Heroes of Dreamland, Book 7: Kirby and the Battle for Dreamland (OLD)

There is Darkness Within Us All

Meta Knight's POV:

As soon as I fall through the clouds, my first reaction is to try and quickly fly back above them again, but to no avail. Some invisible force is pulling me downward at what is much faster than a normal falling speed. The others do not come with me, but I am not sure as to whether this is a good thing or bad.

Sakura is gone, having been dragged away by the time curse, without anyone to help or guide her, and now the others no longer have me there to help them, either. I have never really been one to panic, thank goodness, but I will freely admit that at this moment in time, I am quite filled with fear-induced adrenaline. Wherever I am being taken to is not a good place to be going, I can guess that much already, and since very similar circumstances led to Sakura's turning against us... No. Whatever happens, I will not give into the Darkness again, no matter which form it comes in; I will not be turned against my allies once more, no matter how high the cost.

Taking a deep breath, I quit resisting the odd, unnerving downward pull, and focus instead on holding my sword in a 'ready' position and clearing my mind of all extraneous thoughts. Whatever is waiting for me down there, it's about to be given the fight of its life.

Finally, what feels like an eternity later but is probably actually far less than a minute, my descent slows and eventually stops, gently dropping me onto yet another cloudy floor, which is probably much lower in the sky than the one I was on before. The room I am in is very dim and hard to see in, mostly because of a swirling fog that fills the whole place. At least, thank goodness, it is not Darkness, but instead just an everyday, thick, all-swallowing mist.

For a terribly long minute, there is silence. I raise my sword to cast some light on the subject, but the mist around me is so choking that it offers little aid. Suddenly, though, a dark, awful laugh echoes throughout the room, seeming to come from everywhere around me all at once, making what feels like ice course through my veins. Always, I feel this way when I am faced with a great evil: cold, unbearably so, as if I have just fallen into a nigh-frozen river.

"My source's son always has been so proud of ye... One of his biggest prides, thee. Ye and his other three proteges are his biggest joy in life, but if he knew the truth about where ye came from right before ye joined the army and began to learn from him and his Light-blinded 'wisdom,' would he still be so proud?" The dark, frigid voice only makes the cold sensation intensify, and the cool sense of amusement it carries doesn't help matters at all, either.

Grasping at Galaxia's hilt tightly with both gloves while I look all around myself, trying to deduce where Dark Solar is and where best to launch an offensive, I answer the beast, "It no longer matters who I was or what I did. That was over two centuries ago, and it has long since been forgiven me. It is no longer a part of who I am, and thanks to the eventual removal of the 'gift' I received then, it truly never will be, ever again, Solar."

A smirk in his voice, he muses, "Yes, yes, thy monster within... Some of my predecessor's best work, that idea. A pity it was never allowed to be used on more Star Warriors than just thyself. Nightmare wasn't exactly pleased with the... not-quite-as-expected results, shall we say, and yet, ye certainly weren't entirely a failure."

His words quickly make me grow rather irritated on top of my nervousness. "What do you know about that? What did the first Solar have to do with that incident, when he wasn't even there when it transpired? What was his and Nightmare's real plan?"

Silence. When he finally responds, his voice sounds as if it's coming from just in front of me now, still shrouded by the pea-soup-thick fog. "Well, I suppose it can't hurt to tell thee the whole story, now that it's all over and done, but why would ye want to know? As ye said, it is no longer a part of thee, so what does it matter, boy?"