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Hey so, bit of a weird question. Anyone here ever heard of Torchwood, and could maybe point me how to get back to contacting the local branch? That'd be really handy, yeah?

Year and star system coordinates would also be fantastic, but I'm not holdin' my breath waitin'.

[Bites her bottom lip in thought.]

[She doesn't even know which universe this is. Much less how she got here without a dimension cannon or where everyone she was with went. Maybe they're here. But then maybe even saying their name depending on the universe is dangerous. Luckily, she's had 5+ years (give or take for literal dimension rewinds and time in the vortex) of experience in learning how to do codes.]

Here's a fairytale you've probably never heard before.

Once upon a time there was a big bad wolf. She wandered a city of metal filled with metal men. [Too dangerous to even say the world cyberman until she learned more!] She thought she was on a mission to hunt down her lost prince. But she was actually on a mission to find home. Bit like Dorothy from Wizard of Oz if you know it. And one day she met a man who wasn't a prince at all. He was a very brainy professor. There was even another man who started off as a mouse but turned into a lion full of courage, saving worlds he never even knew existed. And a really flirty captain who was probably too pretty for his own good. They weren't off to find a wizard. Just a blue box.

The big bad wolf ran away from home and her pack over and over and over again, but no matter how many times she ran, and how many new friends she made or which universe she fell into, something was always calling her back. 'Pparently you can't escape your family that easily. That or the Big Bad Wolf's mum was seriously terrifying and would fight a werewolf for diamonds and totally win.

Thanks for listening, Ta!

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Actually here's a lot more like home than I first thought. In more ways than one.

Anyway, the story goes like this... [He clears his throat slightly and begins.]

A long, long time ago, people lived in peace, bathed in the warmth of light. Everyone loved the light. Then people began to fight over it; they wanted to keep it for themselves, and darkness was born in their hearts. The darkness spread, swallowing the light and many people's hearts. It covered everything, and the world disappeared.

But some small fragments of light survived, in the hearts of children. Together, the children used these fragments of light to rebuild the lost world. That's the world we live in now. But the true light still sleeps deep within the darkness; that's why the worlds are still scattered and divided from each other. But someday, a door to the innermost darkness will open, and the true light will return.

So remember, even in the deepest darkness, there will always be a light to guide you. Believe in the light, and the darkness can never defeat you. Your heart will shine with its power, and push the darkness away.

[He drops the story telling tone fore a more normal one.]

I think that last bit was just tacked on there to give the story a clear moral for kids, but that's the story. It varies a little depending on who's telling it, but the basics are the same.

Yeah? How's that? The cities thing or just...? The people?

Sounds like a great story. The first part sounds like a parable for love and money, but the last part is really nice. Hopeful, yeah? Like Pandora's Box.

The cities a bit. And some of the circumstances. Ask somebody who's been here longer what happened when the barriers around the cities weakened.

[He chuckled.]

Where I'm from light and darkness are very literal things. And that that semi-glossed over mention of a war between them that destroyed the world? We've got someone trying to start up another one. So it's not nearly as metaphorical as you might think.

And I don't know who Pandora is or what her box has to do with anything, but yeah, it is pretty hopeful. Good thing too, because a lot is riding on that hope back home.

Sounds fun.

[Pause.] I've never actually met a realm where light and darkness aren't literal, but I take it you mean the coveting and such in story context.

I'm sorry. Wars are always difficult to survive.

Pandora was a mythological woman who opened a box with all the worlds' evils trapped inside. Despite being told over and over not to do it, that it was dangerous and bad and wrong, she was just too curious. So all the bad things, wars, famine, and the like were let loose to ravage the world. All that literal darkness. Or is that metaphorical darkness still? Either way, after the box had been emptied, what was left was hope.

Still metaphorical darkness, but its connected to that. The darkness I'm talking about is this.

[He holds out his hand and opens a Dark Corridor. Though it doesn't connect to anything here, he turns his phone so Rose can see the ominous portal made of swirling dark energies. After a moment he closes it again, turning the phone back to himself.]

Where I'm from, darkness isn't just the absence of light, it's the opposite of light. Remember those Heartless I mentioned? They're physical manifestations of the darkness in people's hearts. They attack people and try to steal their hearts, which are then consumed by darkness and become more Heartless, that then go on to attack more people, and so on. Very icky, dangerous things.

Wow. That's kind of...

[Interesting, fascinating, intriguing, she wanted to know more, but at least Rose was smart enough or at least, good with people enough to know better than to say any of that.]

You're right, that's different. And I've seen a lot of weirdness. So heartless try to steal other people's hearts to fill their own void.

But where do the original hearts go?

Yeah, I know. Trust me, it's weird to me too, and I've lived it. But that's how things work, so... [shrugs]

They're trapped inside the Heartless. If the Heartless is destroyed they're released, but unless they're also released from the darkness they were consumed by, they'll just reform as new Heartless somewhere else later. Only a weapon called a Keyblade can really free the hearts. And even then, reuniting them with their bodies is... more difficult than you'd expect.

But they're... the wrong hearts? Or just sealed away from the heartless themselves?

Sealed away from the Heartless. They sort of collect in the Realm Between, and with a bit of prompting can come together to form a false Kingdom Hearts. But it takes a lot of them to do that; not sure of the exact number, but it's gotta be in the hundreds of thousands at least. Maybe millions.

And the fact that someone managed to do it, and it didn't seem to even put a dent in the overall Heartless population of the worlds should tell you how much of a problem they are back home, even after all Sora and his friends have done.

Yeah? [She misses her dimension cannon, somehow. It just seems like the kind of conversation she would have had while using it to travel on her own.]

[For now she just leans against a wall, arms folded.] What did they do? Were they the ones who made... the fake Kingdom Hearts?

No, Sora and his friends stopped the group that was doing that. The group's leader wanted to use it to put thirteen copies of his own heart and mind into the bodies of the group's members who had lost their hearts and been rendered empty shells called Nobodies; that's with a capital 'N'. He'd lied and manipulated them to get him to help create a false Kingdom Hearts by promising them that it would get them their own hearts back, when really it was all part of his grand scheme to take over the worlds.

And again, I know how weird it sounds. Trust me though; I couldn't make this stuff up.

[Swears under her breath.] No. No, it doesn't sound crazy or unlikely to me at all. All too real.

I don't suppose you know his name? It... It's something I've run across before.

How did Sora stop him? If it's not too much to ask.

Seriously? Man I thought my world was the only one with luck that bad...

Anyway, the guy's name was and is Xehanort. Long story short, Sora and his friends have thrown monkey wrenches into his plans a couple times now, and while they've stopped the immediate threat, now he's back to his full power, and backed up by several other versions of himself, looking to do even worse than before. But we're working on our own plans right now and it's sort of a 'calm before the storm' type situation.

And they stopped them by taking out the remaining members of Organization XIII-the group that had been putting together the false Kingdom Hearts-, including Xemnas- its leader and Xehanort's Nobody. He'd merged into the unfinished Kingdom Hearts to get extra power, so when he went down, so did it. The Hearts dissipated and went back to where they were supposed to have gone if the Organization hadn't interfered.

If you're looking for more detail than that, though, you're asking the wrong guy; I was kinda... dead at the time, so I've just got second hand information.

[Sighs.] Haven't heard the name, but I guess the multiverse is just full of whackjobs willing to do stupid things for stupid selfish petty reasons.

Nah, that-- [She cut off mid-sentence, a lump in her throat.] You remember being dead?

[She is not going to get used to that. Ever.] What... or who brought you back?

Selfish definitely, but he'd neither petty nor stupid; unfortunately for us he's smart and dreams big. Though you could definitely make the 'petty' argument for Braig, one of his cronies; not sure what he hoped to get out of the whole arrangement, but I doubt it's as broad as Xehanort's goals.

And well, I don't remember being dead, exactly, aside from a few bits that I'm not sure whether they were some kind of dream or not. But I remember dying, yeah. Twice, if you want to get technical; neither time was fun.

The first time was when I was about 14, when I had my heart taken and became a Nobody named Axel. Technically speaking, I died when that happened, and Axel was born. Then I died as Axel, and since my Heartless had also been destroyed, they kind of recombined back into Lea, and I woke up as a complete human being again like I am now. So I guess you could call it a natural process, if anything regarding creatures that were never supposed to exist can be called 'natural'.

[He shrugs.]

I don't claim to know how the process works, just that it does. Though I bet Ienzo or Even could give you a whole lecture on the subject.

What makes you think it's neither?

[Her face remains stoic as he explains the deaths.]

[So weird.]

[She just shakes her head at the end, not commenting.] Are either of them here? In this plane or whatever you call it? Dimension?

[It's just as weird to him, and he lived it. He's learned to just roll with the weirdness.]

Because he's kind of a genius who's been manipulating people since probably before I was even born and arranging a bunch of different contingency plans for himself, up to and including a way to bring himself back if he died. And because he was doing all that so he could cause a war and take over world in the aftermath. So yeah... not the stupid or petty type. I wish he was; might make our job easier.

And no, they're not, unfortunately. But if either of them shows up, I'll point them your way.

Eh, I dunno, kinda is. I've met others who did that too. You can do a lot of evil with just luck and banking on greed and paranoia. The difference is just... good people don't think like that, so it's hard for them to realize others might.

Thanks, yeah? Have you got friend here?

I guess you're gonna just have to trust me n this one. Going into a full explanation of Xehanort and how much he's messed things up where I'm from- or at least as full an explanation as I understand- would probably take all day. Suffice to say, if a scrawny, old, bald guy with gold eyes, dark skin, and a gravely voice shows up, do yourself a favor and steer clear. Guy's bad news. As are all his other selves, but just our luck we don't know all of them yet.

Though thankfully I do have a friend here. One of my best friends in fact; a girl named Xion. And Demyx is here too from back home though he's less a friend and more 'that annoying old housemate who used to steal your food out of the fridge'.

I believe you.

[And laughs at the last part.] I'll keep my eyes open for 'em.

Chances are pretty good they'll both be wearing the same sort of outfit as me, so they should be easy to recognize, at least. And I don't think there's anyone but Demyx who owns a big, blue Sitar.

Should be easy enough to spot, yeah?

Definitely. Well, Demyx more than Xion; she's on the small side, and would be pretty easy to lose in a crowd.

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