Kingdom Hearts F.I.M: From One To Another

Darkness. The ever-present sea of nothingness from which creation developed. A wise man’s imposter once said, “All hearts stem from darkness, and so all hearts shall return.”

Or something to that effect. Genie couldn't really remember. A mere thought that passed through his head as he drifted through the stuff. It was the only thing he could do as he waited for the last of his light to fade.

The darkness was taking hold now, he could feel it. It spread itself out in every direction and touched every point in space. It was all, and it was nothing. It slowly gripped his heart and mind, detaching it from his mind and soul. The darkness that seeped from his wounds made it easier, for he had already been tainted by jealousy, desperation, shame, and self pity. All the darkness needed do is finish it’s work.

It didn't take him long to come to terms with himself, to accept his situation. In the end he was at least able to save his best friend and family.

“That’s all that really mattered in the end. Isn't it?”

As the darkness transformed him, memories of his past began playing through his head.

~~~

Boring. If anyone has ever even hinted at off possible chance that being a Genie is all it’s cracked up to be…

They’re half right.

Oh sure, once you’re out and about, you’re king of the world with only one person you take commands from. You could travel the world in the time between wishes. You can do anything you want as long as you stick around for the magic words.

“I wish for…”

However, once you hear those words for the third time… that’s it. Back in the lamp for another hundred or so years. It’s cramped, it’s smelly, and it’s sometimes dark. But most of all... it’s boring!

Genie thought so as he sat inside his lamp, neck bent forward, reading ‘The Introduction to Djinn’ for the 523,423rd time, give or take a few. There were only so many things one could do inside the lamp, even with magic. Sure he had a swimming pool a large scale, library, and countless other means of entertainment. But he was still alone.

“Let’s see, that makes year number 323,” he muttered, looking over at his completely generic clock. With the little foot pointing at the 14/13 and the X3A batteries popping up, nice and toasted, Genie could accurately tell how long it had been since the lamp had last been rubbed.

“What I wouldn't give for a--OHH ohhhhh, hehe! Some~body’s rubbing meh la~amp!” Genie cheered, sensing that familiar sensation of calling. With a flourish, he flew down the opening of the lamp and out into the outside world, He was certain that, with this much pent up energy, whoever rubbed his lamp was going to get quite the show.

Genie would soon come to know how this particular session would change the course of his life.

~~~

Unbeknownst to the man, as the memory played through his mind a small speck of light appeared in the darkness.

~~~

Jafar, as tall as a mountain, and as red as the devil himself. Stood tall above the kingdom. He had the power to crush gods. Genie felt terrible, having been the one to grant him this power in the first place. However, Genie was surprised to see that, even with all the powers of a god, there still stood one the defied Jafar.

A single boy with an oddly shaped weapon. This boy appeared from nowhere, but still did everything he could to help them over and over. That boy inspired Genie to regain the confidence he needed to fight again.

With the help of the flying carpet, the boy defeated Jafar and sealed him away. From that point forward, Genie devoted himself to come whenever he was called. To assist that boy in his adventures in different worlds.

It was that point that Genie began to travel alongside him, helping out when needed and seeing all new worlds.

~~~

The speck of light, still floating out in the distance, began to take shape.

~~~

Genie hovered above Aladdin’s head with a curious expression. Aladdin meanwhile continued to grunt in exertion with every thrust.

“Hey, Al?” Genie began.

Aladdin thrust the sword forward before swinging to the right in a wide arc, “Yeah?”

“Whatcha doing?”

Aladdin tossed the sword into the air before catching it in his other hand and repeating the maneuver, this time to the left. “Training myself to duel wield,” he answered.

“Why?”

Aladdin swung three times with his left, “So I can fight better.”

“Can I try?” Genie asked.

Aladdin froze mid strike, “You… want to try fighting?”

Genie floated down and landed on the ground, nodding energetically.

Aladdin smiled, “Alright, but no magic. If you really want to fight for real you can’t rely on magic to help you.”

Genie gave a large military salute, noticeably leaving out the costume. “A’Sir, yes sir!”

Aladdin gestured over to the armory near the back wall, “Alright then. Which weapon do you wanna use? We have a full assortment.”

Genie floated over and inspected the various sharp tools. “Let’s see... we have a sharp thing, a blunt thing, some sort of staff, and another sharp thing. “l’Il take the sharp thing thank ya kindly,” he said, grabbing a short sword.

“Interesting choice.”

“We~ell y'know, feels familiar and all.”

Aladdin chuckled, “You miss him don’t you?”

Genie gave a nostalgic smile, “Yeah, he doesn't summon me much anymore. I wonder where he went.”

~~~

“I never did ask any of those girls what happened to him,” the man with no name muttered.

Finally, the darkness took complete hold and dragged him into its depths. Fierce wind whipped him back and forth and his entire body began to feel numb. The memories that played through his head faded and disappeared. He felt like a hollow shell as he was pulled further down, this time into a complete void of nothingness.

At the last second, the far away light rushed down to him, disappearing into the void after him.

~~~

The man opened his eyes, his blank soulless eyes, to see that he currently sat on a rock overlooking a dark beach. The moon shone high in the sky, reflecting off the clear water.

“Never expected to find you here.”

The nameless man turned his blank stare toward a small light that fell from the sky. He watched as the light shifted and morphed, taking the form of a boy. He had spiky hair and a he wore a dark jacket with a silver lining and mid-length baggy pants. Around his neck swung a crown necklace.

“Who are you?” the man asked.

The boy took a few steps toward him and sat down on the sand. “Someone who’s been here before. And as someone who’s been here before, I can definitely say that you of all people don’t belong here.”

The man turned back to the sea. “How can you know that?”

“Because I know you,” the boy chuckled.

“That makes one of us. I don’t even know me.”

“You don’t remember anything?”

There was a moment of silence before the man responded, “I… have scraps. Bits and pieces of memories.”

“What are they?”

“I remember… being alone for a long time. I remember people, important people. They gave me something important... but I can’t remember what.”

“Do you remember me?” the boy asked.

The man looked back at the boy. I took a long hard look. Something did seem familiar to him but as hard as he tried he couldn't remember any details. Finally the man shook his head sadly, “I don’t--

“Held on a sec,” Getting off of the ground the boy turned to face him and held out his hand. In a flash of light, something familiar appeared. A giant metal key. “Do you remember now? When you used to travel with me?”

“I--”

“Look.” he said holing the key further out, “No matter what form I was in or what attacks we used. Whenever I summoned you, and whenever you fought by my side the first thing you would do was copy this.”

Memories began flashing in the man’s mind. Images and scenes from various places began to connect and form links. From those memories, more memories began to resurface. Memories of his past, his home and his friends. He even remembered who he used to be, the energy he exerted and the joy he brought to everyone around him. For the first time, he began to wonder what happened to that person.

“The magic never made you who you are. You are more than that, and this is the proof.” The boy held out his key and motioned for him to take it. “Here.”

The man hesitantly gripped it in his hands, “But I--” A soft light began to emanate from the grip.

“Take it. Use it to help your friends and discover who you are.”

The man smiled, the light in his eyes returned full force. “I finally remember.”

As the light grew to encompass them both the last that he saw was the boy’s bright smile.

~~~

Spike hopped from the top of the tower and held out an outstretched hand, “Dash!”

Hearing his call, Dash flew past and grabbed him out of the air. Flying him high into the air, she released him and sent him plunging towards the Jafar-Darkside in a blazing green ball of fire.

“Emerald Comet!”

The Darksides body transformed from black to red as it held up a single hand to stop Spike’s attack.

“M-more of Jafar’s magic is leaking through. It’s making the Darkside more powerful,”  Aladdin said, struggling to stand. Twilight caught him on her shoulder and have him a teary eyed look.

“Don’t try to stand, you’re injured…. Also I--”

Aladdin held up a hand to stop her, “Don’t. Lets just stop Jafar right now.” Twilight wiped her face and nodded.

Both of them jumped when Pinkamena landed in front of the two and growled, “Look alive, ladies,” she spat, glancing upwards, “because all hell’s about to break loose.”

Glancing upwards, Twilight paled as the once small spiderweb crack in the lock now seemed to be on the verge of breaking completely. Bits and pieces of the sky began breaking away to reveal the darkness beneath.

Twilight tore her eyes away and turned completely around, “Jackie, Rachelle! The keyholes almost open!”

Dash quickly tried to reload her gun and resume her electrical onslaught, “We’re trying!” she screamed.

AJ switched from keyblade to gauntlets as she leapt up and punched two Darksides. Landing she scoffed at the sight of multiple heartless merging insides to replace the fallen ones. “These varmints are comin’ back faster than we can take ‘em out. Frankly, it’s startin to get on my nerves,” she spat, punching out another one.

Jafars laughter echoed out as the red Darkside blocked another one of Spike’s attacks, “It’s no use! Just surrender to your fates, you worthless...”

A small ray of light began to shine from the red Darksides chest.

“Ignorant…”

More rays of light, brighter this time, burst from the dark beast.

“Street rats!”

All at once a large ball of light exploded from the Darkside and shot into the air, destroying the Darkside completely.

Twilight watched the ball of light stop just under the keyhole. “Wha--”

A loud, energetic voice rang out from the light, a sharp contrast to Jafar’s malicious tone, “Street rat this! Street rat that! Centuries worth of time to think and you still can’t come up with something new? Come on, I’ll even give you a hint. How about shoeless. Oh what about Curly Cue? I know! Fez Head!”

Aladdin, having recognized the voice, looked up with wide watery eyes, “Genie?” he whispered.

The ball of light caved in on itself before exploding outwards in a large colorful explosion. A figure appeared in the middle of the explosion in a flourish of light and trumpet sounds. He still had his light tan skin and blue eyes, but he was leaner, and he had a head full of tied back black hair long enough to reach his waist. He wore a long blue open robe with no shirt and baggy blue pants with no shoes. In his hand was a long golden keyblade. It had a round blue handle with small arabic symbols written around it and a lamp without a lid acted that as the teeth. Swinging from the end was a small keychain version of a plain silver keyblade that he had been given.

“Y~ou know it, ol pal o’mine!” the man cheered. Taking in a deep breath, he took a look around, “Ahh it’s good to be back. Glad to see that nothing’s changed while I was gone. Same old darkness infested kingdom same old heartless, same old friends fighting for their… huh.”

The man pulled a picture down from his keyblade. On it was the picture of Agrabah as he knew it. The picture Agrabah was in perfect condition, his friends happy and cheerful. In reality Agrabah was overrun by darkness, his friends kneeling and exhausted. He looked from one to the other.

Perfect condition. Overrun.

Happy and cheerful. Kneeling and exhausted.

The man looked around with a blank look. “Well that’s not right…” he muttered. Turning around, he glanced above him at the nearly completely broken keyhole. Without batting an eyelid, the man pinched the middle of the keyhole and peeled away the entire set of cracks, leaving the entire keyhole unblemished.

Twilight gazed up in complete confusion, “Wat?” With the keyhole patched up the darkness that the Darksides pulled on evaporated and the stream of heartless that piled into the city ceased.

Turning around with a newfound smile, the man took stock of the situation. There were heartless in the city, several darksides that were still present, and a considerable number of small heartless in the courtyard. Spike, Twilight, Aladdin, Pinkamena, Dash, and AJ were here so that meant that Rarity and Shia were helping out in the city.

The man put a hand on his chin and nodded in understanding. Holding his keyblade high above,  his head he closed his eyes in concentration. From the tip of his keyblade, a pulse rang out, then a flash of light that encompassed the entire courtyard.

As the pulse passed through Twilight’s body she felt a strange sense of irritation and displeasure. As it passed through Pinkamena’s body she felt a strong urge to switch back to Pinkie.

After the pulse and light faded. The man smiled and flew straight into the castle. Within a few seconds he returned with a small flashlight. Turning it on, he pointed it directly downward. Every heartless that got caught in the light instantly evaporated. Twilight watched as the tiny hearts flew upward and disappeared into the air.

Twilight stood up in surprise, “Did he just…” she trailed off as she continued to watch the man simply fly around and defeat heartless simply by shining a light on it. “....but that’s impossible,” she muttered.

Twilight turned on him with a shocked look, “What do you mean ‘what’? Look, he’s banishing them with a flashlight! I mean that flashlight is fine. I could enchant a flashlight to do that, but look!

Spike hopped over and landed next to them. “Look at what?”

“He’s freeing their hearts! Can’t you see it. Hearts are only supposed to be able to be freed by the Keyblade, but he’s doing it with an enchanted flashlight.”

“Oh common Twilight, don’t be so uptight.” Twilight looked up and watched AJ and Dash land next to the group. “Don’t look a gift horse in the mouth I say. If it weren't for whatever he did the keyhole woulda busted wide open.”

“Yea~h,” Pinkie wondered, “I wonder what he did?”

“Something that I’m about to do here.” Nearly everyone jumped when the man appeared behind them and huddled them together. “Watch this, it’ll be awesome. See all those heartless in the city?”

Everyone nodded.

“Presto.”

Everyone’s jaws hit the ground when they watched the man reach out an arm and literally flipped the entirety of Agrabah like a chalkboard. In fact just about everyone instantly put a hand to their head in pain. Their minds clearly rejecting what they saw.

Immediately afterwards the man began to wave his keyblade in everyone’s faces. “Ahah! Look, now I have one too! You see it. Mine’s cooler than your’s!” he taunted.

“Is that a challenge?” Dash threatened, instantly recovering.

Twilight shook her head to clear it before stepped up to examine the man’s new tool. “Genie that’s amazing! Where did you get it from?”

“An old friend who needs to update his wardrobe a bit. That’s all I’m saying,” the man answered.

“So? Cough it up, what’s it do?” Aj urged.

“Oh a little of this a little of that. A little of reality manipulation here and there. Little things.”

“Reality manipulation?” Twilight repeated. She nearly fell backwards when the man leaned in close to her face with a huge smile.

“Oh, I’m so glad you repeated!” Stepping back the man adjusted his reading glasses and continued. “You see, my keyblade is called the ‘Soul of Freedom’. It… Eh, you might want to write this down; we’ll be having a quiz later. It allows me to use a power called ‘Eternal Freedom’ that emits an area wild field. Inside this field, as you saw, there are no rules, laws, restrictions, or requirements unless I want them to be. While it’s activated, I temporarily have access to the sort of magic I had as a genie. Like this…”

Lifting up Dash, he peeled the rainbow from her hair and placed it on his own, giving himself a literal rainbow waterfall-like head of hair, while Dash was stick with slate gray. “There’s no rule that says this isn’t possible,” he gloated, flipping his hair excellently.

“That’s amazing!” Twilight cheered.

AJ whistled, impressed.

“Oh my gosh that’s so super cool! I wish I had that power!” Pinkie cheered, hopping up and down.

The man stroked his long rainbow beard. “Perhaps someday, young partyhopper.”

“Give me back my hair!” Dash all but screamed, trying her best to ignore Spike’s laughter.

As the group continued to be impressed by the man’s pranks Aladdin lifted himself up and took a struggled step towards the group. “Genie?”

All merriment stopped as the man turned to look at his dear friend. Several long seconds passed between them before the man ran over and hugged Aladdin.

“I’m sorry I never told you. I should’ve asked for help and I’m sorry,” the man whispered.

“It’s alright, I’m glad you’re alright,” he said, pulling away. “That is you right? You look different.”

The man scoffed and ruffled Aladdin’s curly hair, “Pa~lease. I’m the same old guy that helped ya out when you tried to lie your way through life, just with a gorgeous head of hair and sexy bronze skin. You don’t believe me?”

Aladdin chuckled, “No, I believe it’s you alright. How did you escape the darkness?”

“I met an old friend, and he reminded me of what’s important. Not my magic, but my friends and my purpose.”

The man was cut off by the sound of heavy breathing and sick moans. Everyone turned to see Shia and Rarity come through the castle gates, leaning on each other and looking unwell.

Shia moaned, cheeks bulging as if she was about to vomit. Rarity goaned, “I do not know what you all did… but please warn us next time…” With that both of them fell forward and passed out.

~~~

“Lets get this partay star~ted!” Pinke screamed.

Everyone cheered as they tossed the birthday girl into the air. “Pinkie! Pinkie! Pinkie!”

“Wheeeeee! Finally!”

After a few minutes of cheerful tossing and singing the group finally let the pink girls feet touch the ground.

“Noooo! I wanna keep going! Don’t stop,” she whined.

Dash put an arm around her and smirked, “Fine, but you know, the longer we do this the more the candles will burn.”

Having nothing to lean onto anymore, Dash ungracefully fell to the ground. Everyone turned on the spot to see Pinkie already sitting at the cake table. “What are you guys waiting for? Come on, I have like a thousand wishes ready!”

Everyone shrugged and stood around her. All at once they began to sing happy birthday, much to the girls immense pleasure. After finishing Pinkie immediately took in a huge gulp of air and blew out each and every candle simultaneously.

“So,” Dash began, “Which of your thousand wishes did you make.”

“Well, you know I’m not supposed to tell you,” Pinkie teased. She paused for a second before bursting out in giggles, “but I’ll tell you anyway!” she motioned for everyone to come closer, then closer, then closer until everyone formed a tight circle with everyone’s cheeks pressing against each other.

Slowly, Pinkies eyes trailed over everyone else’s before speaking, “I wish that Genie could remember his true name,” she whispered.

Aladdin opened his mouth to say something but nothing but air escaped when he, and everyone else, found themselves gripped in a tight hug by the man himself.

“Well wish granted, little lady! Because I do remember!”

“Yes! Birthday magic for the win!” she cheered.

Aladdin finally managed to extricate himself from the group hug. Brushing himself off he gave Pinkie an odd look. “True name? What do you mean?”

“Well, when I was trying to cheer him up he told me that he couldn't remember his name from before he was a genie. And that made a little sad because if I couldn't remember my name I wouldn't know what I would do or what I would want people to call me.” she turned back to the former genie with wide excited eyes. “But you said you remember right? What is it!”

Every eye in the room turned to the man as they waited for him to answer. Smirking, he cleared his throat, “Before I tell you that I have something more important to talk about,” he began in an uncharacteristically serious tone, “I’m leaving Agrabah.”

The room sat in shock silence before erupting in various arguments and questions.

“Wait, what?” asked Aladdin.

“What do you mean?” asked Twilight.

“Where are you going? asked Jasmine.

“Are you going to travel with us?” asked Pinkie.

“What will you wear?” asked Rarity.

The man put his thumb in his mouth and blew a loud trumpet noise that completely drowned everyone out. “Calm down ya babies. Now, like I was saying--Twilight!”

Twilight jumped, “Y-yes?”

“Is it or is it not true that people who wield the keyblade are tasked with keeping the balance between light and darkness?” he asked.

 Twilight nodded, “Yes. it’s true. If--”

“Then is it also true that with amount of heartless that were released, the balance has been tipped?”

Twilight paused for a second, mulling it over, “I… suppose so.”

Aladdin stepped forward, “Are you going to come back?”

The man, stepped over to him and pulled him into a one armed hug, “Well where else would I stay, you guys have my bed. I’ll probably come back to visit every other few days or so.”

“You can’t ever stay in one place can you?” he smirked.

The man jumped high into the air, “No!”

“Come on! Enough stalling! I wanna hear your new name!” Pinkie yelled.

The man fell back to the ground and gave her a large smile, “I don’t blame you, my name is pretty awesome. I’m surprised I forgot it. My name is…”