That was close. That was really, really close.
Once Xehanort's vessel finally faded away in a swirl of darkness, Sora let his keyblade fall with a clatter and disappear in a flash of light. He swayed a little, before collapsing to the ground, breathing shallow and shaky.
He let his cheek rest against the dirt, bangs and dust sticking to his forehead and the sun above unrelenting in its heat. Trust that he'd run into one of them when Donald and Goofy were working with the King today.
He lucked out, he really did. If he hadn't crossed paths with Riku—who happened to have his missions on the same world as Sora's today— he would have been done for.
And Xehanort would turn him into his vessel, for real this time.
Sora smirked weakly to himself. Trust Riku to have his back, huh?
Speaking of Riku… Sora lifted his head off the ground with a groan. About ten paces away, Riku was sprawled against a boulder, head lolled back, still bleeding from where the Aero spell had glanced off his shoulder.
With the last of his energy, Sora got to his feet, grimacing because his entire abdomen hurt like hell, and stumbled over to collapse beside him, sitting up this time.
"You're out of potions too?" Sora managed to gasp.
"More or less," Riku responded, just as breathless. "I'm waiting for my magic to come back."
Sora lifted up his shirt, frowning at the bruises littering most of his chest and stomach. He tried taking a deep breath, and immediately regretted doing so. A broken rib, probably.
Riku made a strangled noise at the sight. "That looks really bad."
"You're worse off," Sora eyed the long cut, which started from the edge of Riku's collarbone and crossed over to his arm. Riku would lose too much blood before he could heal himself, he thought. He dug through his pockets with one hand.
"Yeah, right."
His fingers at last wrapped around a familiar vial. "At least I'm not bleeding," Sora said with finality, as he dropped a bottle of potion into Riku's lap.
"At least I'm not hurting when I breathe," Riku said at exactly the same time, as a bottle of potion landed in Sora's.
Sora blinked. "Dude, I thought you said you ran out."
"I did. I was just saving that one for you," Riku shrugged the best he could with one shoulder. "And I thought you said you ran out."
Sora laughed, quietly as not to aggravate his injuries further. It came out more like a whoosh of air. "Well," he rubbed the back of his head sheepishly. "I was saving that one for you, too."
Riku tilted his head to smirk at him from the corner of his eye. "Well, isn't that cute of you?"
Sora returned the smirk with a grin of his own. "Right back at ya." He uncorked his bottle and raised it up. "Cheers?"
"Cheers."
Their bottles clinked.