((A/N: FINALLY THE LAST CHAPTER I HAVE TO FIX! –dances- I have to make a mental note to always read my work over and over and over before I post it… XD
Disclamer: KIMAHRI NO WANNA DO DIS! KIMAHRI GET NO PAY AND EES FORCED TO STAND THERE AND LOOK "FUZZY" WHILE FLAME CAT GIRL SIT THERE LOOKING AT COM-PEE-U-TOR SCREEN WITH BLOOD RED EYES THAT WANT TO EAT YEW! FLAME CAT GIRL YOU ARE SO CREWL! THE LEAST FLAME CAT GIRL COULD DO EES LET KIMAHRI TAKE ANGER OUT ON BOY-WITH-ROCKS-FOR-BRAIN-WHO-SAY-YUNA-EES-A-HAWT-MAMA!
Chapter III: Awakening
Part I: Island
Soft waves echoed in the distance. Seagulls could be heard calling back and forth to each other and the leaves of the trees could be heard swaying in the salty breeze.
'…………… W-where am I? ……. Mommy? Daddy? Where are you…?' Sora thought quietly to himself, as him mind struggled to release itself from the binding darkness that clouded his thoughts.
It took him some time but he eventually opened his eyes and viewed his surroundings. He was on an island with some trees scattered along the sandy beach. Sora looked to his left and then to his right hoping to find his parents. But to his disappointment he only saw the ocean and sand.
"I'm alone……" He mumbled as he hugged his knees and buried his face in them and silently cried.
"HEY! Suzanne! C'mere quick!" An unknown voice called out.
Sora looked up quickly at the voices and the footsteps coming towards him and quickly hid behind a nearby tree. 'Daddy said to hide from strangers until he comes and helps me if I'm lost…' he told himself as he dried his tears so his vision wouldn't be blurred.
The footsteps got louder and faster and it sounded like there were two people. "I'm coming, I'm coming…. Jeeze quit pulling on me… you know how much I hate that…" A female's voice responded to the voice who had called her. "Now what in the world do you wanna show me Riku?"
Riku turned to the female and then pointed toward one of the trees. "There's someone behind that tree…" Riku said flatly as the female averted her gaze to the tree where Sora was peering his head around ever so cautiously.
"Another one, Eh?" She let out a sort of sad sigh and then sat down in the sand. "Heh, no need to be afraid… We're here ta help." Suzanne said calmly to Sora. "C'mon out…"
Sora looked at the girl who was called Suzanne with a bit of confusion. She was wearing a long navy blue coat and a bandanna on her head. She wore a black shirt and blue jeans. It was pretty warm and here she was in clothes that looked better suited in colder climates like that of Kalm or Wutai.
"Suzanne… You can already tell he's not gonna come out anytime soon…" Riku said with a bit of a moan.
"Hush… You were exactly like this when you appeared outta nowhere on my island." Suzanne replied with a bit of a bored glare. Riku only huffed as he walked toward the ocean and began to kick the shin deep water around.
"Y-you're island…?" Sora asked in a very quiet voice.
Suzanne nodded. "Mm hmm…"
"Are you… Did I…" Sora seemed at a loss for words. He couldn't really figure out how to word what he was trying to ask.
"Why don't you tell us your name and then I can answer any questions you have." She said with a little smile.
"Uhm… M-my name's S-Sora…"
"Sora… like as in sky?"
"Y-yes… daddy named me that 'cus I looked like I could see somethin' up d'ere."
"How old are you?" Suzanne asked with an arched eyebrow.
"Four…" he said quietly again.
"Ah… I see…" She gave a little laugh and a smile as she dusted herself off as she stood up. Sora nodded slightly and then looked up at her with eyes that said 'I'm sorry…' Suzanne just laughed a little before she spoke again "It's ok… Riku here has a bark worse than his bite.…" She pointed her thumb behind her to Riku.
Sora looked at her confused. "Is he a dawg?"
Suzanne burst out laughing, "Oh no, it's an expression! It just means although he looks like a baddie, he's really a nice kid once ya get ta know him."
Riku over heard and as soon as she finished talking he turned around and stuck his tongue out as far as he could.
"Keep that tongue in you're mouth or I'll byte it off…" She said with a small glare. He didn't listen so she just shrugged it off. And tuned back to Sora. "You wanna come with us? My house would be a lot safer than being behind that tree at night."
Sora envisioned himself still behind the tree at night and some horrible monster coming to take him away… Or even worse than a monster would be that man with the silver hair. "Y-yes… Please…" He quickly responded
"Well you're gonna have to come out from behind that tree if you wanna get ta my house. Sora nodded and then slowly walked out from behind the tree.
"-Before we go…" He quietly said.
"Hmm?"
"Did you see my daddy? …Or mommy…?"
Suzanne looked at him with sad eyes. "Sorry… I haven't. You're the only one we've found so far.
His eyes seemed to fill with despair and pain as he tilted his head downward.
Suzanne could see that he was obviously heartbroken by this, which caused some of her own memories to resurface-painful ones. She quietly knelt down and opened her arms wide. "Do you need a hug?"
He stood his ground for a while before walking into her arms. She wrapped them around him and whispered in his ear, "It's ok to cry if it'll help ya." It was a little uncomfortable for her… she was never the motherly type… but for some reason seeing Sora so sad compelled her to comfort him. Although, silently in the back of her mind she wished that someone was there for her when… it happened.
Sora's shoulders shook as he tried to suppress his tears, but he eventually let them flow freely down his cheeks. Like little crystal spheres each flowed down with the greatest of ease. Although Suzanne said nothing-she had to laugh in her mind, for when she saw Sora crying she thought of rain from the "sky."
"It's ok… I too know what it's like to be all alone… I know… Shh….." She whispered as she rubbed his back.
Although Riku didn't seem to pay any mind, he did seem to feel a bit sorry for the boy. But yet at the same time he felt like he and Sora were the same… Lost on an island, separated from their parents, it was quite a lonely life if he thought about it. But he quickly shook his head to prevent himself from doing so.
A few minuets of Suzanne's comfort and Sora was fine. "All better?" Sora nodded with a yawn. "Here… Jump on. I'll carry ya." She said turning her back to him so he could climb on. "Ok let's go Riku."
'FINALLY!' Riku screamed in his head. As much as he loved to see Suzanne show that she had a soft side, he wanted to be home so he could eat something and then go exploring. He quickly followed her without a sound.
-A little past sunset -
"Hnn…"
"You awake?" Suzanne asked. "Heh looks like you took a little nap."
"Kind…a…" He responded while kneading his hands with the heel of his hand.
"We're almost ta my house… You'll be in a bed soon." She reassured him.
"Where are… we?"
"We're somewhere in the center of the island… I built my house as much as I could inside the jungle so that other people would think this island is deserted."
Sora nodded and looked back to see Riku trotting along at a relatively quick pace for someone his age and size. He then looked down to see that there was nothing but large deep roots beneath their feet. 'Are we in the trees? Or on the ground?' Sora asked himself; everything was just so green it was hard to tell what was up and what was down.
Suzanne's long coat billowed as she moved past the wind and surfed gracefully over green foliage. Sora watched it with an intrigued look as he started to remember Junon Harbor with its rainbow colored water. His mind slowly started to wander but it came to an abrupt stop when Suzanne stropped dead in her tracks.
"Ah! We're here!" Suzanne announced. Sora looked to in front of him to find a huge house. House? This was a mansion in the trees!
"WOAH!" Sora yelped. "T'is is you're house?"
"Yup. Built it myself with the help of my friend… and family…………" She trailed off. And for a split second looked extremely sad. But she quickly snapped out of it. "Well let's get up there!"
"How?"
"… Well you seem too tired to climb up a rope or stairs… so… You wait here and I'll bring down the lift!" She set Sora down and then jetted off past one of the huge tree trunks.
Sora replayed the image of Suzanne running off and how it looked as if she was flying almost. "Wow… Is she always that fast?"
"No… not all the time… but when she's excited, yes…" Riku said looking up to the mansion in the treetops, waiting for the lift to come down.
"How's she move so fast?"
"You'll find out sooner or later… It's best not to overwhelm you with to many things at once."
Sora nodded, even though he didn't quite understand. He and Riku waited for a moment and a cutout in the wooden floor that, from their perspective was a celing, a lift came crashing to the ground. Sora didn't expect a lift to come down so he let out a scream like a little girl in fright for a second.
"Soooooooorry! I didn't mean for it to come down so hard!" Suzanne called down through the cutout where the lift once was. "Jump on! I'll make sure it goes up slow!"
Riku casually walked on like it was no big deal, but Sora had a few problems.
He seemed to be in a state of shock, and couldn't move. Suzanne tried to calmly lure Sora on the lift, but in the end Riku got him on by pushing him a couple hundred times.
The lift's gears creaked and let out a slamming sort of moan as they shifted into place and lifted the platform back into the mansion. Sora clinged to the railing for dear life, as he didn't deal with heights to well.
When the two were finally in the mansion Suzanne gave Riku a small slap on the head for being too hasty with Sora. The two started to argue a little but after a second they dropped the subject and Riku walked off to the kitchen to get something to eat, saying that he was just hungry.
Suzanne watched Riku for a second and then finally opened her arms wide and said, "Welcome to my mansion OF DOOM!" Sora jumped a bit when he heard that, but then Suzanne reassured him the "of doom" part was something she said because it was fun to say.
"Ah… Well would you rather explore first or take a nap?"
Sora yawned and nodded. Suzanne knew that, that nod meant he wanted to go to bed so she took his hand in hers and walked to one of the rooms with a closed door and opened the door wide. "You can stay in this room ok?" Sora nodded and crawled into the bed; too tired to really exclaim how the room was decorated with the theme "ocean."
"Do you want the light on or off?" She never received an answer for her question; for Sora was already asleep. She quietly laughed and turned all of the lights but one, just in case, and then closed the door and walked to help Riku in the kitchen. "He's gonna have a wonderful stay…" Suzanne said with a smile.
((A/N: WOOT THE LAST CHAPTER! I'M DONE FIXING THE CHAPTERS! Don't worry… I'll make sure that something like thiz never happens… within the next month… XD … Now if you'll excuse me I have to torture Kimahri by reciting the next chapter's disclaimer….
Kimahri: NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!))
