Disclaimer: I do not own Kingdom Hearts.
This is a sequel to Endless Hurt, going back to what happened when instead of Riku opening the door, it was Arick. Enjoy
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"I thought you might want something…" she told him, handing him a few pieces of fruit with a cup of water. Arick took the glass first and drained it in less than two gulps before reaching for the orange, pushing the quilt off of him a little.
"Thanks," he said, tearing off the skin and taking a large chunk into his mouth, squirting juice all over his cheeks. "Where am I anyway?"
"A small chain of land we like to call Destiny islands," She answered casually, taking a seat next to his bed. "Where do you come from?" she returned.
"I don't know," Arick said, shrugging and taking another bite out of the orange. "I woke up and I was falling…"
Kinno suddenly woke from her strange dream to hear startled cries, screams and the roar of a monstrous beast. Grabbing her sword that was tucked beneath her star plush pillow for just these kinds of situations, she rushed from her tent, gasping when the blast of pure heat hit her skin, a shock in contrast from the slight warmth of the tent.
The forest they had taken refuge in was now a battlefield alight in flames, shimmering off of the shadowy flesh of the scores of heartless that was attacking their camp. A behemoth crashed to the ground ahead of her, Seifer and his friends leaping atop in and attacked its pearl white horn. In the midst of the fighting, she could spot her brother Riku alongside Sora at the front lines, their key blades flashing and sparking as they struck against armor, swords and claws.
A loud thump landed behind her, and she span around just in time to deflect the big body's stomach from bashing her, and with a quick stab to its glob of fat, the heartless dispersed into dust. Her sword glowed a light of pure silver as the adrenaline started pumping through her veins, she dashed away to join her brother, but a cry from Aurora caught her attention, and out of the corner of her eye, she saw Sora's older sister fighting desperately to defend the younger children that were too frightened to engage in the battle. Having ran out of arrows for her crossbows, she now used her body as a human wrecking ball and crashed herself into the advancing soldiers, gaining more cuts every time she drew back to charge again.
The heartless that were attacking her suddenly flew into the sky as if an invisible bomb had exploded, in their middle of their number, and kinno leaped into the air with them, slicing them to pieces in a flash of her sword, their remains showering aurora and the children with dead heartless dust. Landing perfectly, she glared at the oncoming soldiers, who came in the wake of their fallen brethren, her sword angled and ready to attack again.
While Kinno defended Aurora and the youngest of them, back at the front lines, Riku and Sora mirrored each other's moves flawlessly, becoming a spinning death ball of keyblades, occasionally summoning a second to dual wield, tearing through the small army of heartless with little difficulty. But that all changed when another deafening roar hurt Sora's ears before sharp teeth sunk into his shoulder and tossed him away from his comrade.
He rolled roughly across the ground, stopping after twenty feet or so and got to his feet, reaching out into the air and summoning his keyblade back to his hand. His blue eyes widened as he glanced upon a somewhat familiar colossal demonic three headed dog. But instead of pure black fur, its skin was scaley and jagged, colored sliver with underlying red and a stripe down its back, its eyes glowing an eerie solid white.
"I thought I killed this thing back at the coliseum!" Sora called to Riku as he ran back to help his friend, who was rolling and dodging the demons three snapping jaws.
"Its not the same!" Riku yelled back as he flipped onto of the creatures back, plunging his dark keybade several times into his crusty tough skin before he was slammed by its enormous tail. Riku quickly regained his balance in midair, and landed his feet flat against the trunk of a nearby and leapt away to go and find Kinno, knowing they couldn't win this battle without her help. "retreat Sora!" he called to his friend as he ran to where Kinno fought off the seemingly endless onslaught of scouts and soldiers from taking the young ones hearts.
"He's here," Riku told her as soon as he was at her side, taking out several soldiers with a single ice spell. "And it seems he's brought a new friend."
Kinno nodded, biting her lip in anxiousness. She ran from this battle, and saw Sora running from amidst the trees, having ignored Riku's command to retreat, and somehow had managed to piss off the Cerberus within that few seconds, and the giant dog came crashing after him, snarling with rage, one of its eyes bleeding from its left head.
Her protective nature flaring immediately, Kinno narrowed her eyes at the monster, and from the silver pendant that hung from her neck, an orange light spiraled into the sky, exploding into an inferno of flames that soon molded itself into the scarlet feathers of the eternal phoenix.
The magnificent bird spread its wings, screaming its cry and all of the minor heartless suddenly burned up in flames, and all the wounded children were healed as the phoenix's magical voice carried across the battlefield, a few large heartless who were able to resist the phoenix's magic still remaining were suddenly engulfed in a flurry of swords, daggers and clubs, a renewed moral taking hold of the warriors at the sight of the summon.
The Cerberus seemed completely unaffected by the phoenix presence, who growled and glared at the bird as it hovered in the sky. Taking a deep breath, the dog gathered non-elemental magic into his center jaw and shot three consecutive blasts at the phoenix like a magical cannon, each exploding in mid-air one after the other, trying to hit the giant bird as it dived toward the ground, cawing before it caught Cerberus in its talons, flapping hard to carry the strugglling dog into the sky and tossed it with a heave of its legs, watching it land in the trees far from Kinno and the others. The bird flew back to the ground, allowing Kinno to leap onto his back before he took off after the Cerberus with his summoner mounted between his shoulders.
"Get what you can from camp and get everyone to safety," Riku commanded Sora, taking off to follow Kinno. "We'll meet back up when we finish this thing off!"
Sora tried to protest, but Riku disappeared too quickly to allow him to utter a word, and with a frown, he turned around and started shouting orders, running towards his sister and helping those who needed it to their feet, telling them to to take down tents, gather the food, etc.
Back in the sky, the phoineix trilled as its emerald eyes scanned the tree tops to find where Cerberus landed, Kinno standing perfectly balanced, the warmth of his feathers on her feet giving her a small comfort.
"He's close..." she whispered to herself, feeling his presence growing slowly as they flew over the vast forest canopy.
Their was a loud roar, and Kinno was suddenly thrown from Phoenix's back as the giant dog suddenly leaped from the cover of leaves, colliding with the bird, biting clawing to try and bring him down and out of the sky by attacking its wings.
The ambush gave Kinno no time to react to slow her fall, and could only hope that luck would let her survive as she tumbled through leaves and branches until she hit the forest floor.
Cut, scratched and possibly fractured a bone with the way her hip felt, she was relived she could still move. Using her sword for support, she pulled herself to her feet, but almost fell straight back to the ground, huddering and almost choking form the darkness that eminated from the figure that leaned against a thick tree trunk, his arms crossed over his chest.
"Arick," Kinno greeted with a growl, shaking where she stood. The boy she once knew as her childhood crush had changed dramtically since the darkness overtook him. His once blue eyes that were full of life and happiness had dulled to a grey, cold emotionless color. His violet red hair was almost black, but had grown considerably since last she saw him, now down to the base of his neck. He wore all black, his jeans running two white stripes down the sides with zippers on either that ran from his knee down. the blue collar they had made as a present had been replaced by a robelike hooded sweater with a a red heartless symbol embroided on the chest. on his wrists, the special blade gloves Cid had made for him sparkled in the moon light, stained red with the blood of hundreds who had tried to stand up to him before and had failed.
"Hello Kinno," he said calmly, looking int o the starry sky at their summons who battled eachother ruthlessly.
"What do you want?" Kinno growled, knowing he desired something from her, otherwise he would've attakced her by now. She pulled her sword from where she had staked it in the ground and raised it pointedly at him, ready for anything he might try.
"I want you to join me," he answered, pacing around her in a circle, not even giving her a glance, keeping his eyes straight ahead. "I can't kill you without killing myself, you've known this since we were kids."
"Your not sure about that, but i'd love to test it on you," kinno replied, her sword point following his body.
Arick chuckled and shook his head. "you and i both know its more or less a fact. And i'm tired of this dillema. So I'm offering you this," he said, stopping and finally turning his gaze to her, sending a shiver down her spine. "either bow to me, or you can spend the rest of your miserable life as my prisoner. Your choice"
"I'll never join you!" Kinno answered harshly, returning his darkned gaze with a look of pure determination, ready to defend her freedom.
Arick sighed, shaking his head and pulled up the sleeves of his sweater so they wouldn't hinder his blades. "Sad," he said with a huff, going through his mind on how he could paralyze her without effecting himself directly.
But before their battle could begin, Cerberus suddenly crashed betweeen them with a howl, bursting into magical energy and retreating back into Arick, who screamed with agony. The phoenix cawed from above, diving towards the now weakened Arick, but with a grimace of pain and outrage, he teleported off the planet.
Kinno sighed a huge breath of relief as the phoenix shrunk his size and landed before her. That was the one drawback of being a summoner. If your aeon was defeated in battle, it severely drained the life of its owner in order to maintain its own existence.
Kinno sheathed her sword, and reached out to gently pet the crown of Phoneix's head. "Thanks," she said with much gratitude, "you just saved my life..."
The bird trilled in reply and tilted its head towards her, and instantly all her wounds became scars, and with that he swirled into an orange light again and retreated within its jewel that was infused on her necklace.
Kinno gazed down at the silver pendant, admirming the penatagonal design with the twelve different color stones set in a pattern at different points of the inner star. It had been given to her as a gift, but by whom she had no memory of. She liked to think it was her mother, who gave it to her daughter knowing that one day she would need its protection.
Taking it into her palm, she gazed at it dimly, brushing her forefinger over each finely polished stone, sensing the different summons within. Her mind wandered back to every incident in which she probably would have never survived without the summons help, and she sent a mental word of thanks to each one as her finger passed over their respective stone.
"Kinno!" Riku cried as he burst from the bushes and stumbled to her side, looking around at the fallen trees and flattened ground where cerberus had crash landed. "Where is he?" he asked fiercly, anxious for a fight with Arick.
"He's gone," Kinno told him, letting her necklace drop back to its place. "Phoenix defeated Cerberus and weakened him."
"Coward," Riku spat, looking like a child who had just been denied a cookie. His keyblade disappeared and he wrapped his arms aroud her, teleporting them away to rejoin Sora and the others.
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Sora was sittng by the fire, laying his hands flat on the ground to support himself as he leaned back slightly. most of the others had gone to bed execept for a few of the older boys, including Seifer and friends, who were sitting cross legged on the other side of the fire.
Sora turned his head slightly over his shoulder to glance at his sister Aurora, who was sound asleep inside her sleeping bag with all the young ones piled around her, two of them actually resting their heads ON her. He smiled a little, thinking the whole picture was quite adorable.
That moment of peace was suddenly shattered when Riku and Kinno appeared next to them, one of their feet accidentally landing on his hand, causing him to yowl in pain and draw his hand back to clutch the injured fingers.
"I'm sorry! I'm sorry!" Kinno apologized, jumping away the moment she felt Sora's fingers wriggling in pain beneath her heal. Seifer and the others suddenly busted up laughing, which was almost instantly silenced by a glare from Riku.
"Its fine..." Sora grumbled at Kinno, holding his hand in the other. Both of them took a seat to his right, warming their hands on the flames.
"did ya find him?" Sora asked Riku, not seeing any signs that he had battled with Arick.
"No," Riku growled with disappointment. "Kinno took care of him before i got their."
"Phoenix took care of him," Kinno corrected him. "All i did was tell him i didn't want to join him."
Sora blinked, tilting his head a little. "Why would he want you to join him?"
Kinno pointed at her heart with her thumb, tilting her head towards the other kids to signal that she didn't want to explain verbally, but the gesture to her heart pretty much answered the question thoroughly.
"Oh..." Sora said in realization.
"I wish he'd die..." A twelve year old suddenly piped up out of nowhere, tears welling up in his eyes. "I'm so tired of running from him..."
As Sora was about to utter some words of consolation, Seifer cut him off with a few words of his own.
"He's one evil bastard alright," he agreed with the boy, spitting to the side.
"And a sadistic asshole to boot," his freind Rajin added, spitting as well to copy seifer.
"He wasn't always evil you know..." Kinno mumbled, glancing at the three boys.
"Psh, yeah right," Seifer replied. "His heart was probably a lump of coal when he was born."
"Yeah!" Rajin agreed with sniggers of laughter. "he probably started killin when he was four too..."
"Your wrong," Kinno suddenly growled, her eyes flashing with anger at the insults thrown at Arick. "He was a good and loyal freind before he was taken," she protested. "You don't know anything about the real Arick."
As she spoke these words, her mind drifted into the good memories that she carried of Arick. Back to the sandy beaches of Destiny Islands. Back to when she rembered Arick to be kind, gentle, and none of them had even heard of the heartless.