Good morning, Fanfictioners!
Welcome to the first chapter of my very first Kingdom Hearts story. (: As I'm still playing the games, I'm kind of still testing the waters for this fandom. (In regards to writing stories for it.)
And yes, the title is an awful play on the 'The Town Mouse and the Country Mouse' (which I don't own either)
The other thing that I should warn you about is that I'm a slow updater. Especially so in this case as I haven't gotten through all the games yet. So if you like this, I suggest you put it on alert or whatever because I can't guarantee when chapter two will come out. Well, now that all that dreary business is done, off we go! (:
Chapter One
"That is so cheating!" Sora cried as Riku reached the destination seconds before he did. He looked to Kairi for assistance, but she could only shrug.
"I did say you could take whatever route you wanted," she confirmed. Riku sealed his official victory with a smug smirk. With a scowl, Sora conceded to defeat.
It was another sunny day on Destiny Islands. The three close friends were together, as was the usual. However, unbeknownst to them, today was to be exceptionally memorable.
Sora looked back out over their race course. Riku was faster, so in order for him to have any chance at all of winning, Sora had to take a higher road- literally. Running above Riku's well-beaten path was an old bridge. It was missing planks in quite a few places, but it had always served him well. Until now anyway, when a piece he was sure had been perfectly attached yesterday had suddenly given way today. He glared at the traitorous board of wood that now lay in the sand. He was sure Riku had had something to do with it, but there was no way to prove it.
"Fine," he said, turning back to the silver-haired boy. "You win. What do you want to do today?"
Riku opened his mouth, but he didn't get a chance to reply, for at that moment Kairi spotted something and waved, beaming.
"Namine!" she called. "Come on over!"
"I don't think I will," the other girl called back, looking none too pleased with the situation. She was perched precariously on the edge of the tunnel that connected the two sides of the island.
Namine was a strange girl. Sora thought so anyway. Not strange in a bad way, just… strange. The pale blond girl was rarely seen outside the mayor's house. She preferred to spend her time inside reading or drawing instead of frolicking out by the ocean like the rest of Destiny Island's younger residents. 'I'm not a creature of sunlight,' she'd said to him once.
"Sora," she called now. "Your mom's looking for you."
"All right," he called back, feeling none too upset over having to stall Riku's victory decision. "I'll see you guys later."
"When will you be home?" she asked, this time addressing Kairi who shrugged.
"I don't know. Later," she mended. "In time for dinner."
Satisfied with this answer, Namine nodded and turned away from them. Kairi and Namine weren't actually sisters, but they might as well have been. In truth, Kairi had washed up on the shore of the island as a young child- nearly ten years ago now. No one knew where she'd come from, and Kairi herself couldn't remember any place she had to return to. She hadn't been in the best shape when they'd first found her, but, to the surprise of everyone, she hadn't grown up to be a sickly child. On the contrary, she usually had more energy than her adoptive sister. It hadn't been long after her recovery that she'd begun chasing after the two boys.
Sora smiled fondly at the memory. At first Riku had tried to convince him that girls had cooties, but he'd soon taken to her as well. Kairi was one of those people that made friends wherever they went. It was hard not to like her.
"Hey, Namine," he said, coming back to the present. "Do you know why my mom wants to see me?" Nothing in his mental database came up when searching for reasons he may be in trouble. Hell, he'd even cleaned his room yesterday!
The mayor's daughter shook her head. "She didn't say." She paused then added, "She looked okay, but I could tell something was wrong."
Sora took her word for it. Whatever else she may be, Namine was perhaps the most intuitive person he knew.
Once the two reached the other side of the tunnel, Sora could see his mother a ways away, outside their house, up to her ankles in the ocean.
"See you later, Namine!" he called as they parted ways. She nodded in response, looking contemplative, but as he'd already rushed off, he didn't see it.
As Sora drew closer, he could see that his mother's hair was being held back with a clip she'd fashioned out of a seashell. He smiled in spite of himself. Kairi loved seashells. She'd spent countless hours on the beach, collecting them with his mother though Riku and Sora himself tired quickly of such activities. On more than one occasion Sora had wondered if his mother would have preferred having a daughter. Someone who could sit still and would actually listen to all her directions before rushing off to the task at hand.
His curiosity chased the thought away as he hurried across the sand to meet her. She looked up as he neared. Kagiana Shinzo smiled at her son, but her eyes were sad and her face was pale. Sora stopped, the first strings of worry knotting in his stomach.
"Mom? What's wrong?"
"Honey…" her voice trailed off. She looked pained. For once in his life, Sora was patient as she worked to find words. "Let's go somewhere we can talk, okay?"
"Yeah, sure." Sora knew immediately where he was leading her as soon as they started walking. A tiny plot of land- it could just barely be called its own island- was settled just off the shore of Destiny Islands. He and Riku were its most frequent visitors, choosing to use it for swordfighting practice. Just as he'd hoped, they had no other company than the ocean breeze.
They sat with their legs dangling over the edge, completely silent for as long as Sora could bear it. Which, admittedly, wasn't long.
"What's going on, Mom?"
"Sweetheart, what have I told you about your father?" she asked.
"Not much," he answered honestly, no less confused.
"Well, I suppose I'd better start at the beginning then," she said with the air of one who didn't seem to expect to enjoy the story any more the second time around.
"I met your father when I was a little girl," she began. "We grew up together here on Destiny Islands. We spent our entire childhood with our parents pushing us together. To be honest, I was a little too wrapped up in myself when I was younger to take any serious notice of Takao Shinzo. Though the rest of the island wasn't nearly as impaired as I was. He was athletic, good-looking. He was also just a tad bit arrogant, but he was charming enough for everyone to ignore that." She paused in her storytelling. "He looked a lot like you actually," Kagiana said fondly.
Sora had figured. His mother's hair was long, straight, and yellow-blond in color although it had gotten a bit darker as she'd gotten older. They had the same deep blue eyes though. Her son refrained from any commenting so she could continue.
"I only really started looking at your father when I was seventeen. And then… we fell in love," she said as if such a thing could really be so simple.
"And a year later you had me," Sora chimed in; this was the part of the story he had been told.
"Yes…" said his mother slowly. "The next July I gave birth… to twin boys."
For a moment Sora just stared at her, not fully comprehending what this meant. "What?"
"We named the two of you Sora and Roxas," she continued as if he had not spoken. "We felt the names complimented each other. Unfortunately, Takao and I no longer complimented each other. If there was one thing that Takao hadn't lost from his glory days it was that he dreamed big. He said that the air here was stifling- he had to get off this island. I refused to leave. This was my home. I couldn't understand how he could just leave everything he'd ever known behind. In the end, there was no dissuading him. I stayed behind, and Takao took off for the mainland with Roxas. We meant to set up visits. I wanted you to know your father as much as I wanted to know my other son, but we just… lost touch. In the end, neither of us had the munny to make frequent trips to and from the mainland."
There was silence. Sora's head was spinning.
"So why are you telling me this now?" he finally got out. He couldn't explain the hard quality to his tone. He'd wondered about his dad his while life. Until his mother had told him otherwise he'd let his mind be entertained by all sorts of fantasies. Maybe he was dead. Maybe he was a king to some foreign, unheard of country. Maybe he was just another dead-beat dad. She told him now that he'd been living on the mainland all this time?
Of course, the mainland is still farther than you think, he told himself. His father, and now his brother too, were just as unreachable as they'd been before. His mother lovingly ran a hand through his untamable hair and he let her.
Then she took a deep breath and said, "This morning I got a letter from a woman on the mainland informing me that Takao was dead… and that your brother was being sent over on the next supply ship tomorrow to come live with us."
…
Roxas sighed desolately. "I don't want to leave Twilight Town."
"I don't want you to leave Twilight Town," said Axel from where he sat at his desk.
Roxas was lying on Axel's bedroom floor, watching the ceiling fan twirling around indefinitely. It would most likely never see the outside of this room, stuck in one spot forever- until the house was one day demolished. Roxas wondered, was is bad to be jealous of a ceiling fan?
It was weird to think that not even a week ago he and Axel and Xion had been in this very room, celebrating his fourteenth birthday. He'd said his tearful goodbyes to Xion the day before, but he couldn't bring himself to cry now. Scratch that, he wouldn't allow himself to cry now.
As much as he loved his best friend, Roxas was only here because he couldn't stand to stay in his empty house. Axel had gone over that morning and packed up all his things.
Roxas kicked over the suitcase from where it sat by his foot. It fell over with a hearty thump, but it didn't burst open and magically restore his life to order like in some fairytale.
"Roxas… about your dad…" Axel let his voice trail off. Rarely had Roxas ever heard his friend's voice so gentle, but he shut him down all the same.
"I don't want to talk about it."
Axel didn't push any further and an hour later Roxas was looking down on all his friends from Twilight Town who'd come to see him off from where he stood on the deck of the boat that was gearing up to take him off to his own personal hell. Think of this as a new beginning, he'd been told more than once already. Not everyone gets a chance to start over.
But I don't want to start over, he thought desperately as he watched his friends fade away. As he lost sight of Twilight Town, his remaining hope flew away on the ocean breeze. He was leaving the old Roxas Shinzo behind in Twilight Town. To be honest, he wasn't quite sure who it was that would be arriving on Destiny Island but it sure didn't feel like him.
Hours later, he was gripping the railing tightly, trying not to look at the waves that were rocking the boat so violently. There was a reason a boat only came around for supplies once a month- the waters around Destiny Island were hard to navigate, and they certainly weren't going easy on the boy who'd only made this journey once before in his life. It was almost a relief to see the shore come into view.
However, no sooner had he stepped off the boat there was a boy with wild brown hair and blue eyes identical to his own in his face. In no less than six seconds he was informed that this boy was Sora and that the blond woman standing behind him was his mother- their mother. Roxas wasn't sure if he said anything- he was too dazed by all the excitement to really grasp what was going on. He was led through a crowd of blurred voices and faces that had come to welcome him.
Eventually he became aware that the crowd had narrowed down to just the three of them. His familiy (the word didn't sound right in his mind) was leading him across the beach. The boy- Sora- was chattering away excitedly, but Roxas didn't hear a word he was saying. Was this really just like some big party for him?
At last they reached a cottage (Roxas wasn't sure it could truly be called a house) a little ways away from the rest of Destiny Islands' inhabitants. He turned down their offer of dinner and opted to be shown to his new room. Once there, Roxas threw his suitcase on the floor and flopped down on the bed.
Here, finally alone in the darkness, Roxas would have let a few tears slip through, if only he hadn't been certain the feeling would actually make him sick.
Review please!
Wow, this first chapter is probably going to be the longest in the whole story. I'm not sure if I should feel guilty about that or not…
I'm sure this story idea isn't terribly original, but I got the urge to write it anyway. (: At least I can truthfully say that I haven't read a KH story with this exact plot so I can be sure that all of this is coming from my own mind.
I own nothing.
