Back again! Whew, so many alerts, faves, and REVIEWS for just one chapp? One that was posted only about 4 days ago, no less. Thanks so much guys, I really appreciate it. I especially appreciate the new reviewers - 'bout time you slackers posted some feedback :D
This chapp's a bit short, mainly because I know the chapps might get really long once we visit some worlds, so I might as well give your eyes a break or two...or eight...between all that. xD
Oh, and by the way, SummoningShadows18: POST SOME. I'll be the first to read them if you'll just lemme know :) And I'll even...though it kills me...give you a cookie. I love cookies. SPEAKING of cookies, thanks for the cookie ComfortablyConfused. I LOVE COOKIES.
(Noms on cookie) OMNOMNOMNOM...Anyway. Sorry for giving ya'll the creeps from that Spider-In-Ear Incident. Oddly enough, I didn't start feeling all paranoid spider-wise until I read those reviews 0_0''
(Sighs) I'm too weird for my own good. I swear. Well, read, review, ENJOOOOY!
Goofy and Donald perked up even more, running towards her. "KIERAAA!"
"NOOOO!"
THUD.
"...Good to see ya'll, too," she managed to get out with a groan, now soaked from head to toe and being pressed into the even MORE soaked carpet.
"We missed you so much!" Goofy informed her.
"Right back atchya, can ya'll...get off me now?" she asked weakly, trying not to breathe in the horrible smell of seventeen-year-old carpet.
They bounded up, pulling her up with them. Kiera stumbled a little, feeling lightheaded. "Whew...All I smell is carpet..." she muttered thoughtfully, wrinkling her nose and making several odd faces.
Sora sweatdropped as she made one face that made her sneeze and hiccup at the same time, and he shook his head. "...Nope, you haven't changed."
She glanced at him, shrugging. "Why would I?"
"I dunno, two years've gone by, you coulda been totally different."
"Not quite two years yet, THANKS very much," she corrected importantly, crossing her arms. "So. ...Why're you all here?"
Wow, I just said "you all" instead of "ya'll"...Weird.
Goofy and Donald exchanged a look before looking at Sora expectantly, making him sigh. "We need you."
Kiera smirked. "I know you do, that's been obvious since week one. But why're you here?"
His temple throbbed at that, but he kept going. "The King's got another quest for us. And he asked for you specifically to come with us."
"What? Why me?" she asked distractedly as she dove to shut the windows as the rain blew onto her school papers and whatever other crap was located on her desk.
"Apparently there're other Gatekeepers out there. Y'know, people like you."
"People like me. ...What am I, an alien race?" she muttered with a temple throb. Sora scoffed at that one. "Is that a trick question, Kiera?"
Her temple throbbed even more, her right eye starting to twitch. "Why you little –"
"ANYWAY, if you two can stop the banter for a second, we need to get goin'!" Donald interrupted, ruffling his feathers for emphasis.
Kiera gaped at them. "Leave? Now? JUST LIKE THAT?"
"You did it last time. Twice," Sora pointed out.
"Yeah, but the first time – the time that started all this – wasn't on purpose!" she protested.
"What does that matter?"
"Well, I, um...It just...IT JUST DOES." She looked at them before sighing and shaking her head. "You guys, I can't just LEAVE...It took me almost two years to get things this good, and if I leave, I might as well have done squat..."
"But Kiera, The King needs us!"
"Yeah, Goofy's right! The worlds do, too!" Donald added.
She shook her head again. "I'm sorry, I really am, but..." She trailed off as Sora moved a little closer before pointing outside. "The Heartless are back. Kiera, if you stay here and don't help us, they'll come here again, too. And I doubt you can take care of your mom if that happens. C'mon, just don't let her grab onto your leg and cry a river this time and you should be fine!"
"Now that's not fair. You know I woulda stayed whether she'd done that or not."
"Not fair? You left us all hanging for about two years, THAT'S not fair."
They tried to stare each other down, but eventually, an extra loud rumble of thunder interrupted them, making them both jump. Kiera glanced to her right and sweatdropped; Goofy and Donald were on their knees pouting at her. "Pleeeeeaase?" they begged.
Dammit.
"...Fine. Fine. FINE," she relented with a heavy sigh, already holding out her arms as they glomped her. "YES!"
They quickly let go of her this time, running for her bedroom door. "To the Gummi Ship, then!" Kiera spastically shushed them. "SHHHH! ...My momma already thinks I'm leaving tomorrow, anyway – which I guess is technically today. Be verrrryyy quiet and wait outside or something, I just have one tiny thing to do, okay?"
They all nodded before creeping out the door and down the stairs as she rifled through her papers for her letter. She had wrote it a long time ago, around the time she had first gotten back home. When she had considered visiting Destiny Islands – you know, like she had promised.
She had also been determined to write as eloquently as Kairi. Thus, her farewell letter was born.
" Momma –
Please, please forgive me, but I'm not sure I'll be home again. And...y'know, maybe someday you'll look up and, barely conscious, you'll say to no one: "Isn't something missing?" You won't cry for my absence any time soon, I know – You forgot me long ago. But I still can't believe that, not completely. I mean...Am I really that unimportant...? Am I that insignificant...? Isn't something missing? Isn't someone missing me? Well, someone will be missing you, believe it or not. Oh, and I guess I should tell you that I found Dad. It's probably best you'll never see him again. ...At least, you better not. I know the truth. I know neither of you ever really wanted me once I was here. But I have to hand it to you, you did a flawless job of pretending you did. I believed it for fifteen years. Remember that I love you. Please don't throw away my things again – I will be summoning them from time to time. Summoning. It's that trick that gets me everything I want. Except, of course, love. You do remember what love is, don't you?
Goodbye, Momma.
Kiera "
She nodded to herself after folding it up, going downstairs and plopping it on top of Grace's current beer can.
She, of course, was fast asleep on the couch. Roseanne was on. Kiera still had a blush creep up her neck and cheeks whenever it happened like that – when the scenario was exactly the same. Roseanne, Momma presumably asleep, laugh track.
She shook herself quickly before summoning a literal mountain of beer to the left of the fridge. She then summoned an even bigger mountain of cash and change, and that ended up to the right of the couch.
Kiera nodded. "That should last her for a good while."
And after summoning an umbrella, she stepped outside to make sure the idiots hadn't done anything...well, idiotic.
She sweatdropped at the sight of all three clinging to her mailbox for dear life. "THE HELL'RE YOU DOING?" she shouted over all the noise from the raging storm.
"WIND! STRONG! BLEW US OVER!" Sora shouted back.
She rolled her eyes, teleporting to them. They clung to HER for dear life, making her sigh exasperatedly as she teleported them all to the Gummi Ship.
"Honestly, how did ya'll survive without me all this time?" she wondered as Donald and Goofy let go of her. "Not well," Sora replied, his face still buried against her neck. She felt the blush surge back up to her face, which in turn made her temple throb. "OFF ME!" she commanded, making him fly into the furthest wall.
"...Forgot your necklace, I see," he managed to get out with a groan, his face now buried into the wall instead.
She smiled. "Nope. I just wanted to hurt you a little."
"A little?" he wondered, sliding down to the ground with another groan. Donald and Goofy tried to hold in their laughter for Sora's sake, retreating to navigate the ship.
Kiera yawned and stretched. "Ugh, I'm exhausted. I had just gotten back from work when ya'll showed up, so if you excuse me, I'm gonna go enter a goddamn coma."
She blinked after noticing he was blushing a little. "You wanna put on some pants first?" he asked simply.
For a split second, she considered wishing for the floor to swallow her up right then and there, but then she realized she WAS at least wearing underwear, so it was no big deal. And obviously what he saw was good enough to make him blush, so maybe that was actually a plus.
"Nah, I think I'm just fine without 'em," she said simply, walking only a few feet to the right so that she could get something to eat. Damn was she hungry.
Sora rolled over before standing up, glancing at her every five seconds. He could've commented on her newfound curves, or how she was a shade or two tanner, or the fact that her hair was even more red than before, or the fact that she looked all-around...shall we say... "grown-up" in general.
But all he said was, "Your, um...Your hair got longer."
I'm such an idiot sometimes.
Kiera glanced at him as she ate some yogurt, sweatdropping. She had felt him staring at her for a good minute and a half, and THAT'S the best he could come up with?
Guess I should say something in response to that...
She could've commented right back at him about his hair seeming spikier, or him somehow managing to look even more fit than before, or the fact that his eyes were brighter than she remembered. Or even that he was about as tan as her, maybe tanner, or that he was all-in-all even harder to look away from – for multiple reasons.
But before she could say any of that, she heard herself saying, "And your, um...Your shoes...Make you look a bit taller..."
I don't think it's his shoes...You're a frigging moron, she thought miserably, wanting to facepalm herself.
"...I'm just gonna go sleep now," she muttered, making her yogurt disappear. Once she turned the corner, she practically ran for the cots, diving into what had been distinguished long ago as HER cot.
She closed her eyes, deeply breathing in that familiar cottony smell. "I can't believe I'm back on this old flying ship again."
LATER...
Sora looked out the window at Destiny Islands before sighing and turning to look at Donald and Goofy. "...Who's gonna be the one to wake it up?"
"It?"
"Yeah, Kiera," he replied with a shrug. They nodded. "Ahhh, right..."
"Rock paper scissors?" Donald suggested. Sora nodded. "Alright, but no cheating this time!"
"Of course not!"
"Rock..."
"Paper..."
"SCISSORS!" Goofy declared, and they all brandished their signals of choice. Goofy and Sora had scissors, and Donald had paper. "YES!" Donald quacked happily, jumping down the ship's exit before anyone could guilt trip him into waking up Kiera.
Goofy and Sora exchanged a look. "Rock, paper –"
"SCISSORS!"
Sora had a rock. Goofy had paper. "Looks like you're the one doin' the wakin'," Goofy said cheerfully before tipping his hat in a "Good Luck" kind of way and jumping down the exit like Donald had.
"Goofy, wait, can't you – ...aw, dammit," he muttered, trudging to the cot room. "In what universe does paper beat rock anyways?"
Once he entered the room, he was immediately greeted by the sight of Kiera with her back to him, in her bra and underwear, bending slightly at the waist to inspect something.
"U-Umm..."
She jumped about a foot into the air before screeching "SIIIIIT!"
THUD.
"...Nothing ever changes with you, does it?" he wondered with a groan, rubbing his ass as he felt her hold on him lift; the initial scare was out of her system.
Kiera glared at him. "No, it doesn't. But you're more perverted than I remember you being."
"I came in here to wake you up, thanks very much!" he said defensively, crossing his arms in defiance. She rolled her eyes. "Right. That's your story, and you're sticking to it."
"Well, now that I'm in here, what the hell're you doing practically naked and randomly standing here?" he asked, moving further into the room to see what she had been bent over.
She flushed a little, making him smirk. "I-I'm not practically naked, I'm just...not...so clothed as usual."
"...Uh-huh."
"Well, ANYWAY, I was just deciding which clothes to wear." She pointed to some random shirt, then the top half of her old outfit on their last quest. "Should I just put on normal clothes, or the clothes I wore last time around?"
Sora sweatdropped. "Please just put on a shirt."
Kiera smirked. "What, have you got a bad case of Museum Syndrome?"
"Museum Syndrome?" he repeated.
"Yeah. You know, you wanna look but can't touch, so you'd rather not be forced to look at all," she said matter-of-factly, grinning even bigger when his temple throbbed.
"That's not true!"
"Uh-huh. Well, anyway, I'm gonna go with one of my normal ones. Stupid boobs, I probably outgrew the other one after all this time," she muttered more to herself, making him flush and avoid looking any further south than the top of her head.
"I-I'm just gonna –"
"Go, Sora, before you choke on your drool."
"I'M NOT DROOLING!"
"Right. Bye now."
"Oh, bye."
As soon as he turned the corner, he pretended Kiera was in front of him. He promptly strangled Imaginary Kiera to death before sighing and jumping down the exit hatch. "This quest is gonna be even more nerve-wracking than the last...She's gonna be the death of me, I swear on it."
