A Tale of the Betrayed

Getting up from the ground Destiny felt something dripping from her nose. She touched the moister and brought her hand away from her face to see a small amount of blood covering her fingertips. Of course a nose bleed to make things even harder. Knowing that Derick would be mad if she tried to get something to stop the bleeding instead of cleaning, she resorted for cutting a corner of her skirt and holding that up to her nose.

Destiny got to work on cleaning, making sure she cleaned everything to the best of her ability while avoiding dripping blood on it. It took her longer than normal to get her cleaning done, the pain in her body making it incredibly hard to finish it with the speed and ease that she was used to finishing things in. However she wasn't disheartened by this fact, at least Derick had not returned to yell at her for not having finished it yet. He was honestly probably to drunk to care at that time. Soon enough he would sober up and probably punish her more, but that wouldn't be for a bit.

Finishing her work the girl retreated to her room. She walked over to the window and stared out it waiting until she heard the latch of her door click in place by Derick. With it in place she knew she wouldn't be allowed out for a long time, Derick would never bother climbing all the stairs unless he didn't need her for a while, most likely the rest of the night. Destiny then walked over to her bed and reached under her mattress, pulling out the letter. She stared at the words on it, trying to read it better and understand everything. As she stared at the letter, a song touched her lips once again. Quietly she sang as she stared out the window. By this point her nose stopped bleeding but she could feel that her cheek was still swollen. Sometimes Destiny wondered if anyone glanced up and saw her in the window. Wondered if anyone cared she was there or wondered what happened in this house. Even if they didn't it was okay. At least she had a roof over her head and got fed, even if she was missing dinner tonight. She wasn't so hungry that she would die, and for that she was grateful.


Carson got a few odd looks but for the most part not many people paid him much mind. It seemed that people were too worried about other things, other things such as creatures appearing on the world, hurting people. From the sounds of it there was some in the woods nearby.
Carson got up from the bench and wandered off towards the direction of the woods. The pain in his arm lingered but soon enough he was going to remedy that.

It didn't take long in the woods before Carson came across some shadows hiding in the darkness. Carson wasted no time summoning his keyblade and getting to work. As each heartless dissolved to mist at the swing of his keyblade, the dark mist found it's way into the runes that covered his arm, and relief filled his body. The runes flickered and shined as he continued to take out heartless. When all was eradicated in one area, Carson moved deeper into the forest. He had all the darkness he needed to quench the curse, now he just wanted to see what else he could discover.

The one thing Carson had not expected to find however was a girl wandering the forest. The man glanced at his glowing rune covered arm, wondering if it would scare the girl, before deciding to go ahead and talk to her anyways. "Excuse me, young lady. What are you doing in these woods alone? Don't you know it is dangerous? There are creatures in her with the intent of harming people." Carson explained to Teliana, hoping he wouldn't frighten her too badly. After all he just wanted to help. ​

 

"She's watching the carriage driver, he pulls away. She's been locked in her bedroom a hundred days. She said, yeah he's still coming, just a little bit late. He got stuck at the graveyard saving the day...." Destiny trailed off singing a song she had heard played once. She took the song and made it her own. She stared out at the clouds, watching them roll by. She only wished that someone would save her. Despite this secret wish, she would be pleased with her life, because at the very least she had a roof over her head and food.

The young girl slipped the letter back under her mattress before pulling out the glowing stone from the same place as the letter. She sat once again at the window, staring at the mysterious yet pretty object in her hand. She kept singing her song as her fingertips danced over the surface, taking in all the details of it. She wondered what this was supposed to be, what kind of rock it was, how it worked if it did anything. She didn't know but she wanted to find out, perhaps one day. But for now she knew that she should hide it, before Derick saw it.

Carson remained calm as the girl tensed. He would let her figure out on her own that he was not dangerous. He didn't bother summoning his keyblade for protection, he could do that quick enough if he had to, but he didn't feel threatened. Instead he simply answered her questions. "I am here looking for the creatures of darkness. I am trying to rid this world of them, as well figure out what is going on with a curse type thing if there is any information to be had." Carson explain in a calm voice. If the last part scared off the girl, well he hoped it wouldn't, but it would be understandable. Most people didn't know much of curses and thus took it as the worst and would avoid them. Perhaps this person was different, perhaps she wasn't. There was no telling.

"And just why are you searching for these creatures, if I may ask." He looked at the girl curiously. There was few he knew that would fight these creatures, even less that knew what was going on with them. That being said he wondered who this girl was and what her story was. "Name is Carson, how about yours?" He asked the girl politely. ​

 

"So information is your goal. I guess in a sense we have similar goals with these creatures Ana. If you would like. I will assist you in whatever ways possible." Carson offered the girl. She then mention something about a means of transport. He could always offer a ride to her, but she would need armour to travel through the lanes between. He didn't particularly know how to obtain a set of armour either, for him it kind of just came with the whole keyblade set he had inherited.

Summoning his keyblade Carson showed it to Ana. "Do you know what this is? It is more than just my weapon, it also allows me to travel between worlds through the lanes between. I would offer to give you a ride, given we share a common goal, however the only issue is traveling through the lanes without keyblade armour is a dangerous thing. So we have to find a way to protect you before I can do much." Carson explained to the girl. He wasn't quite sure why he told her that when he had no solution, but perhaps they could figure something out. ​

 

"I am afraid as far as I know magic will not be enough to protect you, and I am not willing to risk trying." Carson told Ana with a slight sigh. He wished it was that easy. She also spoke of having a keyblade and stopping it all. "Having a keyblade doesn't just stop things from happening. It isn't that easy to just stop things from happening. It has power but not enough." Carson explained a slight bit of sadness in his voice. He wished having a keyblade meant he could stop things from happening, save people, yet he couldn't.

"The keyblade certainly helps with adventures but you can still do something without one. I can already tell you for a fact that darkness still lingers in these woods." Carson turned slightly so the runes on his arm were more visible to Teliana. "You see these, this is my curse, the runes need darkness or else they cause me pain. When they glow, they are taking in darkness. They glow faintly now but still glow, they are taking in darkness so yes there is still some here, just not near. The question is where. Shall we see what we can find then, and perhaps along the way we can figure out a way to transport you safely between worlds." He suggested. ​

 

A crash was heard downstairs, followed by the shattering of something. All this was soon followed by feet pounding on the stairs. Destiny quickly hid the star shard she found and curled herself up against the wall looking slightly more fearful than she felt. Of course she was scared but she was used to it so she was not overly scared.

The door lock clicked open and then the door slammed open and smacked into the wall as Derick burst in. He was quite obviously drunk and angry. "Why did you place something in a way that it would fall at the smallest touch? Because of you me bottle of scotch fell an the ground and broke. That was worth more than you ever will. Get the hell downstairs and clean it up now!" Derick grabbed her arm with a lot of force and shoved her towards the door and then kicked her. "Hurry the hell up so I don't have to see your face!" He yelled.

Destiny stayed quiet and kept her head down as she scurried downstairs to clean up. She knew it hadn't been her fault and that Derick was simply drunk, but she wouldn't dare say that to him. She would simply do as she should and get back to her room as soon as possible. As she worked, her injuries from earlier ached but she kept her head down and kept working and ignored it. She could deal with the pain later, for now she just had to get it done.


"Agreed." Carson responded as he carefully headed further into the woods. He was on guard. Who knew what kind of heartless and darkness lurked on this planet. However when it was all done and over with, no matter what they could do for this place, he supposed he should head back to town, see if there was a gummie ship for sale, then he could help this girl out. He didn't know why his mind kept wandering to how he could help her, but it did. He was always the kind to help people in need no matter the situation.

As he got further into the woods her could hear something in the bushes in the distance. Carson went on guard, keyblade ready for whatever was to come. Birds flew away and then he heard a footstep of something big. Next thing he knew he spotted some armour type heartless, a guard armor. "Stay on guard. This will be no pushover." Carson warned as he ran at the heartless and attacked it. ​

 

"I am not saying you can't, I am just... never mind. Let's just get rid of this thing before it hurts people, can we both agree on that?" Carson said with a sigh. Well hopefully she was at least sensible enough to fight as a team and not them each fighting it on their own, that could lead to disaster, specially when the girl was this stubborn and played with fire. He would rather not be burned.

Carson waited till the fireball exploded on the things chest and then surged forward to attack, bursting through the smoke that remained in order to cover his attack. As he reached the other side he stashed at the heartless with a strong slash. From there Carson retreated slightly. When he did the armour split it's limbs off. Sending it's hands, it's feet, and it's body in a different direction each. "You get the hands, I'll get the feet, and we will deal with the body after." Carson instructed, hoping this time she would not be so stubborn to get after him for making a plan.


The glass shattered in mostly big pieces making it easy to clean up, but still small shards remained, getting caught in the cloth as she cleaned. A broom, she needed a broom to clean up the glass, but if the floor was too wet it would only wreck the broom. Destiny continued to clean up the alcohol, wringing her cloth out into the bucket before continuing. This must have been a fresh bottle too that he broke. In some ways it was a shame. She knew it was expensive.

When she finished cleaning she started back to her room. Passing Derrick she stopped to speak. "Sorry about your scotch. It must have cost you a lot." She said quietly.
"I don't need your damn pity! Get up to your damn room and don't come out!" Derrick ordered her, anger in his eyes.
Destiny did as he said, not minding the yelling. She was still going to be kind about the entire thing. There was no reason not to be. The man was sad, alone, and angry. He needed some compassion in his life, even if that compassion was rewarded with beatings.

Once in her room she took up her favourite spot by the window to start singing once again. It was too early to go to bed and really she had nothing better to do. Perhaps someone below would hear her song and enjoy it. Perhaps it would make someones day a little better. ​

 

Carson was caught on the defense for the time being, jumping back and out of the way of the footsteps from the giant heartless threatening to kill him. He had to wait for a moment when it stopped stomping his feet in order to attack, these moments were few but when he saw them he didn't hesitate to take them. Carson ran forward at the feet and swung his keyblade a couple times before jumping back again. This process repeated several times before one of the feet dissipated. Carson let out a sigh and glanced at Ana to see how she was doing. She seemed to be holding her own, meaning he had to turn his focus back to the thing trying to kill him so they could get this battle over quickly.


As the night went on Destiny found the confidence to take back out the glowing piece of rock she found. It sounded like Derick might have passed out so she was safe from his wrath for now. Destiny sat in her window holding the rock. "Dad I don't know what happened to you and I don't want to ask for much, but please just give me a break. Come home and make Derick let me out just for a day. All I want is to be among the people I see from my window for one day? Is that so selfish to ask?" Destiny spoke to the rock quietly.

As she sat there on her knees, something happened. The rock began to glow brighter and suddenly she felt it almost yank at her. All at once the area was blurred and she felt like she was moving. There was nothing Destiny could do but hold on as she flew through the air at a speed that didn't even seem real.

The next thing Destiny knew she had fallen to the ground on top of something, or someone. The girl opened her eyes slowly to see that she was on top of a boy. "Oh! I am sorry!" She said as she hurried to get off the boy. All her injuries ached all at once from the travel and crash landing, yet she didn't seem to mind them, instead looking concerned for the boy. Destiny quickly found her way to her feet and offered the boy a hand up. "I am so sorry. I don't know what happened. One minute I was in my room, and the next... Well I was here. I didn't hurt you did I? Perhaps I can help. I know this magic but it doesn't work on myself. I think I can only use it on others." Destiny explained quickly as her hand began to glow. From there she blew at her glowing hand and green sparkles broke through the glow and landed on Lumen, healing any injuries.

That was when Destiny noticed someone else was there too. "OH! I interrupted something didn't I? Here I will just leave. Don't worry about me." She stated as she turned to walk away, though her steps were small and a little tentative, not wanting to push her injuries too far. Destiny didn't know where she was or how she got there, but she was sure she could figure it out. Someone was sure to be kind enough to escort her home. ​