Riku considered himself to be a good fighter. Nobody could really doubt this. He had three things valuable in a fight: speed, strength and power. However, he refused to even think of touching his dark powers in a fight against normal people. Perhaps it was foolish of him to not use any means necessary to defend himself, but after what he had done, he would never again try to access power that could lead to his friends getting hurt again.

The problem was that no matter how good a fighter he was, he was no match against several people appearing all at once, surrounding him and moving quickly to disable him. It was true that he could take out a few, but then the others would attack him. One person could do a lot of damage, but could not win against the mass.

He fell to his knees as he felt a blow to his back, barely managing to stop his face from meeting the concrete.

"Bitch," a man spat. Someone pushed him to the ground with their foot, holding him down and making it difficult to breath, while his hands and legs were held down. Riku vaguely wondered if this was how he was going to die. It would have been laughable, considering all he had been through. There was a slight temptation to draw on his powers, but then the memories of what he had become came to his mind.

Before he could think of much else, he felt a sharp sting at his neck and then the sensation of liquid being pushed into his system. Quickly, he felt his eyes become unfocused, and he blinked several times. His whole body felt weighed down by more than just the man above him. He wasn't certain if he could have gotten up.

"Just kill me," he slurred.

"Kill ya?" said one of the men. "I don't think so."

Riku weakly tugged at his bound hands, even though he knew that he couldn't break them with the drugs in his veins. He wasn't certain what they had put into him, but whatever it was made him too weak, and it was difficult to focus.

That didn't make him forget, however. He clearly remembered the sound of a zipper being pulled down, and how loud it suddenly seemed in his ears. It was then that he realized what they had in store for him. He remembered the feel of having his pants yanked down abruptly and how he tried to struggle away. And the pain…

It wasn't that he hadn't been hurt beforehand. Xemnas had certainly done wonders to his side, and sometimes it still throbbed just a little. But this pain wasn't just because of the sensation of something foreign entering him and tearing him, causing blood to run down his thighs. It was also the pain of being betrayed by other people, and the anger he felt at himself for being too weak.

After the first man had come, they had used a weak potion on him to make sure he wouldn't bleed to death, had drugged him some more, and moved him to a different location.

There, they had tied his arms above his head, and his legs spread, but secured so he couldn't kick. His mouth was gagged to make sure he couldn't call out for help.

The only thing that kept repeating in his head was how he was happy he was able to tell Sora how he felt before he died.

Seifer walked towards the club as if he owned the place. In truth, it was his cousin, Rufus, who owned this particular club, and a few others. Seifer hoped that perhaps eventually he could at least co-own this club, mostly because the very idea of such clubs angered his father beyond belief. Even now, he was fairly well-known, some even assuming he was the owner.

Most people had ideas of what this club was. A person could easily meet someone and take them to one of the many secluded rooms. It was all about lust, and whatever kinks a person could imagine. But in a way, it was safer, considering the security that they had in the building. Each room was videotaped to make sure that no one was abused….at least not without consent. However, there were quite a few couples that would come to have fun.

He figured that the first thing he would do before seeing Rufus would be to check up on the security room. He knew that Raijin had a shift that evening. Raijin had some weird speech quirks, but he was definitely good as a guard.

Seifer walked into the security room to hear Raijin say, "He looks kinda familiar, ya know? Hey, Seifer! This guy looks familiar, ya?"

Seifer walked over to the monitors to see what was going on. It took a few seconds for him to realize what he was seeing. He ignored the yells for him as he practically ran down the hallways. He knew the building as if it were his own home.

Protocol required that they call security to deal with issues such as violence. Seifer had never been one to follow the rules. He kicked the door open in a brave attempt to let off some steam. Killing would definitely get him in trouble. When that didn't work quite as well as he wanted, he punched the nearest individual in his way before grabbing the man currently fucking Riku, and slamming him into the wall.

"I suggest you all back away," said Seifer to the rest of the stunned men in the room. "Or else I'll make sure you'll never walk properly ever again."

Rufus studied Seifer. He had taught him everything he knew about clubs and how to run them. He was fairly sure that beating clients was not part of the training. Despite Seifer clearly knowing that such actions were frowned upon, Rufus was certain the young man didn't regret his actions one bit.

Rufus sighed.

"If you were anyone else, I would probably fire you right now for your actions. We could have been in huge trouble."

"I know you'll cover me on this. Those bastards deserved everything I gave them. I barely even touched them."

Rufus rubbed his temples. Seifer was a stubborn individual, but he also had a very strong sense of what was right and wrong. It was sometimes a bit of a skewered sense, true, but overall, he was usually correct in his assumptions. He was just worried that he was a tad easy to manipulate.

"Seifer, you're not a stupid individual. When you run a business such as this, you can't go around beating people up. That's why we have security to diffuse the situation."

"The situation never should have happened in the first place!" The fact that Seifer was angry enough to slam a fist into the chair made him raise an eyebrow. It was true that circumstances were beginning to look as if the boy had been raped, but Seifer's….rather passionate display was unexpected.

"How did you know that he was being raped? Or drugged for that matter?"

"Because I know him! I saw him earlier. He was upset about something, but I don't think he'd sell his body for any reason."

"You don't have any proof otherwise."

"That's not the point."

"This is the whole point. If he was a willing participant, it's possible that we could end up in trouble for your actions. Even if he wasn't, we could still be in trouble."

Seifer shrugged his shoulders, clearly not worried.

Rufus decided that there was no point in continuing. He'd just be ignored anyway.

It was like every other infirmary, really: White, with more white, and the smell of cleaning solutions to make things sterile. Riku's skin was already quite pale, but his surroundings made him look even more so.

Seifer figured that the ordeals probably also didn't help.

Nonetheless, there was no doubting the fact that Riku was definitely nice to look at.

Seifer wasn't too picky when it came to gender. He definitely had a tendency to go for attractive looking individuals. But it wasn't the only factor really.

With Riku, it was the way he stood. He looked as if he were ready to fight. In fact, Seifer noticed the first time that they met that Riku would check his surroundings, almost as if he were calculating in his head what could happen, and what he would do. Yet his eyes…well, as cliché as it sounded, they looked haunted. Just as he could take in his surroundings quickly, he also seemed at times unfocused, his brows furrowed. He looked as if he were thinking about something that bothered him, but Seifer couldn't figure out what. Nothing he had noticed specifically seemed to set off these random, unfocused moments. And he often appeared tense as if he were ready to leap into action.

Seifer wanted to figure out this puzzle. He knew it probably had everything to do with Sora. How could he forget the weird things that had happened years before? So the fact that he was around Sora made it crystal clear that Riku had some weird background too.

Now, however, he merely looked like a tired, young boy. Seifer wasn't surprised. The doctor had told them that his assumptions had been correct. Riku had definitely been beaten, drugged and raped. He had even admitted that was what had happened.

Riku's eyes snapped open as he moved closer. Seifer was impressed. He had figured Riku would have been too exhausted to move, and would probably sleep for a few good hours.

"Do you need any painkillers?" he asked. He wasn't going to ask Riku if he was all right. He knew the answer to that one would be 'no.' How could anyone be all right after what had happened?

"I'm already numb," said Riku, closing his eyes. "Why did you save me, anyway?"

"That's kinda weird question, don't you think?"

"You barely know me."

Seifer sat down in a chair near the bed, stretching his legs.

"That's true."

Riku frowned. "That's all you're going to say? You beat up a few of them."

"Assholes deserved it."

"That still doesn't make sense."

"I work here, too."

"You were angry."

Seifer looked at Riku, who was staring at him. "Yeah."

"Why?"

Seifer sat up straighter, the questions starting to slightly anger him. He hated when people questioned his actions, especially in such a situation where he had indeed been correct.

"Does it really matter?"

"I guess not. It's just weird that you helped me even if you have no reason. I know you're not very fond of Sora, and you know I hang out with him."

Seifer scowled. He didn't make it a secret that he wasn't friends with Sora, or any other person that he hung out with. But Riku…he couldn't really deny that he wanted to learn more about him, including a few inappropriate things that he wouldn't mention at that point.

With a sigh, Riku closed his eyes. "You're odd."

"So I've been told. Do you…want me to call your friends?"

For a few seconds, he wondered if perhaps Riku had fallen asleep.

"Soon," said Riku, shifting onto his side and curling up a little bit, not quite into a fetal position. Seifer was surprised that Riku didn't hide the tears that slipped onto the pillow.

Despite what Seifer figured most people would do, he did not look away.

Fin Silver Tears

Notes: So why did I end this here? Mostly because the title really has to do with the pain caused to Riku here, and though I do plan to write more about the continuing relationship between them, I felt that would not fit at this moment. I want to set the continuation in the future after Riku feels a bit more comfortable being around people.

So Silver Tears ends here.

BTW, I was rather inspired by Love Mode for the clubs shown here, as well as the way Seifer ends up barging his way in to help Riku. So just a disclaimer again that all characters belong to their respective owners and thank you, Love Mode, for your inspiration. Seifer and Rufus would definitely make good club owners.