Toy Box pt 1
Toy Box pt 1
Deciding it was time to expand their search and go to new worlds, Riku took them through the gate and they landed on a new world. When the ship landed they were someplace dark, with just enough light from the ship for the trio to make their way outside.
“Where are we?” Riku questioned as they looked around. They seemed to be underneath something large, providing them cover for the ship. They walked forward until they came across a source of light and…
“Is that a giant ball?” Lea stated, pointing out a large rubber ball with a star on it. It was so big that it seemed more like a giant round boulder than a ball.
“And… that looks like a xylophone,” Aqua said in awe, pointing out the large children’s toy. “However, it seems much bigger than normal.”
When they finally reached a more open area and the source of the light, Riku noticed that they were in the bedroom of a child with the toys scattered across the floor and posters on the walls. But the thing is…
“Wait… did we shrink?!” Riku exclaimed when he saw that what they had been under was a bed. And based on the size of the furniture, they must have been no more than six inches tall.
“Holy crap, we did!” Lea gasped when he looked down at himself. “Our bodies changed, too!”
Riku looked down at himself and saw that, yes, their appearances had changed. Now, it looked like their bodies were made of plastic, with their clothes physically a part of them. He looked up and saw that Aqua’s and Lea’s features were slightly different. Aqua’s sleeveless top had turned into a blue and gray jacket, half her skirt was missing and seemed shorter, and a pair of glasses had appeared on her face. Lea now wore a black jacket with the sleeves ending halfway down his arms, hands black, most likely to resemble gloves, and a black and red fedora on his head. His hair also seemed more tame than usual, it changed to look like it was held back in a low ponytail. Riku noticed that his own outfit seemed to stay the same except for a few color changes here and there.
“I remember Mickey telling me about this before we left,” Aqua said in awe as she looked over herself. “He had given Lea and I these glass pins and told us that we would change depending on the world.”
“Oh, yeah,” Lea nodded as he remembered. “Something about ‘world border’ or something?”
“’Order’,” Aqua corrected him with a sigh and a roll of her eyes. At least Riku now knew that the pin Mickey gave him did its job.
Just then, Riku sensed a dark presence in the room and looked around, gasping when several Shadows and Toy Troopers spawned a few feet away.
“Heartless!” Riku shouted as he ran forward, summoning Braveheart as a Shadow jumped at him, slicing it in two mid jump. Aqua and Lea gasped as they, too, summoned their weapons and joined in the fray.
It didn’t take long and soon, the Heartless were gone. With the area safe for now, the three wielders dismissed their weapons.
“Are they new?”
Riku, Aqua, and Lea turned when they heard someone speak. Approaching them were… toys?
“Guess that explains why we look the way we do,” Lea whispered to Riku, who nodded as he examined the newcomers. There was a cowboy, a spaceman, a green dinosaur, and a piggy bank.
“Wait, you look familiar!” the dinosaur exclaimed as he rushed forward, stopping at Riku, who watched him in amusement. “I’m sure I know you! You’re, uh, um, you’re—”
“Yazora!” the piggy bank said as he joined the dinosaur, who agreed with a delighted “yeah”.
“I’m sorry, but my name is Riku,” the silver haired teen corrected them, but they didn’t seem to hear him as they both chatted excitedly to each other.
“Seems like you have a fan,” Lea said with a smirk, Aqua giggling next to him. Riku could only glare at them when he noticed a red dot appear on his chest.
“Stay back,” the spaceman threatened them, getting into a defensive position as he pointed an arm at them, and from there Riku could see the light of a laser. The three of them hesitated to raise their hands, looking at each other in confusion. “For all we know, the intruders sent them.” It was quite obvious that the spaceman toy didn’t trust them.
“But it’s Yazora!” the dinosaur gasped as he did his best to hug Riku with his short arms, almost knocking the teen over. Riku instantly felt uncomfortable while his would-be friends continued to chuckle.
“Slow down, Rex,” the cowboy said with a smile, but he, too, seemed wary of them. “We don’t know them.”
“It’s okay, we can trust them,” Rex said with a big toothy smile. “They’re the number-one-selling heroes in the country!”
“Andy’s mom must’ve bought them for him,” the piggy bank added.
“Right! You saw how they took care of the intruders! They must be here to figure out where our friends are! Or, how Buzz’s laser is now all laser-ing, and all the other weird stuff! That’s a hero’s job!”
Riku only felt more confused at the one-sided conversation that took place in front of them. He looked back at Aqua and Lea, who also seemed to be lost.
The cowboy appeared to think on it as he looked over the three of them, rubbing his chin.
“Woody, be smart,” the spaceman, most likely Buzz as he was the only one with a laser, said to the cowboy. Woody looked over at his friend, back at the newcomers, then smiled.
“So, you must be Andy’s new toys, right?” he asked them, Buzz watching him in shock.
“I… guess?” Riku said in a confused voice, knowing that they had to maintain the order, so he did his best to play along.
“Well, you sure did a number on those intruders,” Woody added.
“Those were the Heartless,” Aqua said as she stepped forward. “They are dangerous monsters that steal the hearts of others.”
“You could say we’ve been dealing with them for a while,” Lea said with a smirk, making Rex light up.
“I knew it!” the dinosaur exclaimed excitedly.
“Then, in that case, you’re fine by me,” the cowboy toy said with a smile. “The name’s Woody. Put ‘er there.”
“Nice to meet you,” Riku said with a smile as he shook hands with the toy. “I’m Riku—”
“Yazora!” Rex cried out again as he hugged Riku again, making the teen groan while his companions laughed.
“Knock it off!” he said as he pushed the dinosaur off him. “My name is Riku, seriously!”
“And my name is Aqua,” the blue haired woman said with a smile and a wave.
“The name’s Lea,” the redhead said with a smirk and a finger on his temple. “Got it memorized?”
“I’m… Buzz Lightyear,” the spaceman said after a moment, still not fully trusting them.
“And I’m Hamm,” the piggy bank said with a nod. “It’s an honor.”
“And I’m Rex, your biggest fan!” the dinosaur exclaimed, bouncing slightly in excitement. He then started ranting about how he’s played their “game” for months, and something about a Bahamut and a Slinky, but soon he was interrupted by some new voices.
“All troops at attention!”
Riku looked down in surprise when he saw five green army men hop towards him, stopping at his feet to salute him and his companions.
“Wheeeee!”
The three keyblade wielders quickly jumped out of the way when a skateboard rolled towards them to stop at the nightstand, three little alien toys hopping off to circle around them.
“Strangers,” one said as it raised its arms to Lea, who watched them in amusement.
“From the outside,” another said, waving to Aqua, making her giggle at their cute mannerism.
“Welcome,” the last of them said to Riku.
“I guess all toys are alive here,” Riku remarked in slight amazement. The outside from his islands really is an amazing place.
“So, you said that you’ve battled those intruders before,” Buzz said, crossing his arms at them. “Tell us where they came from.”
“Uh…” Riku halted, trying to figure out a way to explain the Heartless to them that made sense without telling them about the other worlds. Aqua and Lea also seemed to be at a loss for words: Aqua had never come across anyone this persistent in learning about their enemy before, and Lea– back when he was still ‘Axel’– never cared about the ‘world order’ or maintaining it.
“Well? They must’ve come from someplace,” the spaceman pestered them.
“Take it easy, Buzz,” Woody said with a smile. “What matters is that they got rid of them.” The other toys voiced their agreements. Buzz looked to the others with a soft gaze, but didn’t seem fully convinced.
“Have you seen those intruders– the Heartless– around here a lot?” Riku asked the toys. “Have they been a problem?”
“Nope, not until recently,” Woody said with a shake of his head.
“In fact, they didn’t show up until right after all our friends vanished,” Buzz added with a frown, Woody nodding in agreement. Riku looked to Aqua and Lea with worried looks.
“It can’t be a coincidence,” Aqua said as she crossed her arms in thought, the boys nodding.
“It wasn’t always this lonely,” Woody said with a sad look on his face. “One day we woke up, and they were just gone. And we haven’t seen or heard from Andy, Mom, or Molly either.” He then lifted one of his feet, looking down at a sloppily written “Andy” on the bottom of his boot, written in marker or something and slightly faded from years of wear. “We keep waiting for Andy to come home.”
“You really care about him,” Riku remarked with a sad frown as well, gaining Woody’s attention. The toy smiled as he dropped his foot to the ground.
“Yeah. He’s the best friend a toy could ever have.” All the other toys smiled brightly – even Buzz – as they agreed with him.
“Then, if we all work together, maybe we can learn where they went while also looking for the source of the Heartless,” Riku said with a smile. “Has anything else strange happened recently, aside from them?” Woody rubbed his chin in thought, looking up at the sky.
“Well… there is one thing,” he said.
“One big thing,” Hamm added.
“Huge, sir,” one of the army men also added.
“What thing?” Rex asked, looking to his friends curiously.
“When our friends went MIA, those ‘Heartless’ didn’t come alone,” Buzz said with a frown. “They arrived with a guy in a black coat, the only other toy we’ve seen aside from you three.”
“A black coat?” Riku repeated as he looked to his friends, who all glared knowingly.
“It could be them,” Aqua said.
“Or Sora,” Lea added, reminding them that Sora might have taken refuge in this new world.
“You know them?” Woody asked curiously.
“Sorta,” Riku said to the toys. “The thing is, it could be someone we are looking for, a friend of mine who went missing after bad things happened to him. But, it could also be a group called the Organization, who are bad news. We won’t know until we see their face.”
“If it’s the Organization, then they most likely are the reason everything is going wrong here,” Aqua said as she stepped forward. “But don’t worry, we’ll take care of them.”
“’Fraid not,” Woody said with a shake of his head, Buzz agreeing with him. The three wielders cocked their heads in confusion. “If this ‘Organization’ is responsible for our friends vanishing, then they’re our problem, too. We’ve got to work together.” Riku looked back at the others, sharing a silent conversation before they all nodded with a smile.
“Okay,” Riku said as he turned back to Woody. “Where was the last place you saw the black coat?”
“Sarge!” Woody called out as he turned to the army men, one standing at attention. “Any news from the recon team?”
“The latest reports place him in town, sir!” Sarge said with a salute. “At Galaxy Toys!”
“Then that’s where we start our search,” Buzz said with a smile, looking up at the open window. “Let’s move out!”
===
With some help from Woody and Buzz, Riku and the others figured out how to get up to the window and down to the driveway without accidentally breaking upon hitting the concrete. They did encounter a few more Heartless as they tried to leave the property, but Woody and Buzz proved that they could handle their own, and they learned what Rex meant earlier about the spaceman’s laser going ‘laser-ing’ when the small beam of light did some serious damage. Once the Heartless were dealt with, it was time for the long trek out of the neighborhood and into town.
Thanks to the toys, they didn’t get lost along the way and somehow managed to reach the toy store before the day’s end. The automated doors opened as they approached them, revealing a multi-floored toy store with a large spaceship themed structure at the center. The first floor seemed to be mostly decorated to advertise a space themed video game, what with the posters all over the walls and the large mecha toys on display. Lea looked up at one of the large toys, a sign next to it reading ‘’Verum Rex’ Gigas Now Available’.
“Why doesn’t that toy move?” the redhead asked Woody as he stopped next to him. The cowboy looked up at the stationary toy curiously.
“Guess it hasn’t figured it out yet,” he stated as he titled his hat slightly. Lea was confused by that statement.
“I can make it move for you,” a new voice said from above, everyone looking up in shock when a dark corridor appeared on top of the spaceship structure at the center of the store, a black coat stepping out. They lowered their hood to reveal a young man with dark skin, silver hair slicked back, and narrowed amber yellow eyes. Riku’s eyes went wide when he saw him.
“You’re the one from the Sleeping Realms!” he shouted as he glared at him. “One of the Xehanorts who kidnapped Sora!” The young man smirked at the teen.
“I’m flattered you remember me,” he remarked as he waved his hand, several Toy Troopers spawning in the store. One of them jumped up and climbed into the helmet of one of the immobile Gigas, the helmet closing and the toy jerking to life as it turned towards the group.
“Oh no! They do move!” Woody exclaimed as the toy stomped towards them, lifting its large arms into the air.
“Way cool!” Hamm said as he waddled towards the toy, not recognizing the danger until one of the arms came towards him in a punch.
“Look out!” Aqua shouted as she jumped in front of the piggy bank, summoning a barrier just in time to block the attack, Hamm crying out in shock as Woody pulled him someplace safe. Riku and Lea joined Aqua as they summoned their weapons, the young Xehanort watching them in amusement.
“Truly impressive,” the dark skinned youth remarked as he watched the three wielders force the controlled toy back. “One heart’s shadow filling the emptiness of another to bring it to life, like Heartless and Nobody, working together as a whole.”
“Why are you doing this?” Riku demanded from the young Xehanort.
“Because of a certainsomeone,” the teen stated as he smirked at Riku. “We are missing a darkness we must reclaim. The way hearts work in this world could be of use to us, so I split the world along with the hearts in it to see how they react. I wonder how you’ll take the strain.”
“So, you are the one responsible for our missing friends!” Woody exclaimed as he glared at the young man, who smirked at him as another dark corridor appeared.
“Don’t let me down,” he said before disappearing in the portal, leaving them to their supposed demise as more Gigas came to life.
“Get to safety!” Aqua shouted as she erected more barriers around them, nearly depleting her magic as everyone ran for cover. It was just in time as some of the Gigas began to shoot at them using the guns on their arms. Riku ended up next to Lea and Aqua behind a standing display, Buzz and Woody just a few feet away from them while Hamm, Rex, and the three aliens ran for some shelves nearby. “How are we supposed to fight these?” Aqua wondered aloud as she peeked out from behind her cover, pulling back when a laser nearly hit her.
Riku wondered as well as he looked around the toy store. Those Gigas were nearly three times bigger than the wielders, and there were at least four of them out there, and, on top of the multiple Toy Troopers running around, this would not be an easy fight. His eyes then landed on a Gigas standing dormant on a nearby wall display.
“I have an idea!” Riku exclaimed as he got his companions attention. “Cover for me!” He then dashed out into the open, dodging several lasers while Aqua cast her final barrier on him, protecting him from any he was too slow to dodge. Using the shelves, Riku got up to the wall display and jumped into the empty helmet of the Gigas, the helmet closing as he grabbed the controls. And just like before, the Gigas jerked to life, and they had their advantage.
===
With Riku controlling the Gigas, it was easier to take on the Heartless. Aqua, Lea, and the toys fought the Toy Troopers while Riku took on the Gigas, drawing them away from his smaller weaker companions until they no longer had to worry about the smaller Heartless and could help him tag-team the larger threats. When the robot Riku was controlling started to take too much damage, he bailed it and simply ran for another, and this continued until all the Heartless were gone and no more toys came to life.
“He was being controlled?” Buzz stated as he stared up at the Gigas that came to life before, now standing dormant again after the Heartless controlling it disappeared. “He wasn’t just thrown into battle mode by accident?”
“Is something wrong?” Aqua asked him, frowning slightly as she watched the spaceman toy.
“Nothing,” he said dismissively, shaking his head as he glared at the ground.
“Was that the guy you were looking for?” Woody asked Riku as he jumped out of the toy robot. “What did he mean before about ‘splitting’ the world?”
“No, that wasn’t Sora,” Riku said with a frown as he friends joined him. He knew he shouldn’t have gotten his hopes up earlier.
“From what I’m getting…” Lea mumbled as she scratched his head. “He must have created a copy of this world and put your missing friends in one of them.”
“Like the data Twilight Town,” Riku said, Lea nodding in agreement. “Basically one is the real world and the other is a very convincing copy.”
“You can’t be serious,” Buzz declared with another shake of his head, not at all convinced by their ‘wild tale’. “Oh, yeah, that’s right: you’re from a video game! But, in the real world, you can’t ‘split’ a world in two.” Riku looked back at Aqua and Lea with a frown. How would they be able to explain this to him without violating the rules anymore than they already had, thanks to the young Xehanort?
“I’ll admit, it does sound far-fetched,” Woody said with a nod as he turned to Buzz. “But… let’s say we are in an alternate world? That would explain why your laser is real now, and all the other weird things. Is it really that crazy? Any worse than ‘evil emperors’ and ‘protecting the galaxy’?” The cowboy smiled when Buzz flinched at his words, clearing his throat to regain his composure.
“Point taken,” the spaceman said. “But that just means they are part of the delusion as well,” he indicated towards the three wielders.
“Is that how you treat a friend?” Lea asked him with a glare, crossing his arms. The redhead gasped a soft “ow” when Riku elbowed him in the side, giving him a glare that screamed ‘not now’.
“We know this is a lot to take in,” Aqua said with a shrug. “But for the time being, we need to stick together, at least until we learn what’s going on here.”
“Aqua’s right,” Woody said as he took a step towards his friend. “C’mon! Every toy deserves a fair shake.”
“Tell it to that toy,” Buzz said with a frown as he pointed at the Gigas before turning his back to them. Woody looked over at the wielders and gave them an apologetic frown, making them sigh in defeat. This was going to be a tough day.
“Sheriff, sir!” Sarge shouted as he hopped forward, followed closely by his men. “Rex has been dino-napped, and Hamm and the aliens are MIA!”
Scratch that: it was going to get worse.