The Adventures of Kiko Fluffy Pants

The Adventures of Kiko Fluffy Pants is a satirical Dark Fic by EtherealMutation for the Kingdom Hearts universe. Not quite Alternate Universe, but it takes a Broad Strokes stance on the official canon, rewrites over the Plot Holes in the game, and otherwise fills out the universe with an "ironic realism". With a heavy emphasis on character development and a defiant attitude towards the fantasy cliches Kingdom Hearts is built around, it is, if nothing else, a very different story than one is accustomed to and is better treated as something closer to original fiction.

The story centers around viewpoint character and Audience Surrogate Emily Tennenbaum, an insecure Bratty Teenage Daughter taking the brunt of puberty and bullying. As a fifteen year old high school student, Emily reacts to her social outcast status by writing escapist Self Insert Fics casting herself as Kiko, the all-special girlfriend of Riku. After a barrage of mockery that manages to hit that very soft spot, her day doesn't look it could possibly get any worse...

...except it does. Of course. Given that people aren't keen to read a Kingdom Hearts fanfic where it's just used as a topic of conversation and obsession, she gets unceremoniously tossed into the universe with only just enough levels in badass not to be a total Damsel in Distress. From there, through a combination of prophetic dreams and a protective precognitive ability that does just enough to preserve her life, she finds herself unwittingly drafted into Mickey's army via a military academy specifically seeking out and training new heroes. Thus begins an epic... sort of.

The story has 88 chapters totaling over 450,000 words, with the opening 4 rewritten due to quality concerns. Plans buried deep on the author's supplemental website aim to rewrite earlier chapters up to an unspecified point where "it stops sucking". As such, beginning readers might want to keep in mind that early chapters are a bit rough, but It Gets Better.

Also, unlike a lot of creators both amateur and professional, the author actively reads and encourages feedback; especially negative feedback. The only real guideline is to note that the story is satirizing the kind of people that might give in to Purist Rage, so odds are pretty good that yelling at the author exclusively for violating canon or unspoken rules of conduct for Fanfic writing will just be given a private laugh at their expense and ignored. Otherwise, anything goes, no comments are ever deleted, and changes have been made based on suggestions in the past.

The entire story can be found on FanFiction.Net, Archive of Our Own, Never Wake Up, and as a raw RTF from the author's neglected website, with plans to upload it on Media Miner and other sites given time for proper formatting. Feel free to send suggestions for other hosting options.

Note: Most of this work page was written by the author and may most definitely contains advertising-based weaseling and/or violations of Death of the Author. Feel free to remove this tag after the article is given some alternate perspective.


 * Action Survivor: Emily is evocative of this while believing herself to be an Action Girl.
 * Alternate Character Interpretation: Invoked multiple times both through Emily's interpretations of various characters and as a basis for the work itself.
 * Anti-Hero: Emily is an unmitigated loser with a total lack of social ability and an inability to grasp many major concepts, but otherwise at least tries to act morally. Type I on the Sliding Scale of Anti-Heroes.
 * Ascended Fangirl: Although over time, this turns out to not be such a good thing after all.
 * Beige Prose: Sort of. The intended style is to make the action clear while leaving the themes and subtleties implied.
 * Black Comedy: Mostly when the topic of Discord comes up.
 * Butt Monkey: Emily.
 * Casual Interstellar Travel: While it's not as blatant as the game series, two day travel times across the galaxy is still pretty damn casual.
 * Character Shield: Emily's precognitive ability basically translates to a Double Subversion of this, showing both all the senseless ways she can die while then avoiding them.
 * The Cheerleader: Although it turns out she really doesn't like the hobby in the first place, Dana fits this to a tee.
 * The Corruption: Riku's affinity with the darkness. He can draw great amounts of power from it, but at great risk.
 * Covert Pervert: Emily at first.
 * Cute Monster Girl: Chou.
 * Doorstopper: Over 400,000 words and counting.
 * Dramatic Ellipsis: Admittedly overused recurring element.
 * Fan Girl: Emily.
 * Filler: An author-admitted problem of early chapters.
 * Fish Out of Water
 * The Full Name Adventures: Or full pseudonym adventures, anyway.
 * Genre Roulette
 * Guns Akimbo: Subverted. Emily is generally equipped with two handguns, but the rare times she has used them simultaneously have had a marked decrease in accuracy.
 * Her Codename Was Mary Sue: Emily's self-indulgent fan-fiction.
 * Hollywood Healing: It's given a lampshade hanging as part of the "celestial tint" set of action hero "powers".
 * How Unscientific: Discussed in chapter 4. Emily believes guns to be completely out of place in the universe just to be proven wrong.
 * Huge Schoolgirl: Emily sometimes laments over her perceived lack of femininity/attractiveness due to her height of 5'9".
 * I Just Want to Be Special: Emily.
 * Idiosyncratic Episode Naming: Chapter titles are usually obtuse puns or ironic jokes of what happens within. It's near impossible to guess the plot based only on chapter titles. Chapters 13, 42, and 69 are direct references to their numbers.
 * The Ingenue: Chou.
 * Les Yay: Not quite Touhou or CLAMP levels, but it's a recurring element. Largely between Emily and Chou, but also with a later character.
 * Magic Versus Science: A recurring element.
 * Meta Fiction: Emily comes from the "real world" (although it's heavily implied to be an Alternate Dimension with a very close approximation) where Kingdom Hearts is a video game series and bases a lot of her decisions around what she thinks is "right" in that series. This element dissipates over time.
 * Mildly Military: The Radiant Garden Academy for Exceptional People has no official dress code, but some instructors apparently make a point of demonstrating how impractical certain outfits are.
 * Misaimed Fandom: In-universe usage with Emily's misinterpretation of Riku's original canon personality. Debatably also her gravitation towards the group Queens of the Stone Age.
 * Modest Royalty: King Mickey.
 * Moe: Evoked (and potentially subverted) with Chou.
 * Mohs Scale of Science Fiction Hardness: While hardly "hard", the story routinely averts many pitfalls of science fiction such as Space Is Cold, Frickin' Laser Beams, and No Kind of Atmosphere.
 * Narrative Filigree: The Law of Conservation of Detail was thrown out the window right from the start.
 * The Nicknamer: Simon.
 * Nobody Poops: Averted. There are a few mentions of having to go to the bathroom in order to maintain realism, but it's not too common.
 * Perverse Sexual Lust: Emily's feelings for Riku.
 * Powers as Programs: Everyone that gets drawn into the Kingdom Hearts universe through the "Celestial Transfer" system is given a set of skills and abilities based on their personality and individual negotiation.
 * Psychic Powers: Emily's preservation precognition, although it is uncontrolled and notoriously unreliable.
 * Reality Ensues: Frequently.
 * Reference Overdosed: Lots and lots of songs get referenced both directly and indirectly. Plenty of other pop-culture as well.
 * Sliding Scale of Idealism Versus Cynicism: So very, very far on the cynical end.
 * Super-Hero School: The Radiant Garden Academy for Exceptional People, although it takes unempowered individuals as well.
 * Theme Naming: The most prominent people from Discord are named after failed American presidential candidates (Michael) Dukakis, (Walter) Mondale, and (Barry) Goldwater.
 * This Loser Is You: "Meet Emily Tennenbaum, a girl just like you."
 * Trapped in Another World
 * Uncertain Audience: It was always intended as a fringe project not really intended to pander to anyone.
 * Unreliable Narrator: The third person limited narrator generally agrees with Emily about everything.
 * Wrong Genre Savvy: Emily at first cast herself as one of the heroes and believes the tropes to the games to apply to her just as much as anyone else. She eventually settles in her role as a sidekick (if even that).
 * You Gotta Have Blue Hair: Emily's second form, although it's described in a way intended to mirror Kairi's dark red hair.

Spoilers

 * Abusive Precursors: Turns out they were motivated by racial superiority.
 * Ambiguous Gender: Chou is referred to as a Feylinus "prince". Since Feylinus don't conform to traditional binary gender, it's rather arbitrary what gender pronoun is used. Blue and white uses this as an intimidation tactic and their chapter leaders are all given new female bodies regardless of current gender and discouraged from talking about what they once were.
 * Anti-Anti-Christ: The black clad girl.
 * Apocalypse Maiden: The girl in black was brought into the universe to act as this for the precursors. It... didn't work out quite right, but she's still tied to her role.
 * Asexual: Julia calls Riku this. Whether or not it's true is debatable, but there is an undercurrent of No Hugging, No Kissing to him.
 * Asperger's Syndrome: Name-dropped in a few chapters, but it's not made that big a deal.
 * Badass Bystander: Chapter 39 has a clerk that manages to beat her way out of Riku's grasp when he tried to rescue her.
 * Beware the Nice Ones: Chou... sort of. Despite her sunny exterior, she doesn't flinch at spilling first blood against the Heartless.
 * Bio Augmentation: Axel's specialty.
 * Bizarre Sexual Dimorphism: The Feylinus are very, very far from traditional biology.
 * Black and Grey Morality: While those that use the Heartless are all basically irredeemable assholes, Mickey isn't really much of a dandy on his policies, either (for example, his willingness to employ Child Soldiers and the criminal underground towards his goals).
 * Blade on a Stick: The black-clad girl's weapon.
 * Break the Cutie: Chou back at the Feylinus nest.
 * The Casanova: Simon, although it turns out to be because of his "magic beer goggle cologne" (as Mint put it) that causes most women to flock to him and is implied to be impossible to shut off.
 * Cold Sniper: Due to conditioning and the general hopelessness of the universe, Emily shifts more and more towards this over time.
 * Cosmic Plaything: Made official when the Celestial Bureaucracy flat out states that things are so inefficient because they find entertainment value in it.
 * Crapsack World: Turns out the Kingdom Hearts universe is a rather bleak and depressing place.
 * Dark Is Not Evil: The black clad girl.
 * Doing In the Wizard: Invoked in-universe by Axel when he quotes a speech Xehanort would give to all prospective employees.
 * Dreaming of Things to Come: Or, rather, being fed specially designed dreams to make things come true.
 * Elegant Gothic Lolita: Half of the black clad girl's design motif (complete with flat chest).
 * The Empire: The Daeh Yeo Mar Empire. Oddly enough, despite their use of a Fantastic Caste System, they're one of the friendlier groups out there with minor Cargo Cult tendencies towards the human race.
 * Enigmatic Minion: The black clad girl.
 * Evil Matriarch: Invoked with Julia, who is physically described as an idyllic mother figure.
 * Faceless Goons: Blue and white's standard uniforms all obscure their faces. Not entirely a straight usage since the very first introduced troopers are clearly portrayed as regular people just in it for the money.
 * Fallen Angel: The other half of the black clad girl's design motif.
 * Fantastic Racism: Although what the Daeh Yeo Mar Empire and its species represents is anyone's guess.
 * Fantastic Slurs: "Birds" for Yeo. This would be similar to calling a human an "ape".
 * Feel No Pain: One of the effects of becoming a Nobody is losing all sensation.
 * Five-Bad Band
 * Big Bad: Maleficent
 * The Dragon: Mint.
 * The Evil Genius: Dr. Goldwater.
 * The Brute: Mondale.
 * Dark Chick: Cenari.
 * Sixth Ranger: Debatably the black-clad girl, but after the latter three are dead and she's not very loyal to them.
 * For the Evulz: Invoked by the narration in regards to Maleficent. While Universal Domination is stated a few times, the narration points out that she doesn't really seem like the type to want it. Her actual motives still remain undetailed.
 * Gas Chamber: In the form of an elevator at blue and white's Amaterasu headquarters. Axel finds himself snared in one during the failed overthrow attempt and if he hadn't been saved as an afterthought by the black-clad girl, it probably would have worked, too.
 * Gendercide: One of the Black Comedy tales of Discord involves a mad scientist that invents a Depopulation Bomb and, needing a place to test it, indiscriminately detonates it on a random planet.
 * Good Cop, Bad Cop: Sora and Riku use this at times.
 * Graying Morality
 * Heel Face Turn: Goldwater... sort of. She was always forced to work with Maleficent and company under duress, so she practically leaped at the chance to be "captured".
 * Heroic Sacrifice: Sora does this when faced with Darkside appears on Zima. He gets better.
 * Hive Caste System: The Feylinus.
 * Hope Spot: Axel thought he found a way to destroy blue and white. Turns out it was just bait and their very nature makes them incredibly difficult to overcome.
 * Hopeless War: If the black-clad girl is to be believed, then the universe is caught in an endless cyclic process of destruction and reconstruction marked by constant power shifts and countless deaths at the hands of the Heartless.
 * I Am Legion: The phrase is sarcastically dropped by a disgruntled blue and white mercenary.
 * I Know Your True Name: Brought up as a concern for celestial transfers, but nothing really comes of it. Proven meaningless when Julia uses this as little more than a way of intimidating Emily and the black-clad girl.
 * Ignorant of the Call: Possibly Emily.
 * Immune to Bullets: Perhaps not literally, but Mint's abilities and conditioning make guns basically worthless against her. Julia has a personal force field that is literally this.
 * It Gets Easier: Emily goes from having a minor breakdown from her first hot-blooded, mostly-instinctive kill to not even flinching as she commits a Coup De Grace on a disarmed mercenary that was talking about his family life and firing at an (apparently) unarmed woman a few times.
 * Kids Are Cruel
 * Kill'Em All: Lots and lots of casualties in the past few chapters, most of them off-screen. Could be considered something of a Cozy Catastrophe since so far, the central cast has survived.
 * Knight Templar: Blue and white intentionally designed themselves around this idea.
 * Light Is Not Good: Lightside Heartless are shown to be just as ruthless and destructive as their dark counterparts. The only real consolation is that they aren't violent until provoked (which is apparently quite easy to do).
 * Loophole Abuse: The black-clad girl uses this to both fend off the ancient contract and prevent her loyalty from being claimed by Julia.
 * Loss of Identity: One of the mentioned side effects of the celestial transfer system, starting with the refusal of most to use their real name.
 * Mad Scientist: Discord has a whole slew of the batshit insane type. Organization XIII (Xemnas Corp.), while mostly rational and incredibly successful (although it's bluntly stated they employed extensive corporate espionage), can definitely be considered this as well.
 * Made of Iron: The black-clad girl hits the ground at terminal velocity after having a good swathe of her wings torn off. She turns out perfectly okay.
 * Magic From Technology: The keyblades are technology remnants from an ancient civilization.
 * Magitek: Uina's machinery, with that exact name. Whether or not it has anything to do with the Final Fantasy VI canon is left to the readers to decide.
 * Mineral MacGuffin: The six prismatic cores. Heartless Prime cores can perhaps also be considered this, but
 * Morality Chain: Sora, Kairi, and Chou to Riku. His outbursts all tie to perceived harm or wrongdoing to them and one phophetic vision showed him willing to give in to the darkness witnessing Chou's death.
 * Names to Run Away From Really Fast: Nothing good can ever happen on a planet named "Discord".
 * Never Found the Body: Last Xion was seen, she was heavily wounded and bleeding to death. Then she vanished while "off-camera" for a few minutes. Her fate is still uncertain, although it's hinted off-hand by the black-clad girl that she really is dead.
 * No Doubt the Years Have Changed Me: The black-clad girl.
 * No Name Given: The black-clad girl for most of her tenure. The informally nicknamed "blue and white" is intentionally this as part of their philosophy.
 * One-Gender Race: While still human, one particular ethnicity is entirely female because of a Depopulation Bomb killing all the men.
 * Planet of Hats: While each world has a theme, only the Mad Scientist haven of Discord can really be considered as such.
 * Power Armor: Blue and white tech troopers. Axel and company also employed some sets during said group's invasion of Twilight Town, but they don't hold up very well.
 * Pragmatic Villainy: Despite her apparent sadism, Mint scoffs at orders to mutilate Kairi because she'll (supposedly) be dead in a few minutes, anyway. She doesn't put up much of a fight when Maleficent insists, though.
 * Psychic Link: Emily and the black-clad girl.
 * Psycho Lesbian: Regardless her original gender, Julia is a woman that uses her unwanted sexual advances as a method of mentally tormenting Emily. This was only used as a provocation tactic as proven by her dismissive order to an underling to kill Emily once her real target presents herself.
 * Punch Clock Villain: The first two Faceless Goons introduced are these.
 * Pure Is Not Good: Julia is explained to be "pure of heart" even though she's also "amoral" and "vicious" at the same time. Xehanort is indirectly stated to have been this as well.
 * Sadist Teacher: Michael Selacia could be considered this by people with rather strict behavior standards and a belief that the ends don't justify the means. Along with his introduction where he preys on Emily's insecurity by talking about (but not actually reading aloud) her smutty fanfiction during class, he also intentionally
 * Sealed Evil in a Can: Subverted with the unnamed black clad girl. While she's presented as such, she doesn't really aim to destroy anything.
 * Senseless Sacrifice: Possibly Simon. He ends up getting killed off-screen on Mount Olympus in a battle against either Mint (who turns up later without any injury) or a Lightside Prime (it's left unspecified which got him in the end).
 * The Speechless: Mondale.
 * Taking the Bullet: Xion ends up unintentionally doing this.
 * Teens Are Monsters
 * To the Pain: Chapter 61.
 * Unwanted Rescue: Riku tries to rescue a clerk. Unfortunately, she didn't know she was in danger at the time...
 * Unperson: While this is the exact term used for Axel, it's closer to Death Faked for You and a form of Witness Protection.
 * Utopia Justifies the Means: Blue and white. Not entirely straight in that unlike most cases, they fought for freedom of speech rather than against it, but they're still unapologetic about about their mass slaughter and other intimidation tactics.
 * Wholesome Crossdresser: One chapter has Emily disguise herself as Riku to prevent a possible future. Not only does it not hold up under any sort of scrutiny, but it doesn't even disguise her gender.
 * Wind from Beneath My Wings: The Wyvern in chapter 28.
 * Winged Humanoid: Axel's grand plan is to revolutionize the universe by giving everybody functional wings.
 * World Gone Mad: Discord.
 * You Can't Fight Fate: Discussed. It appears the only way to fight fate is not to know about it in the first place.