"Is it worth the wait, all this killing time?
And are you strong enough to stand
Protecting both your heart and mine?"
―Florence + The Machine, "Heavy In Your Arms"
As Lea had suspected it would, the first foray into the darkness went very poorly. At the outset, Ven was energetic and fidgety, and his nervous excitement was mildly contagious.
"Stick close to me, all right?" Lea told him, before even opening the portal. "If we get separated, you won't have a way to get back."
"Okay," Ven said. His hands were slowly clenching and unclenching at his sides. Lea put a hand on his shoulder and Ven met his eyes. Lea felt like he'd stuck his head in a bucket of ice water.
"Whatever happens," Lea told him, "don't get lost. Got it memorized?"
Ven nodded decisively. "I won't." he said.
"All right, then." Lea turned and opened the portal. Behind him, he heard the breaking-glass sound of Ven drawing his Keyblade.
They stepped into the darkness, and Lea closed the portal behind them; there was no sense in giving the Heartless another way to get out into the worlds, even if it meant Ven might get trapped there in the darkness. He'd stayed up most of the night worrying about what would happen to Ven if something went wrong and Lea wasn't able to open a portal home―like if he died, for example. Lea tried not to be afraid of death, tried to convince himself that he'd died twice before and it hadn't really been all that bad, but his heart beat faster in something approaching panic every time he thought about it. He wasn't sure if it was fear for his own life or for Ven's.
The darkness was close and cold, filled with indistinct noises at indeterminate distances. It wasn't so bad, at first; Lea took short forays through the darkness all the time. However, after about a minute and a half, the atmosphere grew oppressive, grating, and Lea found himself growing tense and nervous. It did not take long for him to draw his Keyblade as well. This, as it turned out, was a mistake.
The Heartless swarmed them almost instantly, crashing down like an ocean wave. Lea and Ven were swept apart by the tide, and though Lea fought like a tiger to get back to Ven, it took all his strength just to stay on his feet. There were uncountable numbers of Heartless. He could scarcely make out Ven fighting against them, his movements clumsy while he struggled with the Keyblade's still-unfamiliar weight. Lea didn't get to watch for long. The Heartless occupied his full attention.
"Lea!" Ven cried. Lea caught a glimpse of the boy, surrounded by Heartless, battered and bloodied, panic in his wide blue eyes. Lea didn't bother calling back. He found strength from somewhere and cut a swath through the Heartless, though they stung and whipped him as he passed. He scooped Ven up with one arm and opened a portal home with the other, while the Heartless struck down on his back like a rain of daggers. He staggered through the portal, Ven hanging limply in his grasp, and closed it swiftly behind him. He dropped Ven, killed the three Heartless that had squeezed through with them, and then fell to the ground. Dimly, he could make out Ven's face only a few feet from him; as he passed into unconsciousness, he had no way of telling if the boy was alive or dead. Agony surged through his heart―that face―His face―dying? He had to do something―was it already too late? His fault, all his fault―Rox―
When Lea awoke, Yen Sid was standing over him. Lea groaned. He ached all over, and the wounds on his back had not yet healed. As he tried to sit up, the bedsheets clung to the healing lacerations, tugging on them painfully. Lea decided to stay lying down, for now.
"What possibly could have possessed you to do that?" Yen Sid demanded. It was the most emotion Lea had ever heard in his voice.
"Kid wanted to find his friend." Lea answered groggily. Suddenly he sat bolt-upright, completely insensitive to the pain of his wounds. "Where's Ven?" he gasped. "Is he all right?"
"He will recover." Yen Sid said. His stern expression did not change one iota.
As the panic drained from him, Lea's wounds began to twinge again. They were multitudinous, covering his back, arms, and legs, although the ones on his back were by far the worst. "Well." Lea said, feigning indifference. "Good. Maybe he can get a stern talking-to when you're done with me."
"Ventus was not responsible for this travesty." Yen Sid declared. "You, however, are."
Lea rubbed the back of his head, though it stretched his wounds and made them twinge. "What was I supposed to do?" he asked. "Tell the kid his friend's dead? I tried that. He wouldn't listen. Said his heart told him she was still alive. I figured, hey, if he won't believe me, maybe he'll believe the darkness."
"So you decided, in your wisdom, to get both him and yourself killed." Yen Sid said, raising an eyebrow.
"It wasn't supposed to go like that." Lea told him. "I . . . didn't think there'd be so many."
"You have made a grievous error, Lea." Yen Sid said. "We cannot afford to lose any of our Keyblade wielders. As such, I forbid you from taking Ventus back into the darkness for any reason."
"You forbid me?" Lea said, incredulous. He almost laughed.
"Indeed." Yen Sid turned to leave. "When your wounds are sufficiently healed, you may resume your missions. Until then, the rest of your friends will have to pick up the slack." The comment knocked the breath out of him, although perhaps not for the reason Yen Sid had intended.
As Yen Sid was opening the door to glide out, Lea said quietly, "They're not my friends."
Yen Sid looked over his shoulder, his eyebrows nearly touching his hat. "No?" he said.
Lea shook his head. "No." His fists clenched on the blankets over his knees. "All my friends are dead."
"You will have a very lonely heart indeed, if it has no room for replacements." Yen Sid said.
"Get out." Lea spat.
Master Yen Sid obliged, closing the door softly behind him.
Although Lea's wounds healed fairly quickly, they were severe enough that he was unable to leave the Tower for several days. When he was well enough that he could move without undue pain, he found Master Yen Sid and informed him, restrainedly, that he was ready to return to his duties.
He almost saluted, but decided that was, possibly, too frivolous.
"Ah, Lea." Yen Sid said, looking up from his papers. "Are your wounds healing?"
"Yes." Lea replied. "I'm ready to get back to work."
Yen Sid considered him carefully for a moment. "If that is what you wish." he said.
Lea nodded curtly.
"Very well." The old wizard looked back to his papers. "There has been trouble brewing in the Pride Lands and I cannot spare anyone to go there."
"I'll take care of it." Lea said.
"There is a Gummi ship in the hangar." Yen Sid said.
Lea grit his teeth, biting back the fury that boiled up in him. Was it not enough to prevent him from taking Ven into the darkness? Were his own powers to be abridged as well? His fists clenched and his jaw began to ache, but he somehow managed to keep his temper under control.
"Yes, sir." he growled, and stalked from the room, towards the Gummi hangar.
He passed very few other living creatures on his way down―there were a few Heartless on the Tower stairs, as per usual, but Lea treated this as an opportunity to exert some of his rage on something other than Master Yen Sid himself. By the time he got down to the hangar, the cathartic hack-and-slash had siphoned off enough of his anger that his mind was clearer. When he thought about it, he decided that, perhaps, it was just as well Master Yen Sid didn't want him to use the darkness to travel from place to place; he found himself sickened with dread by the thought of going back into that cold, dark space between spaces.
In the Gummi cockpit, he looked over the controls with slight trepidation.
"Hope I remember how to fly one of these things," he commented to himself.
"Hey there, Lea!" the intercom chirped. Lea rolled his eyes and strapped himself in. It was impossible to tell if the speaker was Chip or Dale, but then again, they were both equally annoying, so it mattered very little. "Need a refresher on piloting a Gummi?"
"No." Lea snapped. "Just launch."
"Well okay, Lea, if you say so." the other chipmunk said. "But if you ever need―"
"Just. Launch."
There was a pause from the other end. "Okay, Lea. Launching."
Lea was fairly certain his stomach slammed up into his head when the bottom dropped out from beneath the ship.
Fortunately, the Gummi controls were designed to be intuitive (how hard could they be, if Sora had figured them out?), and he got the hang of flying within a few minutes. The trip was, initially, smooth sailing; it was only the last few minutes when the Heartless finally caught up to him. Things were rough until he figured out where the controls for the ship's laser cannons were; after that, he had to admit, the trip got a lot more fun.
He landed the Gummi ship, perhaps a little more roughly than was good for it, in a round alcove at the base of a canyon. Without the benefit of magic, he had to take extra care not to be spotted by the inhabitants of this world; in a place populated entirely by four-legged creatures, it would be painfully obvious that he was from elsewhere.
He spent his day trekking through the canyon and killing Heartless―even they fit in better than Lea did. He encountered no other creatures, and was, for the most part, grateful for it. When his mind was not occupied with battle, he was thinking about his excursion into the darkness with Ven. The knowledge that he'd almost gotten them both killed made him shaky and sick to his stomach, and yet he couldn't make himself stop thinking about it. By the time the sun was beginning to set, Lea had decided he needed more time alone to think. He slept in the Gummi ship that night, telling himself he would return home tomorrow, or the next day, or perhaps the next. In the end, he decided he would stay until he had figured out his feelings about the whole mess.
As it turned out, the amount of time that took was around a week. By the end of it, Lea had come to the conclusion that what he'd done was irresponsible and idiotic; that Yen Sid had been absolutely right to forbid him from ever doing it again; and that there was no force in any world that would make him put Ven's life in danger ever again―the memory of that face, bloodied and bruised and half-dead, was enough to convince him of that. He also felt a powerful need to see Ven alive and whole again, as though his heart couldn't quite be sure he was all right until it had seen him with its own eyes.
So it was that after six and a half days of turmoil and isolation, Lea returned home, his heart still aching but his will shored up with iron.
Ven was waiting for him when he got back. Lea's heart leapt upon seeing the boy alive and well, although his joy was not without a sharp pang of guilt. Ven grinned and waved at him through the windshield of the Gummi. Lea rather felt like his heart was pounding against a bed of nails.
"Lea!" Ven cried, as Lea stepped onto the Gummi platform. He ran over and seemed on the verge of embracing the redhead, but apparently Lea's exaggerated arms-over-head stretch discouraged the action. "Where have you been?"
"Whoah," Lea said, grinning, "didn't know there'd be an inquisition."
Ven crossed his arms and glared. "You're avoiding the question." he pointed out.
Lea chuckled and put a hand on Ven's head. "Sure am, kid. Better get used to it. Got it memorized?" He headed for the exit, knowing Ven would trail along behind him. He was, he had to admit, rather enjoying this rapport.
"Was it a top-secret mission?" Ven asked, hovering by Lea's elbow.
"Not top secret," Lea told him. "Actually, not secret at all."
"Then why won't you tell me about it?" Ven demanded.
Lea grinned again. "Because I like making you guess."
Ven scowled. "That's not fair," he said.
"Sure isn't." Lea answered.
Ven grumbled an indistinct response and the two of them continued on without speaking for a time.
"I'm glad you're okay." Ven said eventually. "Master Yen Sid said you were pretty badly hurt, after. . . ."
Lea waved a hand. "You know how Yen Sid is. Everything's always grave with him. It wasn't that bad, really." He looked over at the boy, who still had a few scratches on his face. "I'm just glad you're okay." he admitted.
Ven looked up at him suddenly; the unexpected eye contact left Lea breathless. However, it took Ven a few moments to finally speak his reply. "When are we going back?"
Lea sighed. "Yen Sid forbade me to take you back into the darkness, for any reason." he said.
Ven's disappointment was palpable. "You mean . . . not even to look for Aqua?" he asked, pained.
Lea shook his head. "I don't know what to tell you, Ven." he said. "I'm sorry." He made the mistake of looking over.
Ven had stopped walking, was standing staring at his shoes with his fists and jaw clenched. As Lea watched, a tear slid down the side of his face and dripped off of his chin. He choked back a sob, then angrily wiped his eyes with the back of his hand. "I was so close," he muttered, his voice thick with emotion. "We could have found her. We could have gotten her back." He looked up at Lea, his eyes reddened with tears. "What if she's lost forever?"
Lea's iron will crumbled like a sandcastle before the tide of Ven's grief. He walked over and put a hand on the boy's shoulder. "She isn't." he said. "And Yen Sid can forbid all he wants. We're not going to stop looking for her. You'll learn to use the Keyblade better, we'll get stronger, and we'll keep looking until we find her, no matter how long it takes."
Ven embraced him again, and Lea was far less hesitant in returning the gesture than he had been before. It didn't matter that his heart was beating itself to death against his ribcage or that the dry voice in the back of his mind was cursing him for a fool.
If he had to be honest with himself, he really didn't mind.
Of course, it would not be simple to journey into the darkness without Yen Sid noticing. Lea spent the next several days puzzling over how best to keep their expeditions clandestine, not doubting for a moment that if Yen Sid found out, he would find a way to prevent Lea from seeing Ven altogether; that was something he absolutely could not allow to happen.
In order to keep their minor treachery a secret, Lea and Ven had decided to see as little of each other as possible, on the idea that if Yen Sid suspected they were rarely together, he would reason that it would be difficult for them to get into much trouble (this idea came mainly from Ven, who was rather more optimistic about the whole thing). This was, however, exactly the opposite of what Lea had wanted. The less he saw of Ven, the easier it was for him to accidentally pretend that their friendship had never been real, the easier it was to project thoughts and feelings onto that carefully blank face―the easier it was to get around to thinking that Ven did not, in fact, care about him at all. It did not take long before Lea's mind was constantly demeaning him and his heart spent its days silently screaming.
It was, thus, with a considerable amount of relief that Lea accepted Ven's invitation to explore Agrabah with him.
"I know we said we wouldn't," Ven said, as they disembarked the Gummi, "but things just got so . . . boring without you around. There's nobody else to talk to."
"Oh, I don't know," Lea said. "You don't enjoy being fourth wheel to the Riku-Kairi-Sora tricycle?"
Ven looked at him, thoroughly confused. "What?" he said.
Lea shook his head, smiling. "Forget about it."
"Not one of the things I should get memorized, huh?"
Lea couldn't help but laugh. "Not unless you really want to." As the laughter drained, he found himself still smiling at Ven. "Gotta admit, though, I was kinda missing your company."
"You were?" Ven said, and there was some kind of hope on his face that sent Lea's heart into a pounding frenzy, made his stomach tie itself in knots. He had to look away.
"Yeah," he said, "it's nice to be the smartest person in the room sometimes."
"Hey!" Ven cried. "What's that supposed to mean?"
Lea only laughed in reply. He had to admit, even to himself, that it felt good to be around Ven again. It felt right. It felt like, maybe, there was something more than just a superficial alliance between the two of them. Maybe there could be.
Maybe, his heart whispered, maybe.
"Anyway," Ven said, after a few more minutes of walking, "when do you think we could go looking for Aqua again?"
His heart's maybes turned to weeping. "Well," he said, "that depends. Do you think you're ready to face all those Heartless again?"
Ven nodded. "I've been thinking. They only attacked once you got your Keyblade out, right? So maybe if we keep our Keyblades put away, they won't come after us."
Lea considered. "It might buy us some time, at least."
"We have a day off in a week," Ven said. "I was thinking, maybe, we could go then?"
"Sure," said Lea. "Not like I have anything else to do."
Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Ven grinning at him. His heart's weeping ceased and it fluttered like a small winged thing.
"Thanks, Lea," Ven said.
"Don't mention it, kid." Lea replied.
And when he finds out Aqua's really dead, the voice in the back of his head whispered, then you'll be all he has, won't you. That's what you're planning. That's what you really want. But what will you do if he does find her? I guess you could always die again. Seemed to work out well last time.
Lea joined forces with his fluttering heart to shut that voice up in as small a box as he could find.
The week passed. Lea saw very little of Ven. The disparaging voice in the back of his mind grew ever more vicious and the fluttering of his heart grew into steady wingbeats that buoyed him against the constant weight of what the voice insisted should be called the truth. The internal conflict was taking its toll on Lea, and so by the time his day off rolled around he was about ready to throw himself at the Heartless just for the momentary peace of mind that would result from getting killed.
He met Ven in the Gummi hangar and they boarded the ship with only the most cursory of greetings. He could see how nervous Ven was―from the sweating palms that he kept wiping off on his pants to the constant fidgeting―and he tried to present an air of cool unconcern. If he had to be the calm one of the pair, that was a mantle he was prepared to take up.
They flew to the Pride Lands, where Lea figured that, first of all, there would be very few Heartless, and second of all, no one he knew would be there to stop him.
They disembarked into the dry canyon floor and Lea set about camouflaging the ship as best he could with yellowed grasses from the surrounding area. The result was less then stellar, but would probably make the ship less easily spotted. From great distances.
He turned to Ven. "Are you ready?" he asked.
Ven nodded once. For all his nervousness, the nod was decisive.
Lea walked over to him and put a hand on his shoulder. "You stick close to me, all right? Whatever happens."
"All right," Ven said, clearly not paying this statement the kind of attention Lea wanted. He took Ven by both shoulders and leaned down to look into his eyes.
"I mean it, Ven. I can't . . . lose you. If you get hurt, it's my responsibility. It's my . . . fault."
Ven looked into his eyes for a moment, his brows drawn together. "Yen Sid might think so." he said. "But I don't."
"But I do." Lea countered. "Like it or not, you're my responsibility. So . . . just don't get hurt, okay?"
Ven smiled. Lea's breath caught in his throat. "Don't worry, Lea." he said brightly. "I've been training. I'm ready."
Lea sighed and let go of him, straightening up. "Okay." he said, and opened the portal. One last try, he thought, and looked over his shoulder at Ven. "Ven?" he said. "Are you sure you want to do this?"
He didn't even pause to consider it. "Of course!" he said, one hand over his heart. "Aqua needs me. She's my friend, and I can't abandon her."
Lea turned away, back to the portal. "No less than I would expect," he said, and walked through.
Perhaps it had been an hour, perhaps two; it was hard to tell in the darkness. Once his eyes had adjusted, Lea had been able to make out shapes―landforms, huge bridges and spires of black rock that cascaded up into inky skies or hurled themselves out over bottomless depths. True to his word, Ven stuck close to Lea. Neither had yet drawn their Keyblades, and though the presence of the Heartless pressed in around them (the creatures had a smell, Lea realized, an oppressive, hard-to-breathe smell), they had not yet been attacked.
His feet were sore and his eyes were straining, and Ven was quiet and the darkness was close and cold. But there, far in the distance―there was a light. A pale gray orb that scattered thousands of tiny reflections off of the surface beneath it.
"Is that . . ." Lea squinted, "a beach?" There certainly seemed to be water, and strange filigree structures sprouting from it; what might have been a spit of black sand with boulders strewn upon it; and was that―could it be―a human figure?
"Aqua!" Ven cried. He bolted from Lea's side, sprinting towards the black ocean and the figure standing by it. Lea ran after him, his chest crushed by a weight so heavy he could scarcely breathe.
She turned, saw Ven running towards her, and her face broke into the most luminous smile Lea had ever seen. Lea stopped running, stopped in his tracks and just watched. She caught Ven in her arms, picked him up and spun him around, both of them laughing and crying. Then, after setting him down again, she took Ven's face in her hands, let out a teary gasp, and kissed him full on the lips.
Lea's ears rang so loudly he thought his head would split apart. Somewhere within him, the thing that had once been his heart clawed at its own flesh in vicious despair until it ripped itself to shreds. He could not breathe, he could not think; his whole body was filled with cold lead. He was dying, he was sure of it. Invisible hands had closed around his throat and were choking the life out of him.
Ven broke away from Aqua and looked at Lea, his eyes shining, his face brimming with joy. "Thank you, Lea." he breathed.
Lea turned away and opened the portal home. "When you're ready," he said, and stood aside, staring out at the dark sea. Ven and Aqua ran through, hand in hand, their smiles and tears still shining on their faces.
The two of them didn't seem to notice that he didn't follow them through.
He walked through the doors of Castle Oblivion as though in a dream, letting them close with a resounding boom behind him. His pace was slow and measured, but he walked with purpose. It was impressive how quickly he came upon the room with the huge crystal ball; it seemed Sora's heart was not the only one the Castle could read.
Lea stood for a long time staring at the smooth crystal, his calm exterior belying the raging turmoil of feeling within him. Gently, he placed a hand on the cold surface of the ball.
"I want to forget," he said softly. He squeezed his eyes shut, wincing, and drew a shuddering breath. "I want to forget." A tear slid out of each eye, and his fingers pressed against the crystal. "I want to forget," he moaned. Sobs racked him, and he slid to his knees, his hand falling from the crystal ball and curling into a fist before slamming against the ground, over and over, as his mantra rose to a scream. "I want to forget. I want to forget. I want to forget!"
Suddenly, he knew that there was someone else in the room with him. He looked up, startled, his vision cloudy with tears; still, there was no mistaking that small, pale form.
"Naminé?"
"Your memory of her." the girl said gently. "But I can still help you."
Lea looked away, closing his eyes again. "I can't take this anymore," he said quietly. "It hurts." He sobbed. "It hurts."
There was a cold hand on his shoulder, soft and light as a feather. "Are you sure?" she asked, quietly, the pain of Axel's grief reflected in her voice. He looked up at her.
"Yes," he said simply. Losing Him hurt too much to bear. Better that he'd never met Him at all. Better that none of it had ever happened. Better to cut out that piece of his heart before it killed him.
Naminé knelt next to him and pressed her forehead against his. "I'm so sorry, Axel," she breathed.
Something snapped inside of him, and for a few moments, he lost consciousness. When he came to, he was alone in the chamber. He looked around, puzzled, and pulled himself to his feet.
"Castle Oblivion?" he said, and scratched the back of his head. "How did I . . . get here?" He sighed, shook his head, and opened a portal back to Yen Sid's tower, wondering what business could possibly have brought him to the Castle and, moreover, why his face was wet.
He decided it probably wasn't worth mentioning to anyone. He'd figure it out on his own.
Like always.