Heart Form Patch

by FieryTGWorks (FierySprites)

Summary:

As Sora once again performs a Dive to the Heart, his next journey around the corner, he finds himself suddenly affected by an outside presence. Unbeknownst to him, a new player has signed onto the scene with a bunch of mods installed—and they very much have a soft spot for playing as female protagonists…

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(A TF/TG fic set during Kingdom Hearts III, where Sora gets transformed into Purple Heart of Hyperdimension Neptunia, and the consequences thereafter.)

Chapter 1: Mystical Mod Malady [Sora to Purple Heart]

Summary:

The first installed mod, in all of its glory.

Notes:

This fic is set at the very beginning of Kingdom Hearts III, during Sora’s obligatory Dive to the Heart sequence. No knowledge of Hyperdimension Neptunia is required to read this. All of the mods described below can be downloaded from the Nexus Mods website.

Warnings:

This fic contains Male-to-Female TF/TG, Mild Sexual Themes, Reality Alteration, and Mature Descriptions.

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???
Dive to the Heart

Sora was falling.

This was… not new to him.

Every Keyblade wielder went through this at some point in their lives. It was a Dive to the Heart: a representation of a significant turning point; an affirmation of their will to continue on, despite all opposition. At least, that was what Yen Sid had told him in one of his many lectures. He didn’t quite understand all the fancy words the old wizard used—but he got the gist of it.

He was about to embark on yet another adventure, high off the heels of his trek to the Sleeping Worlds—and it was going to be his biggest one to date, with the threat of a second Keyblade War impending overhead. It only made sense that this would come up now, especially when his power level was mostly back to square one… again.

Well, it’s nothing I can’t deal with, he thought. Can’t go anywhere else but up from here!

He dropped down onto the stained steel platform, dressed and looking like his classic fourteen-year-old self – also a reoccurring thing in his dreams, for whatever reason.

A voice echoed out from the unending void:

There are seven hearts to save…

Seven hearts, huh…?

Hope they don’t mind that I’ve kept them waiting for a while…

He looked forward to see an ornately-framed silver mirror materialize from a cloud of sparkles, reflecting his current real-world self back at him. Walking over to it, it was easy to tell just how much he had grown in only two years. The extra inches; the spikier (and slightly blonder) hair; the fancier, black-dyed clothes…

He frowned. “You know, after all that business with the ‘Recusant’s Sigil’, I’m not really feeling up to wearing so many crosses again. I know they were a gift from the fairies, so it shouldn’t be a problem, but…”

It wasn’t paranoia if it had already happened to you once, right?

He reached out to touch the mirror’s surface—

—but then, something weird happened.

A vertical black rectangle abruptly appeared in front of his face, hovering just a foot or so away. A label at the top of it read ‘Mod Loader v2.1’, with a dash and an ‘X’ to the far right of it. Below that was some kind of list, featuring combinations of words that didn’t seem to make any sense to him.

Why was the Olympus Coliseum was explicitly named here?

What was a ‘Map Enhancement Overhaul’, or a ‘Re:Mind Ability Integration’ for that matter?

“This is freaky…” he said. “I’ve never seen this in any of my dreams before… Is this… because of Xehanort?”

And then, adding to the surrealness of it all…

…he heard another voice stream into his ears—different from the last one, and sounding even farther away, somehow.

“Man, look at how busy the community has been since this game came out on PC… This game was fun on PS4 before; I can’t wait to see what it’s like with all of these mods!”

What the—!?

“Hey! Who—Who said that!?” he cried, head swiveling about in surprise. His Keyblade—the ever-trusty Kingdom Key—flashed into his hand, ready to be swung at whatever new threat this was. “Sh-Show yourself!”

“I’ve got most of these turned on already, but there are some I’m not too sure about yet. So that’s why I’ve got this dynamic loader, so I can simply turn ‘em off if I don’t care for them!”

Sora furrowed his brows.

“Game…? Mods…? Loader…? You know, I’m getting real tired of people throwing these random words at me!” He started clutching his Keyblade with two hands and shifted into a battle stance. “Can’t you make things less complicated to understand!?”

He didn’t get any kind of response, naturally. The voice simply continued on, heedless of Sora’s words or intent.

“Now, while I like Sora and all, I’m happier when I’ve got a girl under my analog stick.” (Hey, what’s that supposed to mean!?) “Sure, I could just use a character-switching mod and play as Kairi or Aqua—but there’s this new mod that looks like it’ll serve my purposes well enough…”

“Kairi, too…!? Why are you talking about her like—!?”

In front of his eyes, he saw a white box appear in-between the window label and the list, which soon enclosed its own concerning set of words:

‘Play as Purple Heart’.

With the press of a key, the item was added to the catalog—

—and before Sora’s eyes, his reflection began to change.

Gone was the form he knew so well, instead swapped out for the image of a purple-haired braided girl—the most endowed he’d ever seen one be, and wearing a black bodysuit that embarrassingly (for him) was still rather revealing. Her appearance—from the strange sigil in her eyes to the slick, geometric patterns on her attire—reminded him of how he and everyone else looked in Space Paranoids and The Grid.

She was cute, he couldn’t lie to himself; about as cute as Kairi, if not moreso (though he wouldn’t admit that to anyone). For all that he was an accomplished hero… at the end of the day, he was still a teenaged boy—one who was still figuring out how to process his own hormones, especially after going through an entire growth spurt while in an effective coma.

“Huh…? A—A girl?”

The see-through panel of text vanished, leaving him with only him and the mysterious girl for company.

Sora let his Keyblade dematerialize as well. Curious as to what he was witnessing, he waved his hands about in the air—and the girl proceeded to copy his exact movements. He spun around 180 degrees—and when he turned his head, he could see the cross-shaped opening on her back, as well as how impeccably round her… behind was.

He blushed.

This isn’t—I don’t—

Why am I feeling like this? What is she doing to me?

…

Is any of this for real, or…?

Returning to facing frontward, the brunette again reached a hand out and laid it down atop the mirror. He stared into the girl’s sky-blue eyes as she did the same, sharing in his puzzled expression.

“Who are you…?” he wondered. “I definitely would’ve remembered if you were in The World That Never Was. Is my heart… trying to tell me something…?”

Suddenly, the area he was touching began to glow a bright white—and then, quickly afterward, expanded to cover the entire mirror.

“Wh-Whoa—!”

It all happened in an instant. One moment he was standing on two feet, the next he had fallen straight through the glass, barely having any time to verbalize a reaction. Thankfully, it wasn’t too long before he emerged from the other side—

—where he soon found that his troubles had multiplied substantially.

A hefty weight had been added to his chest, plus what felt like balloons attached to his bottom. His skin, once tanned and coarse from island life, was now pale and sensitive to the touch; his muscles, built up over two (technically three… or four) journeys’ worth of fighting, had also been replaced with a leaner, more nimble physique. And below her waist area, it was…

A sharp exhale escaped his fuller lips as everything hit her all at once. Looking down, a voluminous pair of breasts pervaded her vision, with two long twintails poking into view to her sides.

“Wha—!?”

She twisted her body left and right, panic engulfing her every sense.

“Hah!?”

She whirled about to face the mirror, hoping to go back through to her old self…

…just in time to watch helplessly as her salvation promptly dissipated into light.

“No, wait!” she cried—but it was no use.

There wasn’t anything else she could do.

She was stuck like this.

(At least, for however longer this dream would end up lasting.)

“Damn, Purple Heart’s looking fine!” the voice said again, evidently impressed by… whatever the heck had happened to Sora. “The guy who made this mod clearly knew what they were doing! She’s even got that wonderfully mature voice—all the better!”

Sora cast a hand to her throat.

Experimentally, she sang a few phrases from a familiar song:

“Look at this stuff—isn’t it neat?
Wouldn’t you think my collection’s complete?
Wouldn’t you think I’m the girl…
The girl who has everything? ♪”

…

“I almost sound like Ariel now, singing like this,” she muttered. “My voice… My body… Just what kind of dream am I having?”

She then moved her hands to lightly hold her breasts—and proceeded to flush at the electric shock that ran up her spine; a sensation that she had never felt before, far different from the usual rush of adrenaline she got from fighting (which was her closest comparison).

She gasped.

“A-Aaaaaaah~! Th-This… Is this something that all girls have to deal with…!?” she asked herself. “Did—Did Kairi…!?”

A part of her wanted to just keep standing there, trying to figure out what exactly was going on with herself—

—but cryptic, prophetic dreams stopped for no one, it seemed.

A towering array of picture frames appeared to circle outside her heart platform, every single one depicting a memory taken from across her (his?) previous adventures. Temporarily shaking off her discomfort, she watched as three of them detached from their lofty heights to hover right above the edge—inviting her to make a choice.

What do you desire?

“To stop having such a bizarrely realistic dream,” she snarked immediately—but somehow, she could tell she wasn’t going to get that.

So, she settled on picking one of the three clearly-being-offered choices available to her.

And a couple times more after that, too.

First, she had to pick between Vitality, Wisdom, and Balance; something that was rather new to her. Taking a couple minutes to think, she ultimately went for Wisdom, since that sounded like it had something to do with magic (and she could always use more of that)—

—and consequently, she was provided some commentary for it by the second, more casual voice, as if they were the one making the decision.

“You can never go wrong with a little more magic! Even if Critical Mode nerfed it by a lot, it’s still pretty easy to die, so extra HP wouldn’t make much of a difference anyway.”

…I really wish I knew what they were talking about…

The next question—‘What power do you seek?’—was, by comparison, very familiar to her. Having already selected Wisdom, she figured additionally going for ‘the power of the Mystic’ couldn’t hurt—

“This might hurt me for a while, but what the heck. In for a penny, in for a pound, right?”

—and to the last such query, ‘What kind of adventure do you seek?’, she obviously wanted to have a relatively Easy Adventure, after the mess her Mark of Mastery exam had turned into.

“I’ve never been a challenge gamer. Playing Kingdom Hearts III with all those restrictions—Zero Defense and No Cure and whatnot—just sounds like a painfully unfun time, if you ask me. As a casual, I personally prefer having an easy shortcut out of a tough jam whenever I need it.”

Well, we can agree on that much, at least…

She sighed, a slight impatience welling up inside her. “Is this over yet…?”

Their purpose fulfilled, the framed memories disappeared all at once, in much the same way as the mirror earlier. A shallow layer of water began to brush by her feet, soon encompassing the surface of the entire platform in an instant. She stared at it for a moment, startled, before looking up to see a glistening light appear only a few yards away.

A frown crossed her lips.

“Tell me that’s it…” she whispered.

She took a brave step forward—

—and was summarily greeted by the water tilting back and forming a wave, rising higher with every passing second.

Her eyes widened. “Crap, crap, crap—!”

She started running after the light, one hand outstretched in desperation.

Idly, a sense of déjà vu flew through her head—but processing that was the last of her concerns right now.

I don’t know how this body’s gonna take being wet, let alone try to swim! Please, let me—!

Too late, of course.

The wave came down, and engulfed her in all its watery goodness.

Fortunately, since this wasn’t actually reality, she didn’t need to worry about breathing or drowning. However, that didn’t change the fact that she was feeling massive torrents of water beating down on her, causing her bust to bounce and her butt to ripple; both distressing in equal measure.

Ack! I knew it…!

Kingdom Hearts, why!?

She rolled rearward a few rounds—and upon stabilizing herself, caught a glimpse of what appeared to be rays of sunlight above her.

Ugh…

There’s gotta be something up there, no doubt…

But… will I be able to reach it…?

…

…guess I won’t know unless I try.

Steeling herself, Sora did her best to climb to the surface, even as her body struggled to use the techniques that had worked for her as a male. The light grew closer, and closer, and closer still—until…

SPLASH!

“Sweet air!” she breathed. “Oh, that sucked! I am never making fun of Kairi for being a slow swimmer again…”

She arose to what was, quite frankly, a stunning scene: a meeting of a bright, partly cloudy sky with a perfectly reflective sea, both of which were stretching out into a seeming eternity. The clouds closer to the ground were traveling fast in a single direction, further adding to the locale’s mystical, mysterious air.

“Whoa…” she said, awed. “This place is… beautiful. Has this been in my heart all along…?”

Usually, she didn’t get to see much more than the bottom of the metaphorical ocean with these sequences, so this was a pleasant surprise.

Or rather, it would be, if not for the girl whose eyes she was currently borrowing.

“Ah, yes… The Final World,” the also-a-mystery voice stated; presumably, still observing the events of Sora’s dream with her—and apparently recognizing the change of scenery. “Gotta say, it sure was brave of Square Enix to show us this at the start of the game, right off the bat. Say what you will about them, but they know how to make an impact.”

“The Final World…?” the purple-haired girl repeated. “It has a name?”

There was no more time to wonder, though: Shadow Heartless were crawling out of the woodworks (yes, even here), and they wouldn’t be leaving without a fight. Sora briefly paused, and then tensed up.

“You know what? This is fine. I’ve been looking for a safe excuse to find what I’m capable of again after what Xehanort did. Bring it on!”

She swished her hand, fingers closing in a practiced motion—

—but what she ended up summoning wasn’t her Keyblade at all.

“What!?”

No, instead she was holding a long violet sword, stylized the same as her attire and somehow grippable with only a single hand—the longest she’s ever wielded, comparable to Cloud’s Buster Sword. It honestly felt a little weightless – but was that because of something inherent to the sword itself, or the sheer strength of the girl she became?

“It doesn’t matter,” she shook her head. “It may look different, but… it’s still my Keyblade, deep down. I can tell.”

Besides, it wasn’t like this was a permanent affair. She’d finish this, wake up, and return to the Mysterious Tower—and she’d forget all about this peculiar fantasy by next month.

Yeah. That sounds like a plan!

See, Donald? You’re not the only one who can figure one out!

“Time for the combat tutorial,” she heard overhead. “Thankfully, it’s short and to the point. Don’t get me wrong, I would’ve sat through anything after the years we’ve spent waiting for this—but I’m glad I don’t have to. Now…”

Sora swung her transformed blade down, leveling a nice glare at the bug-like threats.

“Let’s do this!”

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Combat Basics - 1/2

Attacking
Press × while Attack is selected to attack with Sora’s Keyblade. After landing an attack, you can keep pressing the button to chain together a combo. At the end of the combo, Sora will unleash a powerful combo finisher.

Blocking and Evading
Press □ without moving and Sora will block enemy attacks. If you are tilting Ⓛ when you press ×, Sora will dodge in that direction instead of blocking.

△ Tutorial   × Next   ○ Close

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The Mysterious Tower
Outskirts

What had followed for Sora was… business as usual, pretty much.

She fended off a number of those Shadows, and thenceforth, a Darkside—because life could be nostalgic like that, sometimes. On the bright side, it wasn’t any trouble to deal with, even with how diminished she was – which showed how much better she was getting at this, really.

Once done, she spent a few minutes admiring the so-called ‘Final World’—hey, she never knew when she was gonna get another chance to come here—and subsequently, willed herself to ascend from the Sleeping Worlds back to whence she came.

But as it turned out…

“Wah—aaaAAH!? You’ve—You’ve gotta be kidding me…!”

…her dream had had some bearing on reality after all.

At the outskirts of Yen Sid’s tower, scrambling behind one of the thick trees so no one could see her, Sora was—as quietly as she could—freaking the heck out.

“I don’t understand!” she spluttered, clasping her hands to her cheeks. “I—I was dreaming! And not like how my Mark of Mastery was in a dream place—this,” she gestured to herself, “was supposed to be all in my head! Or… my heart?”

She was still wearing an ill-covering bodysuit; she still lacked a certain something between her legs. Her hair (well, what part of it wasn’t braided) was still lengthy enough to touch her neck—and everything about this still felt incredibly wrong to her.

Oh, and she still had the humongous sword, too; couldn’t leave that detail out. She gave it a few swings—and sure enough, it rippled the air as expected of a blade of its size.

So… what did this all mean?

How, exactly, did that second voice pull this off?

…who in the Lanes Between was Purple Heart; the girl who she was now ‘playing as’?

“I can’t show my face to everyone looking like this!” she expressed. “But… I also promised them that I’d wouldn’t be long. And I don’t break my promises if I can help it.”

That wasn’t what a friend did.

She groaned.

“Riku’s never gonna let me live this down. ‘Be careful,’ he said. Boy, I wish I had…”

She could practically hear her best friend’s teasing tones upon laying eyes on her. He had literally just gotten Sora out of trouble—and not a whole day later…

…well, what’s done was done.

All she could do now was learn from it and move on.

Sure is gonna be awkward explaining this to Mom, though…

Taking in a deep breath and valiantly trying to ignore the amount of skin she was showing, she stepped out from the tree’s shadow, unsummoned her sword, and walked toward the tower’s front door. Her hips shifted from side to side, her feet delicately tiptoeing to prevent her new ‘assets’ from… jiggling out of control, let’s put it.

“Don’t think about it, Sora, don’t think too hard about it…” she chanted to herself. “Just keep on walking…”

Eventually, she made it to the entrance, where her old companions Donald and Goofy were waiting for hi—her. They looked a little bored—Kingdom Hearts knew Sora would be if he had to sit still for hours on end—but instantly brightened upon seeing the last member of their trio approaching, safe and sound.

Except… Sora didn’t look a thing like she used to.

So why are they—?

“Sora!” they cried in unison.

“You made it!” Goofy continued.

“It’s about time!” Donald complained, as was his wont. “There’s only so many times you can play ‘I Spy’ with someone until you get sick of it!”

…

Can… Can they not…?

The transformed Keyblade wielder blinked.

O-Okay, then… act natural, Sora!

“Hey, I… told you I’d see you guys soon, right?” she grinned, quite shakily. “No way I’d lie about that! Ha ha…”

…I’m bad at this, huh?

The anthropomorphic duck and dog shared a glance.

“Did something… happen down there?” Goofy asked, clearly picking up on her newfound nervousness. “Your smile doesn’t seem as sincere as it was before…”

A bit of concern creeped into Donald’s voice. “Has the Mark of Mastery stuff getting to you? You know it wasn’t your fault. If that Xehanort hadn’t butted in…”

Sora’s heart warmed up inside, despite everything. She’d missed having the two by her side—she could always trust in them to cheer her up.

“I’m not mad,” she said, allowing herself to relax. “And—it wasn’t anything bad! I just… ran into a little hiccup, that’s all.”

Yep! Just a hiccup…

A hiccup that can change your entire body out of nowhere…

Definitely nothing special…

…

…oh, who was she kidding?

She had to confirm something.

“Say, uh… Have you two noticed anything… different since I got here?” she asked, as subtly as she dared. “Maybe it’s only me, but… the Organization did manage to track me through my clothes, and I wouldn’t put it past them to…”

…do even worse while I couldn’t resist, she didn’t finish.

Brr.

(If nothing else, at least she didn’t have to worry about her crosses becoming Recusant’s Sigils anymore: her new attire had none at all.)

“I don’t… think so,” Donald replied, uneasily. “Everything’s the same as it’s always been. You too, otherwise. The Organization would have to be pretty daring to show up here!”

“Ayuck! If it helps, we could get Yen Sid or the fairies to give you a checkup!” Goofy suggested. “Things were going by too fast before, but there should be time now!”

…so, her senses weren’t betraying her.

They actually couldn’t perceive her new body at all.

She wouldn’t be surprised if the same applied to everyone else, too.

It was just her.

Only she could tell the difference between herself and reality as they saw it.

It was as if she was back in the Organization’s trap, chasing after illusions and trying to wrap her head around what she was experiencing. Only this time, she was in the opposite position: she was the illusion, for all intents and purposes.

A few gears clicked into place.

That guy, in my dream… she recalled.

I didn’t get it earlier, ‘cause I had other things on my mind, but…

He… He spoke like…

…my life was this… game to him.

A game he could ‘mod’ however he wanted, but the game itself would still be… the game.

Is this what he was talking about?

Is this why?

…

…

…

“Sora? Sora? Don’t tell me you’ve clocked out on us!”

She snapped back to proper existence.

“R-Right! Sorry! I just got… sidetracked!” she tried to play things off. “With, y’know… thinking!”

“Thinking, huh? Well, that’s a first for you.”

“Donald, be nice,” Goofy admonished the duck. “You know Sora’s been through a lot.”

“I know…”

“Eh heh…” Sora rubbed the back of her neck. “Thanks, Goofy.”

She wasn’t cut out for philosophical ramblings, anyway.

All that mattered was this:

She was a girl, now.

She was a fully-made girl, plain and simple—if a figuratively and literally unknown one.

She was still here, and she still had to deal with it.

So…

Why bother getting so worked up about it?

In the (vaguely remembered and paraphrased) words of her Nobody…

Her life was her own; nobody else’s!

“I think I’ll take you up on that offer, actually,” she continued, cheering up with her signature smile—“but first, let’s go see everyone else! I don’t wanna make them fret again.”

I’m doing enough of that for myself!

Goofy nodded approvingly.

“We’ll hold it to you, then,” he said. “Okey-doke – up we go!”

“You’re lucky Yen Sid is so patient,” Donald chimed in. “At least you didn’t take a nap for a whole year again!”

“Hey, you were doing it with me, too! We literally woke up together!”

“Yeah, but you sleep all the time regardless! Don’t think I’ve forgotten about Port Royal!”

“That was one time…!”

“C’mon, fellas, calm down. You don’t need to be so loud…”

With Sora and Donald back to bickering good-naturedly as usual, the trinity went through the door and up the stairs to Yen Sid’s loft.

And from there…

…only fate could decide where her course would lead.

Notes:

Images used: irori (irorixc), bimmy.

My 22nd birthday just passed, so you all get a fun TF/TG work to celebrate!

This might be my fastest turnaround for writing a fic in a long time. Less than a week, actually! How nice.

HeroOfTheHearts (alternatively known as Izuru Planetes) commissioned a Kingdom Hearts III mod replacing Sora with Purple Heart from Hyperdimension Neptunia several months ago, and it got me thinking: I haven’t done any Kingdom Hearts TF/TGs for a long while. My last one was back in November 2019—which might as well have been an eternity ago. Combined with the sudden reannouncement of Missing-Link a few weeks back, I figure that there’s no better time to return to this fandom!

This was supposed to be a relatively short cap, but a thousand words deep into the preamble, I realized it was getting too long to be simply that… again. So, I threw my hands up in the air, and now it’s a full-blown Worlds of Transformations entry—the first Kingdom Hearts one, in fact. It’s definitely not as elaborate as the (half of a) Sora to Kairi fic I’ve got on the backburner, but that’s just the way the cookie crumbles, sometimes.

Considering how the ‘digitized world’ premise is utilized in both Re:coded and Union X[cross], it’s surprising how I haven’t taken advantage of it for a Kingdom Hearts cap yet. I certainly didn’t shy away from it with Danganronpa. In contrast what I did with the caps from that series, for this one, I decided to get a little more ‘meta’. And by that, I mean have the catalyst for the transformation be the aforementioned character replacement mod.

Who needs things to make any degree of in-universe sense? Not me, that’s for sure!

Now, I don’t have Kingdom Hearts III on PC—I doubt the game would run on my ancient 2014-era desktop even if I did—so I can’t speak for how accurate my description of the described mod loader is. Can’t find any videos demonstrating how it works, either. So if it’s completely off-base, chalk it up to an artistic license. That’s also why Purple Heart’s using a different weapon here as opposed to the actual mod; I wanted to match the ones the reference illustrations I use tend to go for (see the cover image).

Given the nature of the catalyst being used, there’s no transformation sequence this time around. Instead, I elected to simply focus on how awkward Sora feels to be in a body not his own, plus the uncomfortable realization that it wasn’t just part of the strangest dream of his life (which is really saying something, knowing this franchise). I think this is the first TF/TG work I’ve written where everyone—except our protagonist—is virtually oblivious to the transformation at all, to the point where they think Sora still looks as he always did. I usually prefer either the opposite or a full-blown reality change, but I can’t say that writing this wasn’t fun in its own way.

One really has to wonder what your playable characters think when you swap out their appearance with these type of mods. It must be strange, being the only one(s) (un)affected by reality in such a way. I personally don’t care for them myself – I can be a real vanilla kind of person – but hey, power to you guys.

Interestingly, this is my second TF/TG work in a row that prominently involves a mirror. I didn’t intend for that to happen, but—oh well. At least they’re appreciatively different.

Well, that’s all for now – see you around!

Chapter 2: Datascape File Update [Data-Sora to Neptune, Addendum]

Summary:

In the recesses of Disney Castle, the mod-altered reality hits the Datascape in an unexpected way.

Data-Sora just wishes that Data-Riku would stop laughing at hi—her.

“Pfft… Hehehehehehe…”

A pout appeared on Sora’s face.

“This isn’t funny, Riku! Stop laughing!”

Some may ask a rather philosophical question: what is it like to exist only in a digitized realm, meant to reflect reality as it was for but a single moment?

Well, for Sora and Riku—or Data-Sora and Data-Riku, to the outside world… it was pretty comfortable, actually. The simulation was reasonably large, with all kinds of things to do; travelling between worlds wasn’t as restricted as it was in the real Lanes Between; and moreover, aside from the occasional swarms of data Heartless running around, there wasn’t much in the way of trouble to deal with.

That didn’t mean they were immune to weird things happening, though, even if Naminé was no longer (reluctantly) sending out Bug Blox to muck things out.

Especially since Sora was a full-fledged Keyblade wielder, and Riku was the chosen guardian for the memories contained within Jiminy’s Journal.

After all, it was magic that had left said journal completely whited out two years ago, save for the words ‘Thank Naminé’ (and then later ‘Their hurting will be mended when you return to end it’, et cetera).

This, however, was simply…

“Seriously…! Isn’t there anything you can do to fix this!?”

Riku’s mirth died down a little, though he didn’t stop smiling.

“Sorry. It’s just…” He wiped a tear. “I’ve never seen you look or act so cute before. I can’t say I don’t like it.”

His best friend’s pout only seemed to deepen as a response.

Sora’s familiar, spiky-haired avatar had been… entirely overridden, to put it lightly. Now, standing in his place was a little lithe girl, with light-purple hair and stylized plus hairpins (though it should be noted, she was actually slightly taller than 14-year-old Sora). She wore a large, white, and baggy hoodie with various blue and purple highlights, plus a dress underneath and a choker around her neck. White- and blue-striped socks stretched all the way up to her thighs—and her shoes were no longer as massive as a clown’s, fitting her feet just right.

She didn’t like it. She felt weird! Everything was softer, and her face was tingling, and she didn’t have any pants on… and that wasn’t even getting to the two bumps pushing out of her chest now!

What did Chip and Dale do?

Was this them?

“To answer your question, though…” Riku continued. “I looked through the files of the Datascape, and there seems to be some kind of lock on the ones related to your appearance. Your old form’s still there… I just can’t get to it. Not without extensive hacking, anyway.”

“So I’m stuck like this?” Sora concluded. “Aw, c’mon…”

It didn’t help that her voice had become so much more cuter, too; higher-pitched and notably childish.

“If it helps, this is less the result of an issue in the Datascape itself and more the aftereffects of something that occurred in reality. Likely, whatever that wave I detected was, it was targeting the Sora out there—and you were just collateral.”

Riku put a hand to his chin. “I doubt we’ll be able to find out any more than that, though. So far as I can tell, the only people who will be able to notice anything’s different is the real Sora, and everyone in here.”

And unfortunately, the Datascape didn’t yet come with an easy communications method with the outside realm.

“The other me, huh…? That means he must’ve become a girl, too!” Sora realized. (That was an even stranger thought.) “And he probably doesn’t know I was affected, either… What a bummer!”

She crossed her arms. “We could’ve talked with each other about it… would’ve been some consolation!”

“Hey, look on the bright side, Sora,” the silver-haired protector reassured her, “we’ve got plenty of other girls in here to help you adjust. There’s Kairi, Selphie, Aerith, Alice…”

Sora made an increasingly louder whine with every name uttered. It was rather comical, in Riku’s opinion.

“…Jane, Jasmine, Sally… oh, and of course, Naminé—”

“Can we maybe work on fixing this first?” she whimpered, sounding like the end of the worlds had come upon her. “This is already embarrassing enough; I don’t wanna know how they’re gonna tease me about it…!”

“Well, that’s still gonna take some time, so you’re gonna have to at least see one of them,” Riku shrugged. “Actually, I think I’m seeing Kairi approaching on my sensors right now…”

“What!?” Sora’s eyes went wide—

—and then, she latched onto Riku’s arm, desperation dripping from her voice. “Riku, you gotta hide me! Somewhere, anywhere! Even a System Sector will do!”

“Too late,” the older boy laughed.

“Sora, Riku! What’s going on?”

The lilac-haired girl froze like a deer in the headlights.

“Hold up… hey, Riku, where’s Sora? He’s normally with you, isn’t he? Who’s this girl?”

“Oh, you’re not gonna believe this, Kairi,” Riku grinned. “Get a load of this…”

“Riku, no!”

Sadly, it seemed like Sora wasn’t gonna be getting out of this so easily…

Notes:

Images used: buran buta.

I couldn’t leave this idea alone for long. After all, there’s more than one Sora in this franchise, and the other one just so happens to be situated in a rather malleable Datascape himself. Not to mention, if you turn on the Purple Heart mod and then start a new game, 14-year-old Sora actually appears as regular ‘ol Neptune…

There’s not much more to this. I just wanted to write something short and cute, to add on to the implications of the previous chapter. Perhaps it doesn’t really make sense that a mod affecting only one Sora would extend toward the other, with only some of the residue Perception Filter—but to that I say, ‘who cares?’ This is more fun. It’s a data world; I can hand wave it there.

I know most of the names Data-Riku rattles off don’t show up in Re:coded proper, but the Datascape is supposed to be Jiminy’s Journal circa the first Kingdom Hearts, so I think I’m allowed to take some liberties in that department. It’s a shame that we got so few worlds in Re:coded, anyway; as fun as it is, I’ll be happy if we never see Wonderland and Agrabah again without a significant upgrade in a future title.

Well, that’s all for now – see you around!

Series this work belongs to:

• Part 13 of Worlds of Transformations