A/N: Um, hi to the few people that review, and thanks for that! It makes me happy to see reviews waiting in my inbox. I have a new chapter, obviously, and sorry for not posting sooner... college is eating me alive. Luckily for me, I don't taste very good, so it spat me back out. Now I'm covered in a thin layer of gross slime. Anyway, that's enough from my delirious mind. Hope this chapter is up to par. You get to meet Riku in it. And... learn more from my overactive imagination.

On to the fic!

Chapter Two:

We were in a dark cavern with the sound of dripping water. Drip, drip, drip. I could barely see my three saviors—as I had decided to reluctantly call them, until I figured out their names—walking ahead of me. They were so surefooted, and I was so awkward. They must've traveled down to this place many times before. I stumbled a few times, but was offered no assistance. I found that rather rude, since they were the ones who saved me and took me into this place, they could've at least had the decency to help me out with the simple task of walking. I was so lost in my thoughts that I hadn't noticed the new setting we had walked into. The floors were no longer rough stone, but smooth, level granite, likewise with the walls and ceilings. There were multiple doorways, all closed. I hadn't seen this place before because there was no light then, but now the lamps hanging from the walls were lit. Oddly enough, they were oil lamps, not electric. When and how did they light up?

The three ahead of me slowed and eventually turned around to talk with each other. I was too far away to hear, and thought better than to use my power. They reached a decision and the brunet went off into a room, while the two blonds turned to look at me. I stared, openly, confused and a little scared, and they both saw it. The blond that had saved me with the huge sword almost rolled his eyes and walked further into the shadows, like I was too much trouble to bother with. But Tidus walked over to me and tried to comfortingly place his hand on my shoulder.

"We had to take you somewhere safe," he said. "Sorry if you're scared, but we won't hurt you."

I greedily took the comfort he was offering, but I was still the equivalent of an orphan in some kind of sewage pipe turned palace, and nothing he said could alleviate that. A sad smile formed on my lips and I looked at the ground.

"Thanks," I said quietly. Then something occurred to me. "Oh! I don't know any of your names! Well," I smiled at Tidus, "I know yours."

Tidus turned his head back to the other blond, coaxing him to introduce himself. The blond sighed and walked into the light, holding out his hand.

"My name is Cloud," he said, as if it was the most painful thing in the world to introduce one's self. "I'm a Weapons Master."

I had already taken his hand by then, but almost stopped shaking it when he said he was a… weapons master. Huh?

"Well," I started. Then I decided that they would explain everything and not keep me in the dark. "I'm Sora," I waved at him and Tidus, "and I have no clue what you guys are talking about." I laughed nervously.

"You will," a deep voice said. I think I jumped a little. The brunet had come back, but apparently only to tell us that, as he went back into the room he came out of.

Tidus nodded at me and took me gently by the arm to guide me in. I appreciated the level of concern he was showing now, but it was absolutely unnecessary. I could tell that we were going to go into that room.

The first thing that hit me about the room was that it was warm. There was a fireplace with a roaring fire, and two couches and a coffee table in front of it. The room itself was magnificent. Large, and cut right out of the bedrock. It wasn't as finished as the hallway, the walls and ceilings were exposed rock with moss and water trailing down the walls. But it was still warm. They led me over to the couches and sat down, motioning for me to do the same. I melted when I hit the plush cushion next to Tidus, even in my soaked clothes. I was one with the couch. It felt good to sit down and relax again. But there were more pressing issues at hand.

"Okay," I said, determined to get answers. "Why am I here?"

"Hold on," Tidus said. I pouted at him, he said I would get answers!

"Don't bite my head off," he chuckled, "he still hasn't introduce himself." Tidus pointed at the brunet.

The brunet, on the other side of the coffee table with Cloud, glared at Tidus as if he had committed the Ultimate Sin. I looked from Tidus to the brunet a few times, as it seemed they were fighting with nothing more than glares, and then finally the brunet spoke.

"My name is Leon," he said, still in that same deep voice.

I smiled. That wasn't so hard, now was it? "My name's Sora."

"I know, I heard you coming a mile away," Leon said. I stared. What?

"Leon's a Reader too," Tidus offered. It wasn't much, I still had no clue what they were talking about.

My expression said it all.

And they understood. Tidus was the one to speak, as it seemed the other two didn't like to talk much.

"You've noticed the strange ability you have, right? To read other people's thoughts? Maybe even their pasts?"

I nodded. It was kind of hard not to notice that.

"I still can't believe it. He's so young," Cloud said. So he does talk!

"Believe it. Even you can hear him screaming," Leon said. Again with the talking!

Tidus and Cloud nodded. Wait… what? I was screaming?

"See, Sora, I'm an Elemental, meaning, I can use the powers of the elements," Tidus said. That still didn't explain why I was screaming.

I nodded anyway.

"So, I'm not supposed to be able to hear anything like you two do. Though, I am more apt to pick up on your thoughts than Cloud, since Cloud's a Weapons Master. I use magic, whereas Cloud summons any kind of weapon he wants. Readers use magic to pick up on thoughts and emotions, all that stuff. So you can see why someone who constantly uses magic as an attack could hear a residue of the especially strong Readers, right?"

I was lost, but I kind of understood. "So, since you use magic, you can hear me? But Cloud can't, because he only summons…?"

"We're not talking about hearing you, I can hear you loud and clear. We're talking about a hypothetical, any normal Reader. I don't utilize that much magic when I summon, so it's hard for me to understand those who do. But people who do utilize a lot of magic can pick up on other's abilities," Cloud said. This wasn't helping me at all.

"You're just confusing him," Leon said, I couldn't tell if he was reading my mind or my face.

"Well, you try. It's not as easy as it looks, explaining all this," Tidus said.

"We're both Readers. They're not. They do not have the ability to read thoughts. That one," he pointed at Tidus, "uses magic, so he has a strong sense for other people's magic. That one," he pointed to Cloud, "does not use very much magic, and thus does not have a strong sense for magic, so normally, he can't pick up on it."

That was better. "But you keep saying 'normally,' why?" I asked.

"You're different. We've learned to block our minds from Readers, where you're basically shouting all your thoughts out. That's one of the reason you were attacked by the Heartless," Tidus said.

Uh oh, a new word. Heartless?

"Heartless are the monsters that attacked you. They were once like us, and we don't know how or why they changed. Now they hunt us. Normally, they take the person prisoner and turn them into an Heartless, but with especially strong people, the Heartless kill them immediately," Leon said.

"Yeah, and you are very strong," Tidus said. I blushed. "To attract twenty three Heartless in one shot! Amazing. When they come after me, there's like, four… maybe."

"What about you guys," I said, looking over at Cloud and Leon. "How many do you guys attract?"

"The most I've ever gotten was ten," Cloud said.

"Seventeen," Leon replied gruffly.

"Seventeen," I repeated. "So that means..." I counted on my fingers. Yeah, so I wasn't all that great at arithmetic. "I got six more than you!" I found that completely amazing, Leon looked like a very strong man.

He huffed. "If you would recall, this isn't a contest, the least you attract the better," he reminded. Me and Tidus, even Cloud a little, looked ashamedly down at our laps. I still felt a twinge of pride at being stronger than Leon, and that twinge pulled the corners of my lips into a small grin.

"Oh, shut up," Leon said, getting up from his place on the couch and walking to the mantle of the fireplace. Right, that whole screaming thing.

"Why am I screaming?" I asked anyone who would listen.

Cloud and Tidus looked at me funny. "Well," Tidus started hesitantly. "Most of the time, you're not really saying anything. It's more incoherent yelling. And it's gotten quieter since we took you here."

"Probably some type of insecurity you have," Cloud offered. "Maybe because you ran away?"

I scowled. "You can hear that, too?"

"No, but you look like you ran away," Cloud said. "That, and you had no clue where you were going. In Traverse, that usually means runaway."

"You have a lot of them, then?" I said, smiling.

"Only a few," Leon answered. I was surprised, after his little emotional fit I thought he was going to be silent the rest of the night, but I was wrong. Not the first time in my life.

"Hm, I wanna know about... well, more about people like us," I said. It was strange, but I was feeling secure around these three, like I could trust them. Hopefully that trust wouldn't come around and bite me in the ass.

"What do you want to know?" Cloud asked. "We're called Users, for one. Just as a general category."

"Are there different kinds? I thought before that I was the only one with this power," I said. My naivety shown through like a star, but I couldn't help it. I really did think I was alone.

"Let's see... there are you Readers, us Elementals, the Weapons Masters, Healers, Shadows... Cloud, am I missing anything?" Tidus turned to Cloud and tilted his head to the side. Very dog-like, I noticed.

"You're forgetting the most important one," Cloud smirked. "Extractors."

A shiver ran through the room. Even through me, and I didn't know what they meant.

My brow furrowed and lips pursed. "Okay, what do they do?"

"You already know the first three, Healers are kinda self-explanatory. Shadows," Tidus paused and bit his lip in thought. "Shadows are creepy. They can turn invisible and walk through walls and stuff like that. They can even force someone's soul out of it's body and take it's place for a while!" His eyes widened and I heard a suppressed laugh and–yes, I could hear it–Leon rolling his eyes.

"That's only a myth, Tidus, they can't really do that," Cloud corrected.

"Psh, I think they can," Tidus said, leaning back into the couch.

"And Extractors," Cloud continued, since Tidus was too busy sulking in the couch. "They are one of the most powerful Users, since they can... Leon, how would you put it?"

Our three heads turned simultaneously to Leon, as if awaiting a bedtime story. He played the part too, which was even scarier.

"Well," Leon said. He seemed to be unable to put into words what he was thinking. "Extractors are... they can kill. That's the easiest way of putting it. But it depends on what they're up against. Against a human, or another User, they take the soul. Against an Heartless, they take their will, since Heartless don't have souls, only a will to murder. Extractors basically kill things by taking their life force away."

I swallowed. That sounded scarier than Shadows! One thing was for sure, I never wanted to meet one of those in a dark alley.

"Okay, all this talk has worn me out," Tidus said with a wide yawn. "Not to mention those Heartless! How 'bout we go to bed?"

I yawned as well. Apparently, the adrenaline from before was wearing off. I was tired from sleeping in the woods all last night, sprinting here, getting attacked. My eyes were starting to blur up too, which I knew meant I was getting exhausted.

"Um," I said. "Where..."

"Don't worry about it, we take care of our own," Tidus said. He patted me roughly on the back. "You can stay here. In fact, you should stay here, it's the only place protected from the Heartless."

"We don't have very much space inside the compound, so you'll have to board with another from our group," Cloud said, standing up and stretching. "He's nice enough, if not a bit strange. A runaway, like you."

Yay! A bonding point. If he was anything like these three, I didn't see a problem. "Okay then," I said.

"Here, I'll take you to your new room," Tidus said, pulling me up with him. We walked out of the room before Cloud and Leon even made a move, and I briefly wondered why we had to leave so fast. I didn't even get to say goodnight.

Tidus didn't let go of my arm until we stood outside of a moderately sized wooden door. I couldn't hear anything on the other side, and like before I couldn't feel anybody.

"About my whole screaming thing," I started to tell Tidus. "What if the current occupant of the room gets annoyed by it and can't sleep? What do I do to stop it?"

"You can't really stop it until we teach you how, but if you concentrate on absolutely nothing, you should become pretty quiet. Shouldn't be that hard since you'll be asleep too," Tidus answered. I nodded, determined to quiet myself. But a frown soon appeared.

"What if he doesn't like me?"

Tidus looked at me thoughtfully. I stared back with my bright blue eyes. He smiled.

"Nah, he'll like you," he said. "Just be you."

What original advice. How could I not be me? I nodded anyway, and Tidus reached up to knock on the door.

We waited. Silence was all that came from the other side. But then... yes, I heard it, a bed creaking, footsteps on a stone floor coming closer, closer. Finally the door opened and a silver head appeared from the darkness of the room, followed by his pale body covered only in long pants. He leaned on the door frame, still looking at the ground. I wondered if he was a Shadow. The way he lurked out of the darkness looked like something a Shadow could do. He raised his head, the silky strands of his hair falling into place as if in slow motion, his lips parted so slightly, eyes began to open. I was just about knocked off my feet when his eyes did open to reveal
an aqua green so piercing I could feel it prick my skin. His eyes looked from Tidus to me, and stayed there for a long time. Up, down, then up again, his eyes resting on my own. He might've smirked. He couldn't be a real person.

"Tidus," he said in a voice so ethereal I couldn't even attempt to describe it. "What. The. Hell?"

Tidus laughed a little. "You've got a new roomie. Say 'hello' to Sora."

"Hello, Sora," he said, emphasizing my name in a tone so completely seductive and innocent at the same time. I could only stand there and gape. Tidus nudged me into action none too gently in the ribs.

"Er, um, hello," I said, quite automatically. Tidus nudged me again when I didn't inquire the silver-haired boy's name immediately. My brain lagged from lack of sleep, my mind was all fuzzy, and I couldn't properly form a sentence.

"What's your name?" I closed my eyes for the relief and smiled my sugar-sweet smile that could melt even the coldest of hearts.

"Riku," he said. I noted how his eyes had never left mine, that devious little glint in them all the while.

"Right, then," Tidus interrupted the short pause in the conversation. He stretched his arms over his head. "You two can get acquainted, I'm going to bed."

Riku leaned a little further out of his door. His eyes left my body.

"Sweet dreams!" He sarcastically screamed after Tidus. He gave me a sideways glance before turning around. "Come on, Sora."

I obediently followed. The room was dark, but I could still make out two beds, one that looked occupied, and the other that was fully made. I took that to be my bed and dropped my pack on the floor next to it. I was still pretty damp from the rain, but luckily my pack was waterproof. I do still have luck!

"So, Sora," Riku called to me from the other side of the small room. "Do you always yell this loud?"

I frowned, so he could hear it too. "I'm sorry, I'll try to be quiet," I said.

"Don't worry about it," Riku said. "I've been alone in this room for a long time. It's nice to have some company."

There was a pause. I unfolded some of my clothes from my pack and set them on the bed. I definitely wasn't comfortable changing in front of Riku.

"Riku?"

"Hmm?"

"Is there a bathroom somewhere? I want to get changed," I asked. I probably shouldn't have put that last part in there...

He laughed. Loud. "Why do you need a bathroom to change?"

I was silent. I willed my thoughts to be silent too. Hopefully, it worked. I heard Riku sigh and wood creaking. "I won't look, see? All I can see is the wall."

"Okay," I said. I pulled off my shirt and pants and traded them for dry pajamas. "Riku?"

"Yes?"

"I'm done."

"You know, I can't even see you that clearly."

"Thanks anyway." I couldn't see him either, but it was just the idea.

"Yeah, yeah," he sighed. "Get some sleep."

"Oh, Riku, one more question!" I said.

"What is it?" I heard his bed creak again and the covers rustle.

"What kind of User are you?"

There was another pause. I heard him shift in bed.

"I'm..."

I waited patiently. I expected Shadow.

"I'm an Extractor."

The bottom of my stomach fell out.

A/N: It's a particularly long chapter, which I guess is a good thing for readers. A review or two would be nice. And I just have to find the time to proof the next chapter and then I can post that one too. Ugh, I dunno when that'll be though.

Bye 'til then.