"Oh. Ah. Well, it's just that we were looking for ah, a key…"

[Shaizen Latross]

"A... key?"

Shaizen's voice was full of confusion as he would stop and look back at Marmadue, a slight hint of recognition behind the initial confusion. He recalled that each guild head passed down an item to their student who would take over their position. For the Scribes, it was a ceremonial key, used in many different ceremonies within their experiments. It's main use was unknown, along with the reason why it was used in so many experiments. 

"Hmm... the Grand Scribe, Amber, wore a key around her neck at all times. It was the Grand Scribe's Mark, what proved that  they were the ones who ran the guild. I overheard her talking to someone within the Scribes, telling them it was a important to their experiments. Don't know what they did with it though, just that their city, Direk, was almost always lit up with some kinda energy whenever they performed their experiments"

He stopped and looked around at a four-way street, looking in the three ways they had to choose from. In truth, he knew very little about the key the Grand Scribe carried, only that they used it in their ceremonies and experiments, all kept from the eyes of others. It was usually a big thing among the other guilds, but was never looked in to. Unfortunate now, but back then, it wasn't a big deal. Now however, with these question and the comment of this 'key', Shaizen's mind was working to put a few things together

"Um... why are you looking for a 'key'? I am sure you have some laying around, right? A key is a key, you can use it for just about... anything to do with a lock. Did you lose your key or something?"

[Marmadue]

Marmadue nodded to the man's question, the item in question indeed being a key. A strange thing to be looking for, perhaps – the puzzled tone told him as much. But it was what it was, and he had been quite confused himself at first as well. Shaizen was willing to offer more knowledge based on the key he knew about, the one carried by a high-ranking guild official in this guild of scribes. But a key small enough to be carried on one's neck… That didn't seem right. Xion's key had been huge. Larger than many swords. The key Shaizen was talking about seemed like it held some importance as well, but… But it probably wasn't the key they were looking for.

A quiet, thoughtful mhh escaped the Yuke's helmet as he continued following the man quite absentmindedly. It wasn't long until the man brought his own follow-up question, snapping him out of his thoughts.
"Ah. Well, it is not just any key we are looking for, it is apparently a quite special key indeed," he started not even sure how much he knew of the key they were looking for,
"And it's hardly a small key, in the first place. It could ah, even be wielded as a weapon. About this size," Marmadue continued and would have shown Shaizen the approximation of the size with his hands, had they been free. But as he was still carrying the box, the best he could do was get one hand free and use the box as his other hand, indeed marking out quite the gigantic key in the air. It was a good thing he had seen one before with his own eyes, or he probably wouldn't have really bought it himself…

"…It apparently holds the ah, if you pardon the pun, key to saving this world. And possibly ah, other worlds, I suppose."