…and woke to the lovely smell of rotting garbage. I opened my eyes to see a brick wall of an unfamiliar alley. Hmm, that was weird. Maybe… maybe what happened was that the candy my friend gave me earlier was laced with hallucinatory drugs, which had made me dream up all those ridiculous things I saw, and I'd wandered until the drugs wore off and fell asleep in this alleyway. I didn't like that explanation- I don't do, believe in, or go anywhere near drugs- but it was better than the craziness I thought I remembered. Ok, so…so what I need to do is figure out where I am. Then I can call for a ride and get home, though Mom and Dad are gonna kill me when they find out I've been out this late, I thought. Decided on this course of action, I was not pleased when someone suddenly leaned over my slumped position on the ground and held out a hand. I was even less pleased when I saw who it was: some guy only a little older than me but much taller with way long white hair, wearing baggy jeans and a vest over a black muscle shirt with a double-ended zipper.

"Need a hand?" he offered brusquely. I stood up, brushed myself off, and was about to give a haughty retort when he moved into the sunlight (Sunlight? Crap, how late was it?) and my jaw dropped open for the second time that night.

He smirked, brushing his long bangs out of his eyes- now I could tell that his hair wasn't white, but silver (?)-which revealed his eyes to be a lovely shade of blue-green. They seemed… almost familiar, somehow? I gawked for a moment. Then he cleared his throat, reminding me that I was staring at some random guy I'd met in a dirty alley of all places and he knew it. I blushed bright red.

"I'm Riku. And who are you, exactly? I don't think I've seen you before." He offered me his hand again, this time to shake.

"Oh! I'm Elizabeth, and- wait a minute! What did you say your name was?"

"Riku," he repeated, looking at me with a hint of suspicion in his eyes.

"Ohmigod! Ohmigod ohmigod! I knew you looked familiar, I knew it, but this is crazy! You can't be…" I trailed off, then shot questions rapid-fire at him, "Who told you to do this? Are you messing with me? Who are you really?"

He looked at me like I was insane, which honestly, I can't blame him for. I was starting to wonder myself. Then his jaw tightened, and he shot back, "Do what? Why would I be messing with you? What do you think is going on?"

"I'm warning you, this isn't funny! If one of my friends paid you off to get back at me, the job's over. That's it, get your cash, go home. And ditch the Riku costume- I got over that like a year ago."

"What the heck are you talking about? Got over what? I'm Riku! And I don't know why I should have to defend myself to random girls sleeping in alleys!" He turned to leave, but I recklessly grabbed his arm.

"If you're really Riku, then where are we?"

He looked at me with exasperation and something else. I tried to read his face, but it was gone in an instant. "Traverse Town. Where did you think we were? In fact, Sora and Kairi are probably waiting on me right now wondering what the heck I'm doing, so start making sense or I'm leaving."

"Oh man… oh man oh man oh man! I can't believe this! I mean, yeah, Kingdom Hearts is like my favorite video game, but this!..." I let go of his arm as I moaned half-hysterically, only for him to grab mine. His eyes widened, then narrowed.

"Kingdom Hearts? What do you know about Kingdom Hearts?" Mistrust formed in the backs of his eyes, and he tightened his grip. "I don't know who you are, but if you're here to rebuild Xemnas' work or harm us, you will regret it," he hissed.

I gasped, both at the pain in my arm and his harsh words. "W-what? No! I'm not here to hurt anyone, I swear! And I have no idea who you're talking about! In fact, I still don't think I know where we are!" But my frightened pleas did nothing to dissuade him or loosen his hold. In fact, he started to pull me out of the alleyway.

"Where are we going?"

"To see the others. They'll want to know about this," he uttered grimly, eyeing me with suspicion and perhaps even loathing. Shocked by the strength of his emotions, I said nothing more and let him lead me where he would.

Yeah, I know, it was weak of me, but what did you want me to do, huh? At this point, I was still only half-convinced that this guy calling himself Riku wasn't a crazy axe murderer or a gang member taking me to his buddies for turf violation, in which case it would probably be best to cooperate and then get the heck out of there. As he led me through the square, though, I had to admit that A) I'd never been here before, which made the whole passed-out-in-an-alley-after-walking-on-foot thing a little unlikely, and B) everything I was seeing seemed to match up with what I remembered of Traverse Town from my obsession with the video game series Kingdom Hearts two years ago.

Ok, so a little back story. From the clothes and the hints of Sora and Kairi waiting for him, I guessed that I had somehow wound up in the worlds of the Keyblade sometime after the events of Kingdom Hearts II. That, or… what else could it be? Someone pulled the biggest joke ever, I had gotten sick and was delirious, or I was really locked in a rubber room having delusions. Assuming I wasn't crazy or delirious and that no one who knew me had enough time on their hands to pull this off, this meant that -I racked my brains to remember what had happened- Sora had defeated Organization XIII with Riku's help and locked the worlds. Kingdom Hearts, the collection of hearts that Heartless released when killed, had been destroyed along with its creator, Xemnas (Oh! I get why he's upset now!) and Sora, Kairi, and Riku had been reunited and gone home together. Something had happened at the end, though- something to interrupt their peaceful homecoming. Gah! I couldn't remember what, though. Something to do with a bottle…

My thoughts were interrupted as Riku pulled me up a flight of stairs and into a small shop, not even letting go of my arm to open the door. I decided I'd wait to make judgment calls if I was in a world from my favorite video game or not (it's sad when you're reduced to saying something like that) until I met 'the others' and heard what they had to say.