Harry
*The duo exit the Lanes Between through a green, sickly portal. The portal drops them into the Realm of Darkness. For what feels like ages, they fall. As they do, the air pressure drops, popping their ears. In spite of the lower pressure, the air feels thicker, as though they're moving against Furo's wind. An ever so slight smell of mildew with no discernable source curses their senses. Instead of the sound of rushing air, all they hear is deafening silence unfindable in any world within the Realm of Light.*

*The ground unnaturally fades into view before they can decelerate, and they hit it at full force. Despite falling at terminal velocity, they take no damage. None of their bones break; their skin doesn't even so much as bruise. All they feel is the pain of the landing.*

*As they get up, their surroundings shimmer, then fade in around them. They stand on a road, lined with broken buildings and loose rebar. It stretches past an empty hotel and several lifeless restaurants, all unfamiliar to either Keyblade wielder, up to a beach. The dark water beckons them closer...*
Julie
*Brad groaned as he felt his bones wobble upon impact. Truly, he had taken some hilariously comical falls, but this took the cake. This armor had to be pretty sturdy to keep him from turning into total slurry once they hit the ground. Even his Keyblade, no longer in the form of a sick-ass horse motorcycle, had embedded itself in the pavement a few feet away.*

"Guh..." *Brad groaned, dusting himself off and getting to his feet.* "Well, I guess fer a test drive, not so bad. Not like either of us are Furo." *He shook his head, moving his jaw to try and get his ears to pop again. It looked a little silly, the way the mouthguard of his helmet seemed to squish up and down as he tried to yawn.* "Now what is... This?"

*His eyes fell on the broken metropolis before them. Black tarmac stretching outward, tall buildings shattered by some great force. As though the world were frozen mid-cataclysm, an eerie silence drowning them. For a moment, he thought he recognized it. But no, on closer inspection, this was foreign to him. The shapes, the colors, it was familiar-but not the same. Maybe this place was once brighter?*

*Brad shook his head, turning to Cid.* "You okay?"
Armida
Icidro has no idea what half this stuff is; The towering structures, the damaged signs, the _rebar_. He hadn't seen architecture like this anywhere other than The World That Never Was, all glass and steel. The only thing that comes to mind at first is 'ouch,' followed by the startling realization that the world was empty. Silent.

All he could hear was his own heart pounding in his ears, and the minor movements that he and Brad were making. Turning his gaze out toward the water, the only other source of sound that he could hear so far, Icidro swallows back the growing dread as Brad speaks first. 

"I'm fine," Icidro chooses to say in lieu of the truth, "Anything here ring a bell?"
Julie
"It... Looks familiar." *Brad shook his head, rubbing at his temples through the cool steel.* "But not the same. I don't think this is mine." *He admitted, seemingly a little disappointed. And maybe, just maybe, a hint of relief.* "Let's keep movin'."
Kathy
"It's not mine, either, but it was someone's at one time— And I can't shake that feeling. Let's." Icidro echoes the affirmative as he clenched his fist, the fresh leather of his gauntlet straining.

Looking out toward their surroundings, Cid's preference lies with the most open path available to them at the moment. While _he_ could certainly leap over the rubble or fly on his Keyblade, Brad... Cid wasn't keen on the idea of prying his friend out of the concrete.

To that end, Cid follows the street toward the beach.
Harry
*Los dos compadres spot something moving closer to them. A mob of strange Heartless, ten moving along the ground on wheels, and five gliding through the air. They ride along the road, blocking their path towards the beach.*

*Upon seeing the Hot Rods among the dull scenery, memories flood into Brad. These are cars. And planes. Of course they are; that's obvious, but something feels notable about that fact...*

*The Hot Rods immediately begin charging repeatedly at the fighters, spinning out after crossing their horizontal positions before turning back and charging again.*

*The Aeroplanes, meanwhile, divebomb the duo, spinning wildly as they drop towards them before course correcting and pulling up at the last moment.*

```
10 Hot Rods
Group HP: 1760
Flip-Dash (all): 316

5 Aeroplanes
Group HP: 1267
Raiding Charge (all): 633
```
Roland
Information: Unlike in the Realm of Light, your HP, AP, and MP will **Not** Regenerate after each fight. Your item uses and cooldowns, however, will. Use your resources wisely!
Harry
*Cid's graceful flurry of spear strikes take out four of the Aeroplanes (the final dispatched by Brad's Freeze Raid), leaving their pink hearts exposed directly to the Realm of Darkness. Instead of floating up, they shudder, only to be wrapped once again in darkness. The dark hearts spin, then vanish through dark corridors. This most certainly wouldn't be a good place to perish.*

*As Brad contemplates the peril before them, he remembers driving. The knowledge that death was only a small mistake away helped drive out the numbness. The feeling of numbness, amplified by the darkness around him, begins to set in...*

*The Hot Rods, knocked back by Brad's extra-large Counter Hammer, spin out. Half of them charge at Cid, and the other half at Brad, the common ground between their attacks being that, as each one gets closer, they lunge into the air and bite at either warrior.*

```
10 Hot Rods
Group HP: 1760 -1481
Bite (all): 220
```