(IC) Chapter 2: Lumea

After the group left Radiant Garden they traveled through the corridor of darkness to reach their first world. Early on in the trip it was clear that even with Cid's and Cindy's easy to use cockpit Wiwoka and Shiro had no talent for flying. This left most of the piloting to the girls (mostly Aida). As they traveled, Terra Nova would occasionally battle heartless and nobody ships as they made their way to their first world. Two or so weeks later the group reached the world Lumea.

The Terra Nova entered lumea's clear skies over a vast ocean gently cruising in the air. Off into the distance, the group could see what looked to be a sea battle between old sailing and modern warships. As the Terra Nova flew closer, they could see that the sailing warships were enchanted with defensive magic and pounded their enemy with magical cannon fire. While on the other hand the modern ships used their strong armor and powerful engines to withstand and out maneuver the sailing warships.

"Hmmm...I don't see any Heartless involvement down there," said Wiwoka, "Not sure if we ought to involve ourselves in the affairs of this world that don't include the Heartless."

"Sure thing boss," said Cindy who was flying for the day, "alright everyone get ready to-" Out of nowhere a group of heartless dove from the sky and attacked the Terra Nova. Multiple groups of Aeroplanes, Air Vikings, and Air Soldiers along with 4 battleships attacked the ship from all sides. "OH CRAP EVERYBODY HANG ON!!!," shouted Cindy as she rolled the ship out of the swarm of heartless. "The engines were hit I need to down there Vivi take the wheel," she said jumping out of the seat.

Wiwoka quickly grabbed the wheel. "I have absolutely no idea what I'm doing!" he exclaimed, "And my name is Wiwoka!"

"Don't worry, I got this," Shiro declared. "Got what?" Aida asked slightly confused. Shiro was his hand and shouted "Thundara!!!" A magic circle appeared above him and a barrage of multiple lightning bolts hit the Heartless, some hitting the Terra Nova as well. "Are you crazy?!?" Aida exclaimed. "We are still in the air, your are going to take us down with them!!" "I don't understand, " Shiro said surprised, "I was trying to summon just small bolts, not a storm.."

The bolts of lightning that the Terra Nova blow out one of its 4 engines and heavily damaging other 3. The ship began to lost power as the 4 battleship heartless began to hammer them with their cannons. "Dammit we're gonna crash," says Cindy as she returns from the engine room.

"I'm going to put a barrier around us," said standing up. "Woah, hold on," Shiro grabbed her by the arm in protest. "What I did was a bad idea, sure, but what makes you so sure about that idea? How can your Barrier spell protect all of us AND the ship at the same time?" "I'm going off of a hunch I had awhile back when we first came here," Aida said, struggling to hold herself up through the turbulence. "Trust me this will work.... hopefully." She pressed her hands on the deck and declared,  "Baria!!" A magic circle appeared, and a flash of light surrounded the Terra Nova turning into a slightly transparent shield.

Aida's shield protected the Terra Nova but the heartless growing in numbers continued to attack as the ship quickly flew from the sky. Inside the ship warning alarms were going off as the Terra Nova shook violently as it fell. "Hang on everyone," says Cindy now back at the wheel, "I'll try landing next to one of those ships."

"H-hurry," Aida grunted, "Barrier...can't...hold off... this many.... attacks... at once..." She began to sway, straining herself to maintain the spell. "Wiwoka," shouted Shiro, desperation in his voice, stumbling from the violent shaking of the damaged ship, "If you've got something up your sleeve, now would be a reeally good time to use it!!"

Wiwoka acted quickly and managed to open up a portal to his pocket dimension right in front of the ship. The ship's momentum greatly decreased as it crossed through the dimensional portal and Cindy was able to land it much easier. "Phew...that was close," said Wiwoka. As the others looked out the window, they saw lots of items from weapons, to vehicles, and even food. Other than that, the dimension was merely open white space, appearing to go on forever in every direction. "Is everyone okay?" he asked, "I can send us right back but we'd likely be right in the same area. So we should make sure we're prepared before I open the portal again."

Cindy took the time to run a ship wide diagnostic, "well alpha is gone and beta would take sometime to fix but I can get the others workin enough for us land," she says, "the gun ports still work at least but I ain't so sure they'll keep 'em off us for long."

"We're okay too," Shiro said as helped up a slightly exhausted Aida. "But, where are we?" Aida chimed in. "It's as if we're somewhere... yet also nowhere. "

"We're in my pocket dimension," said Wiwoka, "I normally just store items in here but it can sometimes be useful for quick escapes. Its basically my own little world. Anyway, are we ready to get back? We may have to leave the ship hear for now if it's too broken to fly."

"While we're here, I would like to discuss a pressing matter, something that has been bothering me ever since we came here," Aida stated matter-of-factly. "What's that?" Shiro asked.
"Well, remember when you almost vaporized us?" Shiro slightly blushed with embarrassment. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to.." Aida nodded promptly. "Of course. Same thing with my Barrier. After the first few attacks it should've dissipated. And when we arrived here, I felt something.... odd. You and Wiwoka should have too." "What do you mean?" Shiro asked. "The magical aura of this place. It feels.. raw, ancient, wild..." Now that she mentioned it, Shiro DID feel an air of ancient mysticism, like the mana here was both empowering and restrictive; it was almost like the magical aura here was alive. And then of course there were those magic looking circles that appeared, that was new to him. "Maybe the archaic laws are different in this world," Shiro pointed out. "What do you think, Wiwoka?"

"Yes," he replied, "As soon as we entered the world things felt a bit different. Now my magic is mostly limited to the use of my pocket dimension so I don't imagine it will effect my performance at all."

"Yeah, speaking of which, can we get outta here?" Shiro asked. "Any more of this empty void and I'm gonna go nuts." Aida nodded in agreement, although not entirely for the same reason. "We still need to do what we came here for."

"Of course," he replied.  Wiwoka opened a portal beneath the group, dropping them on the ground right where they were about to crash. He did choose to leave the ship in his pocket dimension though. Cindy could take a look at it later when they found a safe place with some locals of this world.

As the crew left Wiwoka's pocket dimension, they landed on an amphibious assault ship that was in the battle. The sailors and marines wearing sci-fi armor quickly drew their weapons and surrounded them. "Drop all weapons, items, and magic tools on the deck and put hands were we can see them or we will open fire," ordered one of the marines. Behind the group the marines stood a 12 old year boy wearing light sci-fi armor covered a hooded cloak that cover his face. Next to the boy was a woman wearing the same armor as the boy. "They don't look like imperials to me," boy said to the woman. "We're right," she said, "and they were shot down by the Imperial Heart Yokai."

"Imperial heart yokai? " Shiro repeated, looking at Aida. She shrugged, equally confused. "Are they talking about the Heartless?" Shiro shrugged back, and turned back to the men in strange armor. "Look, I haven't the slightest idea what you're talking about," he said, stepping towards the woman and disregarding the intimidating weapons trained on him, "but what I do know is, we better get an explanation of what is going on." It was at this point Aida massaged her furrowed head, as if suffering from a migraine. She couldn't tell which was more astonishing: his courageous disregard for danger, or his temper making things go from bad to worse.

"Shiro you damn lughead," shouted Cindy, "are you trying to get us killed?!" "You should listen to your friend over there," said the woman, "we been fighting the Imperial Navy all day so my men here had very itchy trigger fingers." A few of the marines closed in on Shiro pointing their rifles at his head. "Dis guy either crazy or stupid," thought the boy as he watch the exchange that place. Suddenly from out of nowhere soldier and air soldier heartless appeared on the ship. The marines quickly attacked the heartless before they could attack but more keep coming.

"Well that escalated quickly," said the boy drawing his rifle and shooting down three heartless in a row. The woman pushed Shiro to the ground and spin kicked a soldier and shot two air soldier with her pistol. "If you don't wanna get hurt suggest you stay down," she said.

Shiro got back on his feet, frustrated. "That was your first mistake, treating me like some helpless kid." He nodded at Aida as a signal. "Time to go to work." Aida nodded back, and put her hands together whispering,  "Barrier Surge." A soft aura surrounding Aida appeared and she dashed into a group of Soldier Heartless, any and all attacks bouncing off her as she made quick work of them. Shiro jumped into the fray, hacking down several with his personal sword. "Heh, if this keeps up, I won't even have to use m Keyblade," Shiro said proudly.

As dozens of air soldier heartless began to descend onto the ship, Wiwoka opened a portal to his pocket dimension and acquired a very large missile launcher.  "You guys picked the wrong ship to attack," he said.  At Wiwoka's command, the launcher began firing missiles at the oncoming heartless.  The launching and exploding of missiles was almost deafening, and the heat of the explosions could be felt by everyone on the ship due to the proximity of the impact. Smoke from the launching and exploding began to fill the area.

Although impressed by the newcomers skill, the marines continued to fight off the heartless as they tried to take back the ship. As the battle raged on some marines before fix knives onto their rifle while others drew their axes or swords cutting down the heartless. In the midst, Cindy was able to a glowing ball of fire fly into the sky over the ship. "Oh no," she said, "everybody get down!!" The ball of fire exploded over them raining down hellfire in to the ship.

"Enemy ship off the portside," shouted one of the sailors as a large heavy frigate pulled up to their left and began firing its magical cannons. "Man the portside guns," ordered the women as marines and sailor moved to fight the new enemy. After shooting down more heartless the boy noticed a group of mages working together to cast another hellfire spell.

"Hey bowling ball," the boy says to Wiwoka, "do you know how to use a heavy sniper rifle?"