Life was easy when you were made of data, Sora mused, kicking his bare feet as they dangled off the pier, splashing slightly into the water. Or at least, something like easy. He liked it like this - far better than when he'd first been... born? Created? Digitised? He shook his head, and flopped back, feet splashing more water into the air as his hands found their way behind his head.

It wasn't, really, that long since they'd helped Mickey fix the journal of the bugs. Or was that fix Riku? After all, they were basically one and the same. Not that it mattered - he was still Riku, and even though he usually wore that black coat, the same as the one Roxas had worn, he sometimes took it off when he was being just Riku, putting the journal stuff to one side while he played and messed around with him and Kairi and Tidus and Wakka and Selphie and the others.

Sora smiled as he stared into the sky, not caring one bit that the sky, too, was made of the same data, because that meant that they were all connected by it.

He'd regained his memories bit by bit as Mickey and the others on the outside had figured out a way to restore the datascape to the way it'd been just before its reset, but without any bugs at all. When he'd woken up, Riku had been there, and at first he'd worried about what would happen, and Riku had seemed kind of distant for a while until they realised he still felt responsible, and now he felt this stupid guilty gratitude for having everyone back.

It hadn't been long until there'd been things to do to keep that out of mind, though. Because, of course there'd been two journals. And that was back then. Jiminy'd found a way to upload them, and the datascape had a job - making sure there were no bugs, and eliminating them when there were.

Not that there were many. It was more like a job than and adventure now, although it did mean meeting new people all the time, which meant it was a fun job, and not one any of them would want to give up.

A shadow passed over him, and he smiled, not even bothering to open his eyes or sit up. Sure enough, a familiar figure sat down next to him, still casting him in shadow.

"I thought I'd find you slacking off here," Riku said, not without laughter.

"Slacking?! It's called having free time! Besides, you're the one who can't stop working!"

Sora could hear his friend fighting to hold back a laugh, and smiled wider, opening one of his eyes just a crack to see it, and something in the way he looked must have made Riku crack, because then he was laughing, and because of that, Sora was laughing too.

"There's a new world, you know," saying the one thing he knew would get Sora to sit up and take him seriously, hanging onto his every word. "Well, not exactly new, but... something's been added, anyway. The data was already there, we can just access it properly now."

"So? Where is it?"

Riku was in his normal casual clothes, so Sora knew it wasn't a bad thing, because if there were bugs or glitches the coat would be out, and they'd both be already halfway over to the source of the anomaly by now.

"It's called... Twilight Town. That's it - I'm still figuring out why it wasn't here before, actually."

"You mean you really don't know?"

Riku shoved him playfully at the poke at his supposed knowledge of all things datascape, but Sora only bounced back up.

"No, I don't. Which is the odd thing." Riku sighed. "Ah, I'm sure it'll come to me in time. That, or Mickey and the others will let us in on it."

"Yeah!"

Twilight Town, though. Although he pretended it was just another world, it was hard to ignore the aching in his heart - something that no mere piece of data should have, but he'd apparently proven again that the heart wasn't something that could be contained or restricted by silly things like rules.

His heart was aching. The last time it'd done that, had been... Castle Oblivion. And him. Roxas. And... any other time he'd dwelled on those memories.

Well, that definitely meant he had to go there, then. The hurting this time was his, and his alone, and nothing to do with the journal and Riku.

And besides, he'd learned that not all aches were bad aches. Maybe this was one of those.

"Hey, Riku?"

His hands had found the back of his neck again as he walked, half staring into the sky so that if he hadn't known the exact path he was taking, he might've fallen over several times.

"Yeah?"

"What d'you think they're doing? The real us, right now?"

Riku closed his eyes for a moment, but a moment only, with a smile.

"Who knows. Off on adventures of their own. Saving the worlds. Becoming Keyblade Masters... or maybe they already are. We'll find out soon enough."

"And maybe they're standing right here," Sora said, punctuating his words by stamping his foot in the sand.

"Yeah," Riku said with a laugh. "Maybe. C'mon, Sora! I'll race you to Kairi!"

Riku, knowing where he was going and having shoes on his feet and his balance not undone by someone almost knocking him over as he ran past, had a pretty good head start.

Life as data wasn't bad.

...

AN: Written because I had need of Data Sora and Data Riku fanfic set after the game. And I'd had this idea of a scene like in the last dialogue for a while. And yes, the ache in Data Sora's heart is Data Roxas remembering Twilight Town. There are also some hints toward other headcanon type things as well about either the canon or the AU.