NS: Ohayo! It's NS with another one-shot! …bow to me! …ahem. So anyways, this is one that came to me some time ago while playing the Hallow Bastion level of Kingdom Hearts I. It's actually a rather simple concept that I managed to turn into an entire chapter…GO ME!! …yeah. Uhm, I know there's a huge difference between the start and finish dates, but that's b/c I was staying at Seaki's house and didn't get the fic back until 5/6/07, cause I was writing this on her PC. Then...I got really backed up on other fics...soooo...Yah. All the info is below.

OH!! And it seems like I messed something up, but its totally on purpose! I know that when you have Beast, as soon as you get to the Castles Gates and in the room (me forgets what tis called), you fight Riku, but I changed it for the sake of the fic. TY.

.:(insert name here):. is POV

OMG I DON'T OWN KINGDOM HEARTS! ...DUH. :)

4th Kiss: A Shadow in Darkness

Series: Kingdom Hearts

Pairing: Hints of Sora/Riku

Rating: T for content

Summary: YAOI Sora seems to be the model teenager, and the perfect person to become the keybearer. But is this little ball of sunshine all there is to Sora? Or will his true personality show through? SLASH Hints of SoRi ONESHOT

Start Date: 4/10/07

Finish Date: 7/30/07

.:Sora:.

A shadow in darkness.

That was the one thing that never left my mind. Through Traverse Town, Wonderland, Agrabah, Neverland, and even Hollow Bastion. I could never get those four words out of my head, no matter what challenges or obstacles I came across. And there was one other thing…

Riku.

Sure, I had begun my quest in search of Kairi, and to some extent it was still for her, but it was soon after my encounter with Riku in Traverse Town, that I realized who it was I was truly searching for. The one person who really kept me going was the silver-haired angel from Destiny Islands. Every time I got even the slightest glimpse of him, an alien feeling surged through me and it was during those moments that I was thankful for baggy shorts.

…and back to the original thought process, a 'shadow in darkness' didn't really make as much sense as I would have liked. That may have been the reason it was stuck with me, but I like to think there was a deeper meaning that that. I believe that I had a shadow in darkness; and that shadow was my Riku.

…more on that later.

There I sat in Hollow Bastion. It was shortly after everything had been taken from me and replaced with a giant teddy-bear and a fucking toothpick. By everything I am of course referring to my keyblade and friends, Donald and Goofy. Or at least I thought they were my friends. Although, in that moment in time, I wasn't so sure. They had, after all, abandoned me for the one I had once thought to be my silver-haired angel, as previously mentioned. Then he took it away. He took it all away.

Back on the island, I was always the goofy, smiling kid with big shoes and spiky hair. Small as the place was, most of them there didn't even know my name. I was most commonly known as 'Riku's friend' or such. No one really knew who I was. Even from my own parents, I had to come home, only to be compared to Riku.

'Sora, why can't you be more like Riku?'

'Riku's such a nice young boy. You should follow his example.'

'Toughen up a little, Sora! Like that Riku friend of yours!'

My fist clenched up at the sheer memory.

I never really had anything I could call 'my own'. I kept thinking I had found my own hobby, and then would come Riku, adapting it as his own and being twice as good as I ever could be. And then finally, finally, something was mine. The keyblade. Heh. Or so I thought.

As soon as I got to Hollow Bastion, I came to find out even that was just a hand-me-down from Riku. And then that was taken from me as well. And what did I get in return for my efforts? Beast. And a wooden sword. Oh, gee, Riku. Thanks a bunch.

And of course, it wasn't enough that I had gone to all the worlds, defeated all the heartless, watched my best friend get swallowed up by darkness, and fought with the one-winged devil, Cloud. I also had to baby sit a big furry prince and fight my way through masses of shadows that attacked me from the floor while running for my life to try and get back my friends. Yeah. You try it.

I stopped dead in my tracks. Beside me, Beast paused as well. I frowned a little at that; why did whoever was with me always stop when I did? Grr. I glanced up at him and took a deep breath.

"Hey, uh…I think I need a little alone time, do you think you could, you know, leave me alone for a while?

"But, Belle is—"

"I know. We'll save her eventually. In case you forgot, I've got people to find, too, but right now…Just let me go." He stared blankly at me for a few moments, then sighed and nodded. I smiled a little. 'Sword' (aka toothpick) tucked safely away in my pocket via magic spell (where'd you think my weapons and junk always went?), I took my leave and headed up a staircase in the Grand Hall to a large brown door on the left side of the room. As it swung open, I was hit with a breath of stale air like old books and moldy papers. This was explained as I shut the door back and scanned along the many shelves of books around me.

"Ah, the library," I noted, more to myself than anyone else, seeing as I could find no one around. Scattered along the floor were books that were very out of place, as the whole place appeared to be color-coodinated, and there were holes where books should have been on the shelves. "What kind of librarian do these people have...?"

There weren't many books that looked like the kind I would have read, so I didn't. After turning a few corners and hi-jumping my way over some shelves (Did I knock some books in the floor? 'Oops'.), I found a...half-way spiraled stairway? Sure, that sounds good. I took it all the way to the next, and apparently last, floor and found...guess what! More boring books! ...and a table and rest point!

...woo.

There were chairs at the table, so I sank back into one of them and threw my arm across my face to shield my eyes from the excessive light in the room. A heaved a huge sigh and kicked my feet up onto the table.

It was things like that that really made me miss the Destiny Islands. Here was one of my few chances for rest, where I could just sit down for a minute, where on the Islands all I ever wanted was something to do. I really took my entire life and being for granted back then. I thought that there had to be something more out there and I was simply dying to get out and check. Well, just looky where that's gotten me, eh?

Thoughts and plans of leaving were started long before we ever had even the slightest idea for making a stupid raft. How far would that really even have gotten us before it capsized? Psht, whatever. I went along with it. But Riku and I had always been friends. My very first memory was of me and Riku, playing in the sand. We used to play 'adventure' around the Islands all the time. We would be rich explorers, or jungle men. Sometimes even members of a cruise ship that sunk beneath our feet. Whatever the case, we dreamed of something more. Something different. Something far away.

And then the situation changed. Riku was nine and I was eight when the new mayor moved to our Islands with his daughter, Kairi. It was Riku's idea to go meet her, I just went along with him--because that's how it always went. Riku was the plan, and I was his backup. So we went and we met her, but I never thought she would attach herself to me. She constantly tried to pry me away from my best friend and all our adventures. A lot of the time it even worked because my parents were starting to worry I would turn out gay, so they promptly threw Kairi and her pussy in my face. I was ten by the time they decided to do that, but whatever. That probably wasn't the best call on their part...

...all it did was make me more inclined to get away from her and play with Riku. And still, everytime I would try, she tagged along, spouting stories about how great it was being the mayor's daughter and bla, bla, bla. All I ever really wanted to say to her was, "SHUT THE HELL UP YOU FUZZBAG."

...but I wasn't like that, so I didn't. In fact, it actually went the other way around. Because of all the 'hard work' my parents were doing to get me to like Kairi...I thought I was actually starting to. Of course, then I realized that I was only trying to please my parents in the one thing I thought I might be able to do for them. Too bad that only pushed me further and further across the bridge--the bridge to becoming a little less than straight...

Well, I guess they never found out about me sneaking out before sunrise to meet my angel. My parents... probably didn't know. And I would never be the one to tell them...Hee... But that was then! Of course...now that Destiny Islands had gotten sucked up by the vortex, there would probably be no parents to go and tell anyways. Oh well.

I took a deep breath to calm the thoughts of my past. It would never solve any of the problems I had at the moment anyways. I shook my head and prepared to fall back into my thought process when a loud roar of a voice drifted up to me from where I had originally entered the library. It was Beast.

"Sora! It's that boy with your friends! They're here!"

I jerked to my feet and called for my current keyblade--the Metal Chocobo-- and grinned. This was going to be an exciting fight.

NS: K, k. Finally done. If you have questions, ask in a review. R&R!