Edited 3/27/18: I was re-watching some of the cut scenes from KHII and realized I had made an error in some details.

"Hey, Sora?"

"Yeah Kairi?" Sora answered, coming out of his reverie. The foursome had been riding in the gummi ship in silence for a while now, and he had zoned out a bit watching the stars fly past.

"Back in Neverland," began Kairi, "You said something like, 'those things happen to all of us'...you meant getting hurt, or even almost dying, right?"

The question took Sora by surprise. "Well, um...yeah, I guess."

"So does that mean that it has happened to you, too?" Kairi pressed. "Almost dying, I mean?"

Sora scratched his head, a hundred memories flooding his mind all at once. "Well..." He had made the comment without really thinking about it, just trying to cheer up Riku. But it was true, being in mortal danger had become a pretty routine part of his life for the past few years. For whatever reason, though, he had never shared any of those details with Kairi. They tended to only talk about the fun and adventurous parts of his travels, not the dangerous and scary ones.

Before Sora could decide how to answer, Riku jumped into the conversation from the driver's seat. "I assume you mean besides the time that he actually died, and became a Heartless," he said. "You were there for most of that, anyway."

"Oooh, what about the time I almost killed you?" Lea offered a little too eagerly, leaning forward. "The other me, that is."

"What?" Sora replied in confusion. "You never almost killed me!"

"Sure, you had a big gash across your head," Lea countered. "Could have been really bad." When Sora continued to look confused, he snapped his fingers. "Oh yeah. Castle Oblivion. Sorry, I forgot."

Sora shook his head. He still had no memories of the events of Castle Oblivion, thanks to Namine. Lea had mentioned a few things that had happened there, but most of it was a mystery.

"Of course," Lea continued, "You healed yourself like five seconds later, and everything was fine."

Sora laughed. "Come on, I wouldn't call that almost killing me." He almost finished with, "I was the one who got you killed, remember?" but he stopped himself. Even though Lea was technically a completely different person than Axel, it was still hard to get used to him being their friend instead of a member of Organization XIII. Sora often felt awkward around him, knowing that every time Lea saw him he probably just saw the guy who was basically responsible for his death, and who took away his best friend. But at the same time, for reasons Sora couldn't explain, he found himself drawn to Lea as a friend, like he could tell him anything.

"Yeah," Lea sighed. "I bet things would have turned out a lot differently if the Nobodies knew how to heal themselves like you guys do." The other three gave him a look, and he grinned sheepishly. "Not that I wanted things to have turned out differently. Definitely glad that I'm me and not him anymore."

"Anyway," said Riku, reaching forward to adjust the ship's trajectory slightly. "There was that time that you told me about, Sora, in Deep Jungle. When the hunter, whatever his name was, shot you with his rifle?"

Sora winced at the memory and rubbed the spot on his shoulder where the bullet had entered. "Oh, yeah. Clayton. That one definitely hurt."

"Or what about Hades?" Lea put in. "Didn't you say he almost had you once or twice?"

"Yep, definitely some close calls in the Underworld," Sora nodded. "And with Jafar...and Ursula..."

"And the MCP," Riku added. "Don't forget about him."

"Yeah," Sora groaned. "That guy."

"And of course there was Xemnas," said Lea. "When Riku saved your life."

"We both saved each other multiple times during that fight," Riku quickly replied. "It went both ways."

"That's true," Sora agreed. "That was definitely one of the toughest fights we've been in so far."

"Yeah, but I'm talking about what you told me, Sora," Lea persisted, getting a bit too excited again. "At the very end when Xemnas was about to chop your head off, and Riku jumped in and blocked him, and pushed you out of the way, and then Riku got hit and he was the one who almost died instead!"

"Did not," Riku retorted.

"Well, kinda," Sora replied. "You certainly weren't doing so well for a while there." Riku just shook his head and pushed another button on the console.

"It was really Kairi, though, that saved us both that time," Sora continued, looking back over at her for the first time since the conversation had started. He was taken aback by the expression on her face, but couldn't quite place what it was. Fear? Or perhaps worry? "What's the matter, Kairi?"

She shook her head, her auburn locks brushing her shoulders. "Nothing."

"You shouldn't worry about something like that happening to you," said Sora, guessing at what might be bothering her. "You don't even have to go out and fight big battles like that if you don't want to. And if you do, we'll all be right there with you to give you a hand." He smiled, trying to reassure his friend.

But Kairi didn't look reassured. "That's not it," she frowned. "I'm not worried about myself." She paused, as if hesitant to continue. "I just don't like thinking about you being hurt and in danger like that. I was always worried about you while you were gone, but if I had known exactly what you were doing that whole time...I don't know if I could have handled it. I couldn't stand it if anything actually happened to you."

"It won't," Sora blurted. He knew deep inside that he could never actually guarantee that, but he also knew that he was always going to do everything in his power to take care of Kairi. "I told you I'm always with you, and that I'll come back to you, remember? And I will."

After a moment, Kairi smiled. "Okay," she said. "But you won't have to come back anymore, because I'm going to be right there with you from now on." She gestured to the other two. "With all of you!"

Sora smiled, too. "Right. We'll take on whatever they throw at us together!"