A/N: I've always wanted to write out what could have happened in the fall of Radiant Garden. After BBS, I got super excited when I realized that Leon would have been the same age as Isa when Radiant Garden fell. That means that Leon could have theoretically been friends with both Isa and Lea!
This is going to be canon in my mind until we find out exactly how it all went down in BBS v2. A massive, massive thank you to my Beta DigitalTart for going over this with a fine tooth comb and giving out suggestions. =)
Disclaimer: Nomura owns everything. But it would be nice if he could throw us a bone about when the next KH game will come out...
Chapter One: The Scooby Crew
Sixteen-year-old Squall Leonheart occasionally wondered what precisely it was in his heart that made him chose the friends he had now. Sure, Isa was definitely more his speed, but Lea? He didn't know if he wanted to face palm or smack him across the head half of the time. And yet Isa seemed to be quite satisfied with their little trio.
So what was it that was making Squall question his choices today? Oh yes, his current situation: he was standing in front of the locked gates to the Radiant Garden Palace with Isa, Lea, and two girls much younger than them. The back courtyard was almost as empty as a tomb under the partly cloudy sky, except for one or two people passing by. They paid little attention to the small group of people who were standing clustered together by the gates. Squall had no idea why no one had yet to notice them.
Personally, Squall blamed Lea's habit of picking up "stray puppies" for the presence of the girls.
Squall glanced at the two young girls and sighed. Lea and Isa apparently knew the youngest (something about the girl and her grandma being Lea's neighbors). She looked no older than five, and was peering curiously up at everyone with wide eyes. The older one had been keeping an eye out on her younger companion, as the tiny girl had wandered over and innocently demanded to know what Squall and his friends were up to.
They were plotting to break into the castle.
Over the past month, gossip around the town had started to spread when the headstrong teenage daughter of Ansem the Wise, Elenar, quite abruptly moved out of the castle and into a small cottage of her own at the edge of town. She had taken only as much as she could carry. The gossip ranged from wild tales to downright malicious ones about the girl's morality, the latter coming from some rather cruel girls that Squall knew from the orphanage. Lea, the only one out of the three teenage boys that was really friends with Elenar (and that was using the term 'friends' very loosely), shut them up quite firmly, defending the hot-tempered blonde. Upon quietly asking Lea the real story, the redhead sighed and ran a hand through his spiky hair.
"It's not my place to say, Squall. But I can tell you this...I've never heard Elenar talk about her dad's apprentices with so much hatred in her voice before."
Not only did that single statement pique Squall's interest about the mysterious goings-on of the castle, but it gave new drive to Lea and Isa's consistent attempts to try and break in. At first, it had been because of juvenile attempts to become one of Ansem's legendary apprentices, engineered by Lea. Squall tended to prefer to stay out of those little 'adventures,' mostly because the idea of joining an elite group of people like Ansem's apprentices was never his style.
But over the course of a month, not a single member of Radiant Garden had heard, seen, or had any contact with their serene ruler. A new type of gossip was spreading, and it was one that was slowly starting to cause panic in their otherwise pristine world.
What if there wasn't anyone in the castle?
The idea of Radiant Garden without a ruler would cause political unrest and chaos the quicker it spread. After almost two weeks without hearing from any of the castle's residents, people began to attempt to break into the majestic castle, but not a soul could get the massive padlocks on the front and back main gates to open. Initially, the groups that started to come round the clock each day numbered roughly half a dozen. Two days later, that number had tripled. Radiant Garden had a very limited police force, and what little there was of law enforcement quickly became overwhelmed with the growing number of groups at the gates, attempting to break in. By the end of the week of the first attempt to break into the castle, the head of Radiant Garden's small law enforcement team had immediately placed a ban on people trying to break into the castle, and left that as a task meant for themselves.
Yet even then, Captain Quistis Trepe had an overwhelming amount of responsibility on her hands. It was, Leon reflected as he stood at the gate with his friends and the two young girls, a miracle that the city had yet to riot. Quistis's leadership over the past month had successfully managed to prevent a riot, but nobody knew for how long that would last.
Quitis sent two officers to attempt to break in, and rotated them between the morning, afternoon, and evenings. She did this on a constant and daily basis. When the officers began to despair and look to take a break, there were usually a handful of citizens looking to encourage them and cheer them on. Sometimes, an occasionally angry and panicked member would start harassing the officers, but they were calmed down before anyone was seriously hurt. Sometimes, Squall would see Quistis herself hard at work, either trying to get the lock open or patrolling the outer perimeter looking for a way inside.
When Squall had hidden in the bushes with Lea and Isa, the both of them trying to persuade Lea that his "undeniable charm" would, in fact, not work to persuade Quistis's gruff officers that the three of them should be given a shot at unlocking the padlock, the officers were immediately called away by one of their co-workers. The woman's face looked incredibly worried, and while she was talking to the other two officers at the gate, Leon caught the words 'outside the castle.' That was when both of the men at the gate promptly drew out their weapons and followed the woman out of the courtyard. When it was obvious the coast was clear, Leon, Lea, and Isa bolted out of the bushes and rushed up to the gate. The young girls had appeared moments later.
Lea was convinced that him, Squall, and Isa would be the ones to finally break through the gates and find out why Ansem and his apprentices hadn't been heard from in a month. Squall wasn't so sure. Squall however, was becoming unsure about a great number of things over the past month. His girlfriend had taken to staying with him overnight, fretting over a number of conversations that she had begun to eavesdrop on. Apparently her father and some of his friends were planning a forced invasion, unsatisfied with the way the Chief was handling things. At first, Squall was skeptical. Rinoa's father was one of the richest men in the city, but he didn't have enough clout to gather a full-blown rebellion together.
He had changed his mind when he had come to Rinoa's place to pick her up on a date three days ago. Cid Highwind and Vincent Valentine had been sitting at the kitchen table with Rinoa's father, the three of them looking incredibly secretive. Leon knew firsthand that Cid and Rinoa's father had a very difficult time getting along with each other.
"Lock picks?" Lea asked.
"Here." With an unceremonial flourish, Isa handed over a ragtag collection of jagged items that included straightened and bent paperclips, and hairpins donated by girls of the orphanage Squall lived in (courtesy of Squall). All of them were slipped in a bundled mess on a worn key ring. Isa then handed to Lea a thin, sharply bent slab of metal.
Lea beamed at Isa before frowning at the metal piece. "What's this?"
Isa raised an eyebrow. "A tension wrench. You need it to pick the lock properly."
"Oh right!" Lea grinned at his close friend. "I knew that." Has he took the key ring and the tension wrench, the metal pieces on the key ring jangling as he immediately picked a thick, straight blade, sliding it in the lock and wiggling it around.
"Aren't you supposed to put your ear near the lock?"
Everyone looked down at the small girl except Lea, who just continued to fiddle. "Why?"
The small girl shrugged. "Cid from across the street said you havta hear a clicking noise. Then you know you've unlocked the padlock!"
Lea blinked, and turned his head to look down at the girl. "Cid said that?"
The small girl nodded. "Mmm-hmm!"
The older girl frowned, straightening the hem of her blue and white lace dress. "Kairi, where did you hear that?"
"Grandma cracked my window open the other night for fresh air when she tucked me in for bed," the girl explained. "Cid was talking to the neighbors outside about breaking into the castle." Kairi paused. "He was loud."
This earned a chuckle from the boys. Despite the sudden and uncomfortable churning in his gut, he smiled at Kairi. "That's Cid for you." Squall laughed quietly before turning to the older girl. "So why are you two here again?"
"I wanna see you guys break in!" Kairi said eagerly.
"I want to make sure Kairi doesn't get into any trouble. Her grandmother told me to watch her." The auburn haired girl looked no older than ten, and was incredibly soft spoken. "I'm Aerith, by the way."
"Isa," he said, and gave Aerith a nod. "This is Squall." Isa gestured to Squall, who smiled when Kairi gave him an enthusiastic wave. Isa then glanced at his red headed friend who was busy furiously wiggling the lock pick around. Isa then smirked at Lea, saying "And this is Lea, who's being an idiot and not picking the lock properly."
"Hey!"
Kairi giggled at Lea's indignant protests.
"I've never seen you pick one of these, you always have me do the work!" he complained.
Isa shrugged, his blue eyes dancing while the rest of his face remained stoic. "You're the one that wants to be ah—what was it, a jack of all trades? That includes picking locks."
Squall snickered. Lea scowled while Kairi scooted out from underneath Aerith's skirts and up to Lea. Lea frowned. "What?"
"I want to help!" Kairi piped up at him, bouncing excitedly on the balls of her feet. Aerith smothered a giggle while Squall cracked a small smile, wondering vaguely what Kairi would look like if she were a puppy.
Lea, on the other hand, arched a brow at the small girl. "And what would you do to help me?"
"Listen for the lock to unlock! Grandma always said I had perfect hearing."
Lea sighed, resuming his previous task. He did, however, crack a smile. "Sure, why not. Just stay right where you are."
Except for rising on her tiptoes quite comically, Kairi did as she was told. After a few seconds, she gave a frustrated little huff. "Could someone pick me up please?"
Isa knelt down and hoisted Kairi up on his back so her ear could get closer to the lock. Squall gave a glance behind them.
"Hey guys," Squall said, pointing behind them. "There's a large group of people coming across the courtyard."
Isa turned and squinted before rolling his eyes. "Oh, they won't pay attention to us. It's just a group of fangirls all focused on Zack Fair and his 'heroic' travels."
Squall gave a snort. Zack was some mysterious warrior three years or so older than him, Isa, and Lea, that had come to Radiant Garden a few months ago. The story was that he had crash-landed on a ship from another world while in pursuit of his "quest to become a hero." While the story of the ship matched the strange occurrence of odd looking blocks falling from the sky not long before Zack's arrival, that still didn't stop Squall from rolling his eyes at the older teenager as he strutted around telling tales of angry dark gods, elemental titans, and three keyblade wielders that apparently made a big impression on him. While Zack simply wouldn't shut up about the blue haired female of the trio, the mention of the word keyblade perked an interest in Ansem and his apprentices, and there had been a short period of time where Zack had constantly been invited up to the castle. They had stopped about a month before Elenar made her strange exit.
Squall cringed outwardly at the high-pitched giggles of Zack's fans as the noise bounced around the courtyard. Kairi glanced towards the group, decided she wasn't impressed, and resumed her very intent listening of the lock.
"Argh, this is getting ridiculous!" Lea scowled.
Kairi jumped on Isa's knee, startled, as Lea dropped the clutter of picks in frustration.
Aerith frowned. "What is it?"
Lea stomped his foot angrily as Isa put Kairi down and stood up. "I found a pick that fits in perfectly, but the damn lock won't turn!"
"Well, that won't do us any good." Squall rolled his eyes. "You dropped the whole thing." He watched out of the corner of his eye as Zack led his troupe of giggling girls through the garden of the castle, around the corner, and out of sight.
Lea scowled again and looked at Squall. "You wanna try?"
"Wait!"
Everyone turned at Aerith's fearful protest. Her eyes were glued on some bushes at the edge of the courtyard. Out crept two small, strange creatures with yellow glowing eyes and black antennae. Three others were creeping behind the open gate at the far end of the garden. Squall's jaw locked.
Even the normally cool Isa looked slightly uneasy. "If we keep quiet, they'll just leave us alone."
Aerith grimaced. "Maybe we should go back to your grandmother's, Kairi, I don't like those creatures."
Kairi's eyes were locked onto the little black creatures. She was strangely silent for a few moments before finally responding. Her answer was surprisingly mature for a five year old. "I think...if we all stick together, we'll be ok." She moved away from Isa and grasped Aerith's hand reassuringly. Squall did, however, note the quiet fear in her eyes at the sight of the little black creatures.
Isa simply picked up the key ring. " You need to push up the pin in the lock Lea. That was probably your problem. Just sticking the lock pick in and wiggling it around won't do any good. Do you think you can remember which ones you tried?"
Lea handed Isa the tension wrench and the two of them debated over which picks Lea tried already. Squall glanced back at the courtyard and the gardens. The small black creatures had only started appearing around the castle roughly a week after Elenar's mysterious departure. They mostly crept around the gardens at night; appearing to enjoy dark, damp places. However, Squall couldn't help but notice how they were quietly multiplying after people saw the mysterious lack of activity in the castle. It was yet another thing for Chief Trepe to worry about. Squall had seen numerous posters around the streets of Radiant Garden looking for civilian recruits to work side by side with Quistis and her officers for a series of "special night missions." The civilian recruits would, of course, be trained rigorously for an unidentified period of time before they were able to go out on any mission with Quistis and her officers.
Squall's insides lurched uneasily. Were they doing the right thing by breaking in?
He turned to Aerith, who was looking at the castle windows with her brows furrowed. Squall looked at her curiously. "What is it?"
"Do you see her?"
"Who?" Squall followed the young girl's line of vision. The windows and curtains were drawn shut.
"There's someone in the castle. Or something." Aerith chewed on her lower lip, utterly perplexed. "It looked like a black and gree—"
"Yesssssssss!" Lea let out a triumphant yell that was immediately muffled by both Isa and Squall.
"Shhh!" Isa hissed. "We don't need everyone knowing that the door is finally unlocked!"
Squall felt a pair of small hands grip the material of his black pants. Kairi peered up at Lea and Isa. There was a light in her eyes, one that seemed to be simultaneously excited, curious, and fearful, as she peered past the group and gazed down the path to the castle doors. "Does this mean we get to go in?"
"Yep!" Lea grinned and gestured to Isa, who was pocketing the key ring. "You can thank Isa for that!"
"Well, don't thank me just yet, Kairi," Isa said as he gingerly pulled at the latch to the lock, which now came completely off. He let the padlock stay on the bar of the gate it was resting on while he worked to untangle the chains around them. Squall stepped forward to help.
Within seconds, the massive gate doors to the majestic castle at Radiant Garden creaked open. Everyone jumped at the loud noise the creaking made.
Squall couldn't help but grimace. "You sure you saw someone in there, Aerith?" He asked quietly. "These gates haven't been oiled in a while."
Aerith nodded, green eyes bright and searching as her eyes roamed the castle windows. "Positive."
"Well, what are we all waiting for?" Lea grinned encouragingly at everyone. "The mystery awaits us."
Isa rolled his eyes at his close friend, before smiling at Lea's enthusiasm, as everyone slipped in and began the walk up to the castle steps.
Squall raised an eyebrow. "You scared, Isa?" he teased, nudging the blue haired teen's shoulder gently. "Haven't you and Lea broken into this place five different times before?"
"Three." Isa allowed himself a small laugh as he corrected Squall. "Twice we made it up to the doors before we were caught. The third time we did manage to get in."
"How far did you get in?" Aerith asked. Kairi had gone back to clutching Aerith's hand, trotting obediently along with everyone else. She was looking rather contemplative as she stared at the steps a few yards ahead of them that led to a large platform for them to enter the castle.
"Pretty far," Lea said. "We managed to wander down into the basement, where we came upon a set of white double doors—pretty sure there was a lab inside. Then dumb ol' Dilan caught us and hauled us out by the scruff of our necks."
"Oh yeah," Squall grinned. "I remember that one. You kept whining about getting a wedgy."
Isa snorted at a nonplussed Lea while Kairi and Aerith giggled. "You did not. You're just being a big baby."
"Hey," Lea shrugged. "I'll call 'em like I see 'em!"
The walk down the long path and up the stairs was uninterrupted. Facing the massive, ornate blue and gold double doors, the motley group discovered a much larger gold padlock barring them from entrance.
"Quickly." Isa yanked out the key ring and the tension wrench from his pocket, the multitude of picks jangling loudly.
"You need me to do anything?" Squall asked, stepping forward.
"Ah—sure." Isa nodded. "See if you can try and lift the bolt upright for me."
Squall still kept half of his attentions on the rest of the group while Isa fiddled with the lock pick.
"Aerith?" Kairi asked. "Do you remember the blue monsters that came here?"
Squall did. It was a year ago. He used a massive club to try and get rid of them. They just reappeared elsewhere in the city, like a bunch of cockroaches.
"I do." Aerith nodded. "I mostly stayed inside after mother and I watched someone get attacked by one." She bit her lip at the memory, looking ashamed for a few moments. "I wish we could have helped."
"Oh." Kairi paused. "But they weren't there for long, were they? People with big weapons came and got rid of them."
Aerith nodded. "That's what people say."
"No, no, they really did!" Kairi was insistent on this. "Well, at least one person came. I dunno if there were really three though."
Squall looked at Kairi curiously. "You met one of these people?"
"Mhm!" Kairi's head bobbed up and down excitedly. "She had blue hair like Isa!"
"So Zack's 'warrior goddess' is actually real?" Isa snorted.
"I dunno about that," Kairi said. "But she saved me from the monsters. It was right here, too." Kairi added a little stomp of her feet for emphasis, to indicate that the encounter apparently took place right on the Castle platform. "And she gave me something."
"What did she give you?" Aerith asked Kairi.
Kairi put a hand to her dewdrop necklace and frowned. "I dunno what it was, but she put it in here. She said that it will help me."
"Oh, Zack and his warrior goddess," Lea snickered.
"Yeah," Isa clucked. "The one that might be 'my long lost sister' just because we both have blue hair. Ridiculous."
A loud click resonated from the golden padlock.
"Isa, you're a genius!" Lea breathed.
The normally humble Isa was looking rather pleased with himself. "Wow." Squall helped him untangle the chains around the padlock, and they yanked on the base. The latch lifted open effortlessly.
Kairi suddenly grew quiet. "Do you think we'll be able to find out what happened to Ienzo?"
Everyone grew somber. Ienzo was a well known kid around Aerith's age that had been living in the castle. Ienzo was primarily under the care of Ansem the Wise, but all of the apprentices were known to have a hand in raising him. Ansem and the other apprentices occasionally let the boy out to play in the gardens and the courtyard with the other kids. Kairi must have been one of Ienzo's playmates.
But no one had seen or heard about Ienzo for a month, just like Ansem and his five other apprentices.
"I think we'll find some clues," Squall found himself telling the little girl this reassuringly.
Kairi nodded. "Ok. Are we going to go in, then?"
With a hearty shove from Squall, Lea, and Isa, the blue and gold double doors creaked open, but with a much quieter noise than the gates had.
"Yep," Lea said. But what should have normally been an excited expression on his face was replaced by one that was wary.
"What is it?" Aerith asked.
"The one time we got into the castle," Isa said quietly. "It was through a basement side door hidden in a bunch of rose bushes. Lea and I tried looking for it before Squall met us here—but it vanished."
"There have been rumors that the apprentices know how to do magic," Squall offered as a reason.
"Then why didn't they seal the back door with magic on top of the padlock?" Aerith asked.
Silence enveloped the group. Then, Lea gave a laugh.
"I don't think there's anything to be worried about." He looked at everyone. A gleam of adventure in his eyes had replaced the uncharacteristic bout of wariness that was there a few moments ago. "Is everyone ready? Aerith? Kairi?"
"We'll find clues about Ienzo, right?" Kairi asked him.
"Positive." Lea nodded.
Kairi's response was to tighten her grip on Aerith's hand. "I'm ready." She looked up at Aerith.
The girl shrugged and adjusted the pink bow in her hair. "I'm not leaving you behind."
Kairi beamed.
As Squall pushed the door open wide enough to let everyone in, he noticed Kairi's dewdrop necklace emitting a faint glow. He stepped inside allowing the door to stay open wide enough for a faint crack of light to pour in.
There was no need. The clouds had apparently cleared, and the bright afternoon sun streamed through the stained glass windows leading up to the entrance hall, where it appeared that even more light existed. "Well," Lea said. "There's no turning back."
Isa nodded. "It doesn't look so bad, does it?"
Squall looked at Kairi's necklace again. He definitely wasn't imagining that faint glow of light coming from her necklace. And she was starting to look a little pale.
Aerith looked worried. "Kairi, you don't look so well."
Kairi leaned against Aerith and hugged the top of her legs. "I want to find Ienzo." She said stubbornly.
Squall took the first tentative steps forward. "Then let's go."
- This story is going to be split into three parts. As far as picking locks go, I know what Lea did in the beginning and Kairi's suggestions aren't quite right - I did that on purpose. Lea doesn't quite know what he's doing (while Isa does), and Kairi is just too cute to say 'no' to. It's impossible, her enthusiasm is contagious XDD. Any feed back is greatly appreciated.