Author's Note: Hey. So this is my second story, (mind you, the first one isn't finished), and I'm pretty excited about that. This is rated T, but later on it might have some implied stuff that could raise the rating. I don't own Kingdom Hearts, but enjoy this anyway!
Today was the day I would finally face my fear. No more turning down pool party invitations. No longer would my peers laugh at me. And by God, I would take that leap. Literally. I mean, who lives on a tropical island and doesn't know how to swim? All of my friends were practically fish. No way would I be some awkward mammal chillin' on the beach while my friends where surfing on the beach that wasn't bordered by the reef.
When I moved to Twilight Town, some insignificant island in the tropics, I pretty much thought that no one would mind me not swimming with everybody else. Oh how wrong I was.
"Dude, what are you doing?"
I scrambled off the diving platform of my school's swimming pool. I could always face my fear another day.
"We have practice," said the captain of the swim team, "Uh, you can, um, swim later I guess."
So the swim team saw me talking to myself. Awesome.
"Uh, yeah," said the oh-so-debonair I, "I was just-uh- I was, I forgot, uh" I kept rambling on as such until I had backed myself all the way to the door and out. Sprinting down the hallway, I grabbed my duffel bag and, still running, pulled my t-shirt over my not-even-a-little-wet hair and shorts. Darn.
As I made it outside, I slowed to a walk. Heaving a big sigh, I had no choice but to wander back to the dinky little apartment building where I lived with my brother. The stairs creaked as I walked up them to the fourth floor, which was also the very top floor. The walls and floor were painted a faded sky blue, with little patches of graffiti and stains decorating every couple of feet.
I knocked once. No answer, so I could only assume that Cloud wasn't home yet. I dug into my pocket for the little metal key, and let myself inside. The smell was a little musty, mostly from the walls and carpet, but I didn't mind. It was way better then my parents' clean doctor's office of a home back in Nevada.
What could I do? I couldn't swim, and that little fact seemed to echo in everything I did. I mean, I opted out of swim class because I'm a junior, but when all of my friends go out to the beach, I'm stuck either going with them and getting severely sunburned, or politely declining and being bored out of my mind at home.
It wasn't that my parents never taught me, oh how they tried, but I was always so afraid of the water. It was menacing, and too alien for me to enjoy.
My phone rang it's shrill, annoying ringtone into an otherwise silent apartment.
"Hello?" I said.
"Hey Roxas! We're all going to get ice cream, you wanna come?" It was Sora, the happy-go-lucky kid in my biology class. He acted all dopey and cute, but in reality, he was a genius when it came to math and science.
"Sure," I replied, holding the phone between my cheek and shoulder as I roughly tugged my sneakers back on, "Who's all coming?"
"Just the gang, you know, whoever shows up. We're kind of already here, so run your little legs off, kay?"
"Sora! Why didn't you call me sooner?" I nearly shouted into the mouthpiece.
"I forgooottttt, come onnnnn" He whined.
"Fine, be there in a few." I said.
The walk was relatively short, down a couple streets that I'd come to recognize, and before I knew it I was at the little ice cream place, where Sora and our other friends were.
Sitting down, I greeted everyone. Riku, who was on the swim team, had just returned from practice and was still soaking wet. Kairi and Namine, two sisters who lived next door to Sora were ogling his "pretty prettttyyy hair" and "swimmer muscles!".
"So, Marly wanted us to come on his boat after we're done here so…" Sora trailed off, looking at me with puppy-dog eyes.
"No." I said, sipping my milkshake.
"C'mon, Rox, it'll be fun! We're going to the reef and we'll see a bunch of cool stuff and please?"
"Sora, you know I get seasick. I don't want to-" I argued.
"It will only take a little while, please Roxy, please?"
"No, Cloud will worry."
"Don't lie, Rox."
"Sora…"
"Roxas?"
"Sora. No."
"Will you Roxas?" Riku cut in before Sora could, "It'll shut him up."
I couldn't say no to him. He was the first one to talk to me when I had first moved to Twilight town, and I had grown rather fond of him.
"Fine," I sighed dramatically, "But if I go overboard and drown, he's not allowed to come to my funeral." I pointedly glared at Sora.
Of course he ignored my glare and whooped, before grabbing me by the arm and pulling me down the street.
Before I knew what had happened, I was aboard Marluxia's boat, a cheery little rowboat that was as pink as his feminine hair. Being in a rowboat, we went pretty close to the reef. Even I had to admit that it was a really beautiful sight; the glowing sunset reflecting on the little shiny fish and coral. I was at the front of the boat, having refused any part of rowing or steering. The gang was marveling at the creatures we came across, and Marluxia, a marine biologist, was taking notes on some of the algae that occasionally floated by.
At some point, a sea turtle swam from under the boat. It was so graceful, as it swam towards the reef, and everyone leaned precariously to one side to get a better look. With a shout from Marluxia, the boat toppled to the side, dumping its inhabitants into the water.
My first reaction was panic. I thrashed and punched the water around me, eyes wide open, salt water stinging and vision blurring. From the corner of my burning eye, I saw figures that must have been my friends at the surface, but try as I might, I couldn't stop sinking. My lungs were on fire, and with a last chance of survival, a stream of bubbles escaped my mouth. Before I blacked out, I vaguely saw a figure put two hands on the sides of my face.
I woke up, gulping for air. Had it all been a dream? Was I never almost drowning?
"He's awake!" I heard a voice cry.
"Oh, thank God." This one was familiar…dad? No way, not here. I peeled my eyes open to make sure. To my relief, it was only Cloud, my brother.
"What the hell, Roxas?" He said. So loving, my brother was.
I tried to speak, but no words would come out. It felt like my throat had been pumped with sand.
"Here." Sora, the first voice I had heard, held a glass in front of me. Frowning a little, I pushed myself up onto my elbows. He tried to help me drink from it, but I still got water all down my chest. I looked around, realizing that I was indeed in my bed. It couldn't have been a dream, because the clothes I was wearing were still stiff from salt water.
"What-What happened?" I choked out.
"You almost drowned!" Sora blurted out, "It's all my fault! I shouldn't have made you go, I just thougt-"
"Chill out, Sor," I spluttered, "I'm-I'm fine."
His eyes were watering. Oh God, Sora if you cry-
"I'm sorry!" He sobbed relentlessly into my shirt.
"It's seriously fine." I awkwardly patted his back, possibly assuring him?
"Sora, I think you should probably leave. You're mom's worried sick. And you crying makes me mildly uncomfortable." Oh Cloud, straight-forward as ever I see.
I didn't remember the figure in the water until around lunchtime the next day. As I sat with the group at lunch, I thought about those hands. They were hot, far warmer than the already luke-warm water. Had I just imagined it? I couldn't have.
"Sora?" I asked abruptly, ending all conversation otherwise.
"Uh, yeah, Roxas?" He looked at me curiously.
"How, exactly, did you guys save me?"
"Um. You just kind of… floated up, I guess. We fished you up when we saw you, and you were unconscious." He said, scratching his head and looking up in thought.
I just floated up? That can't be, I distinctly remember sinking. Sinking like a rock. Then those hands, that face…yes. There was a face that matched those hands. Sharp features, pale skin, but I couldn't remember details. The water had been blurring my vision.
Later that night, when I went home, Cloud was waiting for me. He worked for a couple of Marine Biologists, including Marluxia, and they had found something weird on the beach.
"What kind of weird thing?" I asked suspiciously, "Is it some kind of new algae or something lame like that?"
"No." He replied. We were walking to his workplace, a little square building fenced in by green, plastic fence with "No Trespassing" signs nailed on.
He scanned his keycard, and nodded to the security guards, who waved at him and smiled at me. When I had first moved here, I spent a lot of time here before I got friends, and practically the entire staff knew me. I was glad they let me through, because according to Cloud, whatever they had found was really important, and really secret.
We entered one of the rooms that held fish tanks, and by the sign on the door, this was where the dolphins and sharks and such were kept. I always loved this room, huge with cement flooring, rows and rows of tanks lining every corner and wall. It was built partly underground, because this was a research facility, not an aquarium, and the people who worked here had no public to impress.
We approached the back of the room, and to my confusion, Cloud opened a door that I had thought to be some sort of closet or something. To my surprise, it was a smaller room with a circular tank, that was sunk into the ground so the lidded top only rose to about my shoulders, and I was a pretty short dude.
"Look inside." Cloud said. He crossed his arms and leaned back against the far wall, looking at me as I slowly walked towards the tank.
I had to stifle my gasp. At the bottom of the tank was a creature that was a fish from tail to hip, but man from hip to hair. His-at least, I thought it was a he- form was more graceful than the turtle we had seen on Marluxia's boat. His glowing, acid-green eyes glared up at me from the corner farthest from the door. He had a shock of blood-red hair, with a long fin of the same color. All across his body were little tattoo-like decorations; two tear-drops on his face, a series of ovals and diamonds on his pale abdomen and arms. His arms, tail, and fin had wafer-thin skin stretched across spindly extremities.
"What the hell," I looked at Cloud, lost for words.
"We found it on the reef this morning. It's not magical, it's not an intelligent being, so don't get your hopes up. I figured you would want to draw it or whatever." He seemed embarrassed, and a little prideful.
He was right, though, I did want to draw it. I liked drawing things, not in an artistic manner, but a scientific one. I liked labeling and sketching observations.
"I'll be home in a couple of hours." I stated, as emotionless as I could muster, and plopped down next to the elegant being, staring at me through the glass.
Cloud nodded and walked off. If it had been my parents, I would never have gotten away with it, but Cloud understood how I enjoyed being alone to do things. That isn't to say that Cloud didn't care, because if we hadn't been on an island smaller than our entire town in Nevada, he wouldn't have let me alone.
He left me a badge in case somebody bothered me, and I gently pulled a small notebook I used for sketches such as these, and started drawing the smooth curves and sharp details of the creature in the tank.
I looked down at my drawing for a second, making sure my lines were not straying from where I wanted them to be. When I looked up again, the creatures face was mere inches from mine, separated only by glass.
I jumped backwards a little bit, widening mine eyes as he narrowed his. But then he suddenly backed off. He looked sad, almost depressed. He wrapped one skinny, pale am around his torso and swam to the very top of the tank, where a trapdoor separated him from the outside world. To my surprise, he pointed at it with his other arm.
Not intelligent my ass.
I stood up slowly. Should I open it? Would he attack me? I gingerly put my hand on the handle, where with a swift click and pull, I could see the creature without the glass in the way. It couldn't hurt, right? The fish-man couldn't jump through it, it would take too much energy in too little a space.
As soon as the handle clicked, the door slammed open, and before I knew what was happening, the creature had spun me around with one hand clamped tightly over my mouth and an arm looped around my neck, keeping me from escaping. I clawed at the arm that was choking me, but my feeble, chewed fingernails hardly scraped the smooth, alabaster skin.
His hand left my mouth, but before I could scream, his hand collided with my face. In that moment, that one moment where his long-fingered, bony hand touched my cheek, I was brought back to the moment where I was deep under the water, losing myself to darkness, and a figure put his hands to my face. This time, I could see the figures face clearly, with all of its sharp angles. As if submerging from a deep pool or a deep dream, I was brought back to the present, where the fish-man was holding my face with both hands, pleading to me silently with piercing green eyes. I could only say one thing, and it came out in a whisper:
"It was you."