By Ever Lasting Night Life
So this is how it feels. Dying I mean. Been smoking for six years and not once did I have a problem with it until now. Was always the one who found smoking as a way to release myself from this world since I wasn't exactly human, but now…I was dying because of it. My name you ask? It's Riku, born into a family that hates me only because my father was a drunk and my mother had moved away as soon as it was possible. Been used as a punching bag for years and often or not I would have to find my own way of getting my own food just to survive. Well…I am seventeen now and only seven and a half stone because of the stressful issues in my life. The old man was dead…killed in a freak accident but I still supported a black eye and one broken rib. I flicked away the butt of the cigarette, walking along the beach as if nothing was going to happen. Then…I spluttered, once, twice, maybe even three times but this time it felt different, as if something was stirring inside of me. I ignored, obviously even though it was bothering me greatly as to what the feeling was. Like waves crashing against foolish idiots who stood in the way, I watched the night sky as I sat there, on the sandy shores of Destiny Islands, the only place that provided escape for me now from the terribly daunting buildings of Hollow Bastion, the one town that didn't seem to really accept other worldly beings such as I was led to believe.
One shooting star after another. I made no wishes, didn't really have any that I wanted to come true. I threw my pack of smokes into the nearest waste paper basket. Didn't want to see them anymore, not after what I had just experienced. Then a face emerges from the darkness, pale, almost as white as a ghost. Two blinking azure blue irises stare back at me followed by the silver mane gleaming in the light of the moon and a realize that it is nothing but my reflection, my own mind playing tricks on me. I sighed, feeling completely stupid from what had just happened. Then a voice, cool and crisp to the touch pushes my thoughts aside. Whatever it is, I can hear it but it is not from behind me, nor in front of me. In fact it is far off from where I am sitting.
"We have found him…the freakish hybrid of our kind, born by that which we must not mention. Kill him!" I froze. That voice now didn't sound to far off. I turned and surely enough I saw a man blocking my only escape from the beach, and another, destroying my boat.
"Hey!" I screamed out, annoyed by the attitude of these men but my screams came to no avail. Then the man blocking my path pulled back his dark hood, revealing a mane almost like my own but longer, impossible to tell how long it was. Then the feel of cool, icy death entered my stomach, a blade protruding from my own body but I didn't fall. Instead I felt angered, stronger than what I was. Two piercing fangs pushed out human teeth and I knew what I was becoming even though it seemed impossible. There had been rumours of vampires scouring the worlds in search of something important to them for days. I guess they found what they were looking for and I was also greeted with two answers that confused me greatly. I pulled at the blade, feeling rather hungry from the sudden attack and the loss of blood. This is what I was all along. A filthy dhampir but then, since I was dhampir, who really was my father. The one who attacked me pulled down his own hood and the two looked almost identical except this one was far older in the skin, a copper colour gracing his skin but still…he was far to beautiful to be human. They both were. I wasn't sure what happened next but I knew that I was tumbling, flipping over my hands as they supported me, helping me run away from god only knows what was going to happen next. And then, at the last possible moment…I blacked out from an alien pain in my back.
The winds crashed against the seashore, giving Twilight Town an unearthly setting to the peaceful town. Wisps of red passed by her face but she ignored the crimson strands of her own hair, staring out instead into the ocean before her. Unlike her friend Axel who was a pyromaniac, Kairi was empathic, the gift passed down from her late mother. However, unlike the woman who had died from the fateful wound of blood loss to her neck, Kairi hated this ability. A hand swept over her neck, her own to be exact. She couldn't help it. Ever since that day, she had been searching in the darkest times of night to find something that would help her solve the mystery of her own mothers death, but all she could find was empty alleyways and streets, just as lifeless if not even more than the neighbouring town of Hollow Bastion in the midday session of living. No one liked her in Twilight Town except Axel and he was away at the moment, trying to find out the current whereabouts of Roxas who had disappeared from the town quite recently. This seemed all in vain however as Kairi had picked up a letter in the post that very day that was addressed to her and her only. It was in Roxa's handwriting and yet what was spoken throughout the words that were written in green ink seemed to make no sense at all. Her hand now slipped into her pocket, where the letter had rested since she picked it up and tucked it away. Only once had she shone it to Axel and in the end, she wished that she never did because now…she was lonely. Pulling her knees up to her chest, she sighed, hoping that the pain she felt would go away but it didn't. There was no one now that she could talk to, no one who would be interested in her problems. A satchel lay dormant at her side, crammed full of work that she needed to complete for college but in the end, she saw no point to it all.
"I hate this…" Her head came to rest upon her knees, small salty tears escaping from her tear ducts. What she wanted to know now was how she was picking up on the same pain as what she was feeling. After all, it wasn't possible to pick up on your own feelings was it?
That was just it. Was not going to sleep anymore now. I think I pushed at something, although I didn't know what it was until I awoke to see someone looking down at me. I blinked again and they disappeared, although who it was I would never know for certain. Sitting up, a groan escaped my lips, one that spoke as much pain as that girl seemed to feel. The dream seemed strange, as if she and I were sharing feelings with each other but she seemed so real. And I knew that Twilight Town wasn't that far from Hollow Bastion. Placing my hand in my pocket, I panicked slightly as I realised that I had lost my packet of cigarettes before remembering that I had thrown them in the bin. A smile graced my own bruised face, hurting a little from the sudden movement and the use of muscles. Until this day, I hadn't smiled once, saw no need to, not even to people who were being polite. Standing up, a scream almost escaped my cracked lips as I moved my arm away from the wound to look at how much it was healing up, before I checked my own teeth and sure enough they were normal. Just a dream, I thought as I stumbled slightly. The wound could have been just inflicted from my own father, but I knew there was some sense of reality to what had happened. Crawling wasn't an option as a why to try and get off of the beach but then, why was I here last night anyway? That was a question that was plaguing me now, something that was going to bother me for sure. I had to get home, hope that I could sleep off the pain and after many stares from people who were too curious for their own good, I did but…the door was left open! I never left it open like that. Would never dream of it since the place had been fixed up as soon as the old man had died. The living room was a mess, objects smashed and the Television was nowhere in site, yet the sounds of someone walking about upstairs alerted me. I wanted to know whom it was that had decided it was fun to try and steal from others. I took one step, two steps, three, four, five straight up to ten until I landed a punch in the thief who was attempting to use the stairs as a way to escape. They knew I was there.
The thief groaned from the pain but I ignored it, landing a knee straight into the revealed gut that was left unguarded. The groans turned into vicious screams until the thief dropped the bag and ran down the stairs, shutting the front door behind him. I collapsed. There had to be more of them somewhere, but I guess they had just left. Then the sound of a car horn being honked continuously which simply told me that there was definitely more but I ignored it and started cleaning up the house, even replacing most of the smashed up china. I didn't care about anything anymore. All I really wanted was answers but they weren't coming to me. I slept most of that day but it was quite restless, full of dreams of the night before:
"Filthy dhampir!" One of the men had shouted, twisted the blade slightly in his stomach. This didn't really help with his mood, knowing how hotheaded he could be if he wanted. The wound didn't sting like it once did but it was quite unsettling to have someone twisting that blade around inside of you. Then the dream became interrupted and he knew that he was no longer on Destiny islands fighting against the vampires but walking along the shores of Twilight Town once more, waiting for someone to arrive back home.
Kairi had received a letter from Axel, telling her that he had found Roxas but the blonde teen didn't exactly want to come home just yet. She sighed deeply as she read through it one more time. It was just like Roxas to do this, get up and go, making everyone else worried. Yet his letter was still in her pocket, she knew that but she didn't get it out. Didn't want to. Thought that it was all just a waste of time until she was distracted by that very same feeling of pain that she felt only yesterday, as if something was beginning to haunt her from her past. Then the need to suddenly scream out for no reason came and she had to keep it bottled up lest she frighten anyone. Who is it that I keep feeling? That was what she wanted to know but in the end, the answer never came, just the thought of a lullaby she had learned when she was a child. The title of the song was lost within the waves of her memories but in the end, what mattered was that the thought of her mother was still there. The woman would sing the feelings she had picked up on earlier in the day to the little child that she was then, dreaming up thoughts of just how these people felt and what they would do about their problems, but since the gift was passed onto her, she realized she couldn't quite grasp it as her mother could and often the feelings would become distorted. However, this one was bothering her greatly. Sometimes at night she would dream of a boy, his silver hair simply telling her that he wasn't normal, not that it really bothered her anyway. What did bother her though was that he would often appear to be walking across the beach on the Destiny Islands, supporting a black eye and a split lip. Yet just by feeling what his own emotions had to offer, she felt slightly attracted but unsure of what he was like, especially since her last dream where he seemed unearthly, taking on what looked like the people who killed her mother. Was he one of them as well? She shook that though away. He was different to them somehow. She didn't know how exactly but he was.
Okay, okay if this keeps up, sleep is going to be out of the question but in the end, if I do fall asleep it will be just to preserve what little energy I may have left after it all. I picked up my satchel, crammed to the brim full of work for college now since I have decided to start working on my A level work. Don't know why I want to do that but in the end I have no choice. I was home schooled right up until my mother died and even though I was seventeen, and because of what I though I was becoming, I wanted to at least look normal. Am going to stay in Twilight Town for a few days, see if I like the college there but if I don't, I just won't go. I am stubborn I know, no need to tell me that. My dreams however, have started to get to me lately, and often or not I would see a woman I didn't know, shoulder length crimson strands of hair pointing down her back rather prettily, and her eyes spoke pain but not just any kind of pain. My own, what I actually felt inside now that I was on my own in this world. I guess, even though it seems strange for me to do so, if I left Hollow Bastion for a bit, I would find her and get to know her like I do in my dreams.
Authors Notes: This is my first Kingdom Hearts Fanfiction piece so if there is anything wrong, please point it out, thank you.