Chasing Hearts -- A Kingdom Hearts Story--

Part Four: Radient Gardens

Demi's eyes groggily opened, her vision blurry as she pushed her hair from her face.  The room was dark around her, so she assumed Max was still asleep across the room.  But to her surprise, his obnoxious snores were not there, echoing in the room.  "Max?"  She groaned, her voice cracking from her half-conscious state.  Yet, there was no one to answer her.  No one was even in the house at the moment, which made everything completely silent.  She sighed, believing her best friend had probably already gotten up, and was playing in the snow.  The teen smiled at his childish ways, and climbed out of bed slowly.

Her bare feet stomped across the wooden flooring of the uncommon room as she made her way over to where Max's door should be.  It was always opened, and so she just assumed it would be as usual.  Only these beliefs were shattered when the sleepy girl ran right into a wall.  A pain-filled yelp escaped her lips as she fell back, and her back made contact with the floorboards.  After a few minutes of grumbling to herself, she shakily stood, reaching over lightly touching the wall.  Using it as her guide, Demi slowly tried to shuffle along the wall until finding a light switch a few feet away, and a door beside it.

Demi squinted her eyes, seeing the switch beneath her fingers, and flicking it up.  The lights soon turned on, and she flinched at just how bright they were, even with her back to it.  The girl turned around, raising an arm over her eyes as they slowly adjusted, and became less foggy.  Once she could actually see correctly, she froze, not knowing quite where she was, or how she got there.  For this certainly was not her, or Max's room. In fact, she had never even seen this room before, not even in a dream. 

Her eyes scanned the uncommon and messy room, finding there to be ninja stars stuck into the walls, and a punching bag in the corner.  The room had yellow walls, dark mahogany furniture, and a green comforter on a twin-sized bed.  There was a case of weapons stuck onto the wall, and had two glass sliding doors to make opening it easier.  Of course, this terrified Demi, and until she found a pile of folded clothes and a note, she didn't know what to do.  Even then, as she slowly approached the note and clothing, she didn't know what to think of this rude awaking.  She picked up the note, scanning over the words written from the purple pen sat beside it. 

'Hey Demi! 

Guess when you see this you'll have woken up, so just throw on the clothes and head out!  Breakfast is in the kitchen, which is down the hall and to the right!  We're all outside training, so you might want to come and join!  I was gonna wake you up, but the boys said to-' 

Demi stopped reading, and raised an eyebrow.  'The boys?  Who the heck are the boys?  The only boy I don't despise is Max, and he apparently is nowhere to be found.  Maybe he wrote the note... No, because this isn't his handwriting, and he would have put something like 'Afternoon, Dem!' just to throw me off.' 

'-leave you alone because of the battle last night.  I'm still REALLY sorry about leaving you..  Eh, anyways, see you soon!

           -Yuffie =)'

Demi's eyes widened as she backed up, dropping the note as the memories flooded back.  The girl backed into a wall, and leaned against it as if for dear life as everything became too much for her.  Earth was gone, Max was probably dead, she had met her favorite characters from her video game, and had got attacked by heartless.  She had been lost in a new town, brought to a new world, and was currently having a panic attack in Yuffie's room, where she had slept the night before. 

The girl let out a harsh breath as she clutched her head, tangling her fingers into her own hair and lip quivering.  There was no way that any of this could be real in her mind, but yet, it was truly her reality.  A game; a game she adored with all of her heart, soul, and being.  It was simply real. There were no loop-holes, no coma making her believing it, and it was no dream.  This was the cold hard truth, and Demi had to learn to accept this.