Finally we are back! So sorry this took so long, there was life, school, and other things that got in the way. But we finally have returned to this story!

Thank you all who have been reading this. I am glad you are all enjoying this story. Now let's continue!

Ch.5

The following morning everyone was preparing for the journey. Everyone was gathering items or checking in with family. Riku on the other hand was sitting in his room, thinking things over. There wasn't much else for him to do anyways. He was still an outsider here. Though now Cecil knew that fact, but Riku knew that it wouldn't be a problem. He knew Cecil would help keep that a secret from the others.

The night of explaining everything to Cecil really did help him though. Never did Riku think he would ever tell anyone his story, but when put in the situation he found it wasn't as hard as he had thought. Not only that, but Cecil had listened politely to everything Riku had to say. He was curious about everything, but also knew to listen as Riku explained. It really had helped him feel a bit better about things now that someone knew his secret.

There was still a lot of other things Riku had to think about though. He still hadn't figured out why the Heartless had shown up here. Riku hoped that he would find the answers he was looking for along the rest of his journey with Cecil and the others. Riku closed his eyes and thought of Sora. He tried thinking what Sora would be doing if he was here. Sora had been in these situations far more than him. He probably would know what to do. Riku chuckled as he thought of Sora with his goofy grin. But before he could contemplate any further, a knock could be heard from the door. Once Riku opened it, Rosa was on the other side.

"I hope I'm not disturbing you, Riku."

Riku looked up and shook his head, "No, it's alright. Is there something you need?"

"Cecil told me that you aided him when we were in the Tower of Zot. And I want to properly thank you, Riku."

Riku rubbed the back of his neck. He still was not use to getting thanks for helping people out. It was a tab bit overwhelming for Riku. He wasn't exactly sure how to respond. "Oh. You're welcome."

Rosa chuckled "You're not used to compliments, are you?" She said as she smiled.

Riku found himself chuckling slightly, "No, not really. But I'm getting use to it." He remembered back when he was in the sleeping world's people had thanked him for helping out, and he wasn't exactly sure how to act or respond. Now though, he was at least a little more use to hearing things like that.

"I am glad to hear it. I fondly remember Cecil being as shy as you are, when Kain and I met him." Rose said as she had a look of nostalgia.

Slightly caught off guard, Riku straightened up at the sudden comment, "Um.. what?"

"Oh, Sorry. I was just reminiscing. I didn't mean to make this awkward."

"It's alright. I understand," Riku said.

"In any case, I believe that we are ready to go."

Riku stood up and nodded. The two of them headed out of the room and started walking down the hallway. As they walked, curiosity flowed around Riku's head. He knew he shouldn't ask to many questions, but he couldn't help himself. He found himself to be rather curious about this world and the people in it. "So how long have you know Cecil and Kain?"

"Since we were little. Kain's father was the captain of the Dragoons. And we were close friends. That is, until we met Cecil. He was but a mere orphan when the former king raised him as his own."

Riku raised an eyebrow at Rosa's comment, "So you and Kain were already friends before you met Cecil?"

"Not right away. But after a few years, we all became the best of friends."

Riku thought to himself as the continued to walk. Yet again there was another thing in this world that reminded him of his own life. Cecil, Kain, and Rosa had been close friends since they were young, just like he was with Sora and Kairi. And not only that, but what Rosa said about Cecil kind of reminded him of when Kairi first showed up on the islands. Now the question Riku thought was… just where was Cecil from then?

Soon they arrived down in the front of the castle, where everyone else was preparing to head out. With all the supplies and everything on the ship, they casted off in search of the place they needed to bring the Magma stone to.

As the ship flew the sky, over the land and the sea, Riku stared off at the view. He was lost in his thoughts again over everything. The Heartless problem was still bothering him, he wanted to find out the reason why they had shown up as soon as he could. He only hoped that he wasn't the cause of them showing up the first time.

"There has to be another possible reason...It can't be because I came here though a dark corridor… could it? Maybe that Golbez guy really is the cause of them appearing here…There was a lot of darkness to him..." Riku thought to himself as he stared at the passing land below. "I hope I can figure this out sooner than later...I don't want this world to be lost to the Heartless."

"I am assuming that it must've been a while since seeing the sea like this, other than your island home." Cecil said as he walked up to Riku from behind.

"Huh?" Riku asked as he was pulled from his thoughts. It took him a few seconds to process what Cecil had just said, but he soon had his answer. "Yeah I guess. Though the sea here is nothing compared to back home."

"I'll bet... Though this is just another one of those days where another comrade of ours dies in front of us. First Rydia, then Palom and Porom... and now Tellah. Sometimes I wonder if their deaths were my fault. Like I have somehow failed them." Cecil said in a saddened tone.

Riku stared at Cecil, seeing the doubt and sadness fill his eyes. It hadn't even been a day since the events that transpired at the Tower of Zot. Those events that resulted in Tellah's death. Riku still felt a bit bad that he had never said anything to console the others. They had known Tellah far better than he did, so he was still a little on the sides on knowing what to do. In fact Riku couldn't even recall anytime in his journey where he had to deal with someone dying. It was not something he was use to. But right now he knew he had to say something to help Cecil.

"It's not your fault," Riku started as he thought over his words carefully. He tried thinking like how Sora would. Sora would know how to help cheer someone up. Riku knew he could do it, he just had to think a little more. Though he knew he still wasn't great at that type of thing. "Things… happen like that. You shouldn't try to keep putting the blame on yourself. Trust me, I know about that at least."

Cecil starred at Riku for a moment... before slightly smiling and had a dry chuckle

"I suppose since you've been to other worlds, it would make sense that you would have more wisdom than I. Though, I do wonder what Golbez's motivations were for keeping me alive in the first place. I find it rather odd that he would simply stay his hand when he had the chance to kill me right then and there."

"I agree. There is something suspicious about him… I just can't figure out what it is yet. I just know there is a connection with him and the darkness. Perhaps… even the same darkness that brought the Heartless here" Riku replied. He didn't want to say anything about the darkness and Heartless too soon, as he couldn't confirm anything yet, but it just sort of came out during the conversation.

"You're probably right. This is too much of a coincidence to ignore. Something is very wrong, here." Cecil Said as Kain approached the group

"We're arriving at our destination. The Island of Agart is our most likely target," Kain explained.

Soon enough the airship came to land just outside of the island of Agart. Everyone disembarked from the ship and began to explore the village. From what they could tell, everything looked peaceful and there were no signs of Heartless or any other monsters.

It wasn't long though before they walked up to a large well that was in the center of the place. One of the village folk had said to them before they approached that the well was a symbol of their town and was said to be deeper than anything else ever. Soon the group stood in front of the well as Cecil approached, with the magma stone in hand. Just as he held it out over the well something seemed a bit strange.

"What's this?!" Cecil questioned as he turned back to the group. He held out the stone for them to see and they all looked on in surprise.

"It's glowing!" Kain exclaimed.

Cid stepped forward as he held out his hand. "Let me see it."

Cecil handed him the stone and he quickly started to inspect it. "That's strange. It's getting warmer… Ouch!" Cid shouted as he jumped back and forth.

Everyone could tell that the stone must have gotten too hot to hold. As Cid shouted some more, he ended up letting go of the stone and it flew right down into the well. Within seconds the ground started to shake, and a large rumbling was heard from nearby.

"What in the world in happening?" Cecil shouted over the rumbling, but his voice was lost to the loud sounds of something tearing apart.

A bursting sound drew everyone's attention upwards to the distance mountains outside of the village. They started to notice that the distant mountain outside of town had begun to crack open and erupt with a scorching fury for well for a couple of minutes before dying down into smoke, revealing a large gaping hole in its wake. Surprising not only the group, but the townspeople as well.

"Oh my goodness," said Rosa once everything had calmed down.

"This is it. This is our chance to sneak into the underworld," Kain said in a determined tone.

"Let's hurry then," Riku said as they all headed back to the airship.

As soon as they were boarded, Cid started up the ship and piloted it up onto the air. High above the mountains now they could see the large, gaping hole that had been formed. From what they could tell it was nothing but darkness below.

The Ship slowly lowered downward into the hole itself. It took an hour to completely fly down inside it, before they all started to notice the temperature starting to rise. And witnessed a barren and somewhat rocky wasteland, surrounded by sea's of magma everywhere.

"This is the underworld? It... it feels rather unnerving," Rosa said as she shuddered slightly.

"There is no mistaking it. This is the land of darkness after all," Kain said.

"So now where should we head?" Riku asked as he looked out at the vastly different landscape.

"We should find locations that house Dark Crystals. That should be enough to allow us to keep them safe from Golbez's clutches," Cecil said.

The airship was maneuvering the landscape, careful to not fly too close to the magma. Everything seemed quiet before Yang noticed something in the corner in his eye. There was something in the distance and it was getting closer to them. Soon the sound of engines was heard by everyone. Cecil turned too look and his eyes widened.

"Those are...?"

"The Red wings!" Kain exclaimed, surprise in his voice.

"I wonder what is going on," Rosa wondered as she tried to see what was off in the distance.

"What could they already be doing down here?" Cecil questioned.

"But just what are they doing?" Riku added.

"Let's go take a look then," Cid said as he started to stir the ship in the direction of the other airships.

The airship flew in closer to get a better look at what was going on. They saw that the Red Wings ships were firing their canons down at a bunch of tanks that ran along the ground. Cid carefully tried to pilot the ship right over head from the battle, but the ships and the tanks still continue to fire, with some of the hits colliding into the ship.

Everyone tried their best to brace onto something as the ship shook with each hit. Cid tried to fly the ship farther from the battle, but they were still getting struck by both sides.

"It seems we weren't fast enough!" Yang stated over the firing from the battle.

"But who are they fighting?" Cecil asked.

The ship continued to be bombarded with hits. Everything shook as Cid tried his best to keep a steady hand on the wheel.

"Hold on tight! We've got to break through this line! Come on, Enterprise! I know you're hurting! Just hold on a bit longer for me, girl!" Cid shouted. Suddenly the ship shook once more from another hit. The engines sputter and made a series of strange sounds all of the sudden. "Uh-oh!" Cid tried to stir the ship some more but it was quickly descending down towards the ground.

the Airship couldn't handle all this firepower both sides were firing upon, before the ship couldn't take it any longer, and started to crash on to the terrain below them!

"We're crashing!" Said Cecil in a panicked tone

There was hardly any time to react or do much else of anything anything, but everyone quickly grabbed onto something on the deck of the ship as it plummeted down. The ship hit the ground with a harsh impact and no one was able to hold on tight any longer. Everyone let out a groan as they were harshly knock to the floor of the ship by the force of the impact.

A few minutes later, one by one, each of the group started to wake up, save for Riku and Cecil. Worrying about their safety, Rosa carefully casted Cura on them, in case they were injured... or worse.

"Cecil, Riku...?" Rosa said in a concerned tone.

Cecil was the first one to wake back up as he opened his eyes and slowly stood up. Just a few seconds after him Riku groaned as he opened his eyes to look around. The ship was now at rest on the ground and everyone seemed to be fine.

"Rosa...Is everybody all right?" Cecil asked once he saw everyone standing around, looking fine after the crash.

Cid sighed. "Everyone but my poor ship. We won't be able to fly her anymore. Not like

this."

"Then I suppose we go by foot from here," Cecil replied.

"But where are we going to go around here?" Riku asked as they all started to disembark from the ship.

"There must be some place that we can go to," Kain said as the group began their twerk along the strange Underworld land.

As they begun their walk, they could see a small castle off in the distance Without much else to go on, they decided to make their way towards it, hoping there could be those there to help them.

And that wraps up chapter 5. Again sorry it's been a while. But we got things planned for the next bit. It's going to get interesting. See you guys next time!