silly-go-round
Sometimes Yuffie doesn't think. Sometimes she goes through mundane everyday existence performing the same old routines and picking the same old silly fights and proclaiming her greatness to the same old people and laughing, hands on hips, at the same old things. Sometimes she's just a machine, not simply a fighting machine, mind you, and it isn't just the townspeople that wonder if there's anything else to her brain other than neurons controlling the movement of her limbs and the rate at which she speaks. Sometimes even her closest friends wonder if she ever thinks at all.
But sometimes she does. Sometimes Yuffie does think and then everything spirals out of control. Everything comes crashing together in one hard, shamed, giddy lump of scrawly colours and didn't-mean words.
Today at the Coliseum Yuffie is just doing what she is best at; running, and running, and avoiding attacks and travelling on wind and being all over the place at the same time. Dancing behind the shadows. And Leon, too, is being the bear that he is; swinging through sharply with his awesome gunblade and muscles and that constipated expression on his face which Yuffie swears to get down on tape someday. And then 9 matches later Sora, Goofy and Donald march in and Yuffie grins.
it's just a friendly match
Nothing changes; Leon has his strategy and Sora his, and even as it begins the exhilaration of it is becoming too much for her. Leon and Great Ninja Yuffie make a wonderful pair and they are still getting the upper hand, challenging though the battle is, now. It is so much better this way, and –
it's just a friendly match
She is at one end of the arena and Squall is at the other. And even as the trio clusters up onto him, even before he grunts and falls in defeat, Yuffie sees, in her mind's eye –
- bloody knees scraping on the ground, one large hand grasping hers, pulling her up, palms firmly pressed together even if hers is sweaty and sliding and submerged in dirt only two seconds ago and his is so huge. When will your aim improve, Yuffie? The way he says her name like it's a fly. Bear hugs, not always entirely appreciated. Then there are the horrifying possibilities. Or impossibilities. Torching, all the same. The sweep of his blade hissing through the air that elevates her. It misses, leaps off her bare skin like something tangible. Shuriken sings. Scratch, feet shifting. Leaping at him, puncturing with her darts watching him wince but him saying nothing, nearly putting out his eyes and the two of them fighting neck to neck and the cuts grow and the blood streams and the dog turns around to bite the hand that feeds it –
it's just a friendly match
Yuffie drops her shuriken and bursts inexplicably into tears.
He cracks open an eye, from where he's slumped over at the other end, and their gazes lock for a fraction of a second, in a terrible suspension of downward-trickling-sand.
i'm NOT a kid. and you think you know but you don't. why i cried today.
And then the moment is broken by tears clouding her vision and Sora running up to her, dropping his weapon, asking what's wrong? and the loud-mouthed little horned guy yelling match suspended and Yuffie? she can't stop crying.
notes: apologies for the vagueness of this drabble. Title is taken from a song by FictionJunction Yuuka.
Kingdom Hearts characters (c) Square-Enix & Disney