New Proclamations

She watched him intently as he laid over the wooden dock, staring into the murky depths. His mind seemed a million miles away as he skimmed the top of the water with his fingertips, his wild chocolate locks blowing in the breeze. His radiant azure eyes fixated in a sad piercing stare, focusing on an unseen target. Eyes that were usually filled with laughter and love were now wretched in pain and turmoil. She gasped lightly as she felt the familiar ache in her chest and she reached out to him tentatively, desperate to save him from his thoughts.

"Sora?" her hand came to rest lightly on his shoulder and he continued his trance-like state. "Sora…are you okay?" she knew the honest answer to such a question, but she asked it regardless, in a despondent attempt to reach out to him. Her words interrupted his trance as he blinked back unshed tears and turned to face her.

"Huh? Oh…sorry Kairi. Yeah, of course I'm okay!" he smiled at her and the graying cloud in his eyes faded, replaced by their usual warmth. She smiled back as the pain in her chest subsided. "Why do you ask?" He sat up and heaved his legs around the side of dock to dangle his bare feet in the cool water.

She ignored his question with one of her own. "Sora, you know if there is anything bothering you…anything at all…you can talk to me about it." Sincerity in her voice, she looked at him sympathetically. "I want to help, but if you don't—"

"Kairi, I said I'm fine." he replied softly before she could finish. "You worry too much!" he laughed as he stood up, still looking at her somber features. He smiled at her again and suddenly pulled his shirt over his head and threw it down beside her. She looked at him quizzically, but before she could question his actions, he was running past her and diving head first off the end of the dock.

"Sora!" she snapped out of her thoughtfulness as cool water splashed her face and she wiped the water from her eyes and crawled to the side of the dock, looking for her friend. She peered into the water, searching for a head to bob up among the aqua sea. She soon began to panic as she kneeled on all fours over the edge and saw no sign of recovery among the choppy waves. Her shrieks were lost as wet hands reached up from the water and pulled her down into the sea. She opened her eyes to meet Sora's wide azure gaze and she pushed off his chest as she paddled to the surface.

She gasped for breath as he broke the surface next to her, holding his sides underwater as he laughed at her expense. "You should have seen the look on your face!"

"Sora! You…I…uh!" she stammered, glaring at him. But, his laughter was contagious and she saw the humor in the situation as well. She was soon holding back giggles of her own. "I'm going to make you regret that decision!" she promised as she started towards him.

The salty water burned his nose as he inadvertedly inhaled as Kairi came crashing down on his shoulders, forcing his head under the surface of the water. Sora grabbed her by the waist and shot to the surface. He temporarily misjudged his own strength as he heaved her across the waves, causing her to land several feet away, coughing and sputtering. She, too, did not apparently recognize his abilities as she stared at him in disbelief and he swam to her in concern, "Oh my gosh, Kairi, are you okay? I-I didn't mean to. I just thought—"

She laughed as he approached, "Sora, I'm fine. A little shocked, but fine… I can't believe you're that strong!" she smiled at him warmly. "I guess two years of fighting for your life does a body good" she joked.

His smile faded and his eyes fell, and she immediately regretted her choice of words.

"Come on, I think I've had enough swimming for today." He said over his shoulder as he swam for the shoreline as she followed.

He reached the beach first and sat down in the wet sand as he watched her swim towards him over the waves. Her movements were graceful, as her arms came up in a high arc over her head, piercing the water in front of her. Her body sliced through the waves effortlessly in skill and coordination. She had always been one of the fastest swimmers on Destiny Islands, and he continuously challenged her to races during their youth. It was only since his return to the islands that he found he could finally outswim her.

She waded through the water towards him. Her wet clothes clung to her petit frame, hugging certain curves on her body that would normally make him blush. Her khaki shorts sagged around her hips and her white tank top was now thin and revealed a light blue bra hiding behind the translucent shroud. Her hair fell in crimson waves around her, sticking to her face and dripping down her back. He felt a familiar burning in the pit of his stomach and he struggled to hide the growing bulge under his wet shorts as she collapsed onto the sand beside him.

"I've missed this so much" she sighed as she leaned back on her hands. "Haven't you?" she peered up at him to meet his piercing gaze.

"You have no idea how much I've missed this." He growled under his breath as he looked down at her.

"What?" she looked at him quizzically. "Sora? Are you sure you're okay?"

"Huh?...oh yeah." He inhaled deeply and ran his hands over his blushing face and through his hair as an attempt to control the thoughts he was having of Kairi. "I was just saying that I missed it to." He said, trying his best to smile legitimately.

She smiled back and rested her head on his shoulder as they gazed out over the endless horizon. He gulped and slowed his breathing to calm his racing heart. "Sora?"

"Hm?"

"Do you remember when we were kids and we used to watch the sunsets together every night? Just you, me, and Riku."

He smiled genuinely at the thought, the graying clouds in his eyes diminishing. "Of course I remember," he leaned his head against hers as he reminisced. "We used to fantasize about what it would be like to visit other worlds. We dreamed about leaving the island on our little raft and exploring new places together."

"Yeah." She smiled at the irony, "And we did just that, huh?"

"Yeah, I guess so…"

"But do you remember the night before the darkness invasion, the sunset that you and I watched…we sat on that same dock…and I told you to not ever change."

"How could I forget that? You tried to get me to runaway with you on our raft and leave Riku here! Remember?" he laughed and poked her in the ribs teasingly.

She giggled in response, but soon regained her composure and became serous again. "But Sora, you did change…We all did. And it's not a bad thing." She pulled her head off his shoulder so she could look at him in the face, "Sora, over the past two years you've evolved into someone that I never dreamed possible. You've had to see things and do things that most people only read about in fairy tales."

The gray cloud was fogging his eyes again as he broke her gaze and looked back out over the horizon. "Kairi, I don't want to talk about it." His voice was jagged and broken.

"But Sora you must talk about it! If you don't, it will just continue to eat at you, until..."

Kairi pleaded with him.

"Look," he turned back towards her and his brow creased in pain that his eyes revealed, "You have no idea what I've seen. You don't know what it's like…the things that I've had to do…"

"But Sora, you had to. You wielded—"

"Wielded what?" he waved his hand in a diagonal line in front of them and summoned the Oathkeeper. "The keyblade?" his voice began to raise he glared through the fog covering his eyes. "This thing is a curse, not a savior. All it did was bring pain and destruction to all the people that I love around me!"

"But Sora—"

He stood up beside her, towering over her. He clutched the Oathkeeper as his hands trembled at his sides. "I had to fight my best friend Kairi! I had to fight Riku to keep him from killing me!" his voice was raising even more, and he didn't realize that Kairi was shrinking away from him. "I was in a coma for a year. A year! One year of my life is completely void, like some forgotten memory."

"Sora, I…" tears were welling up in Kairi's eyes, and some escaped her lids and fell in long streams down her cheeks. She was trembling all over, and she realized that she was actually frightened of Sora.

"Twenty four hours a day I was hunted by unimaginable terrors. They continuously stalked me, trying to get a piece of me, trying to kill me." The fog in his eyes loomed darker and darker as he glared at her. "Do you have any idea what it's like to have to fight something like that all the time?!!"

"Sora, please…I just want to help you!" Her pleas were ignored.

"They tried to take my heart…your heart." His voice became softer and tears began to pool in his cloudy eyes. "Kairi, I had to loose you. Twice I lost you. And I never felt such a void in my life like I did as I watched you fade away from me. And I swore I would do whatever it took to get you back." Tears freely streamed down his cheeks as his eyes began to clear through the haze, "And I did, Kairi. I fought for you, I killed for you, I gave up my heart for you…" he collapsed on his knees in the sand in front of her. The keyblade at his side disappeared in a flash of light and she instantly threw her arms around his neck and pulled him into her. His tears stained her shirt as he wept in her arms. "And I would do it again Kairi…" he murmured into her chest. "I would do it all again if it meant saving you."

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Meanwhile...somewhere in a world far away from Destiny Island's shores….

Darkness. Complete absence of light. Darkness had been a part of him, and he a part of it. He had let darkness invade his heart in a desperate attempt to save hers. He had sacrificed his physical identity in order to move about the realm of darkness freely, so that he might help Sora complete his mission successfully. He had seen darkness, had lived in it, and he knew what it was capable of. It slowly feeds off the light in your heart until it completely possesses your entire being. Now he was searching for something. He wasn't sure what he would find, but he knew that he had to look for it. Light. He was convinced that it was his only hope of redeeming himself and forever banishing his darkness.