"Come on, slowpoke! I'm gonna be late for dinner!"

Sora lengthened his stride, panting but determined to keep up with Riku. "I'm not a slowpoke!"

"Are too!"

"Am n - ow!" Sora fell headfirst into the sand, clutching his ankle.

"What?" Riku paused, turning to look over his shoulder. "You better not be faking just to get ahead of m- Sora?"

Sora knelt in the sand, biting his treacherously quivering lip. "M'fine. Go on ahead."

"Hey, you okay?"

There was a pause. "My ankle hurts."

"Sora... I can't -"

"Don't say that. It's not over. It's just not!"

Riku looks up into Sora's face, mulish and determined, an expression as familiar to Riku as his own face. "How can you say that?"

Riku wavered, and then ran over, because he wasn't going to leave Sora sitting in the sand just so his mother wouldn't yell at him. "Clumsy."

Sora looked up at him reproachfully.

Riku held out a hand. The offered appendage was regarded with suspicion for a moment, and then taken. Riku hauled Sora to his feet and slung Sora's arm round his shoulders. "C'mon. My house is closer."

Sora's eyes stung in the most unmanly of ways, mostly due to pain, but also in part because this was Riku - older, faster, smarter, taller, stronger, better Riku, and this was embarrassing. Riku had never been so clumsy as to fall and twist his ankle!

Somehow it seems easier for Sora to carry Riku's weight, now - Riku, who, despite everything, is still taller and stronger than him, and probably always will be. He should be far too heavy for Sora, who is small and slender and all elbows and knees. He's pretty sure his newfound strength isn't muscles built up by the Keyblade.

"Sora?"

"Hm?"

Riku looks up at him, and Sora can see a tiny swallow of pride.

"You lead."

Sora doesn't hesitate - refuses to give Riku any reason to think that he shouldn't be asking for help. "Got it."

But he's happy to finally be able to repay the favor.