Shadows of Reality

Chapter Three - Someday

Riku was a proud person. Always had been, always will be. He prided himself on being the strongest, the fastest and the smartest, especially in comparison to his younger friends. All of them had always looked up to him, and it made him feel good, powerful even. Sora especially followed him around, since they were best friends. If Sora really enjoyed something, but Riku said it was stupid, then god-forbid he go near whatever it might have been.

Things changed when a certain, sweet little redhead appeared on the island.

Sora had been the one to find her while watching a meteor shower, Riku later learned. And this little redhead also started to take his best friend away. Sora seemed to enjoy spending time with her, even when they were young (Why though? Wasn't he worried about cooties?). It was because of this that Riku and Kairi had slowly become friends.

As they grew up Riku's ego continued to grow, until he absolutely thought he was better then everyone else, especially Sora. That's when he noticed another change.

Kairi would suddenly get giggly around Sora, shifting around nervously when he would smile his big goofy grin. He noticed some changes in Sora too, how the boy would stutter around Kairi sometimes and would often just stare at her. Riku was 15, and he knew damn well what those signs meant. It meant that Sora liked Kairi, but god-forbid Sora had something Riku didn't. So they fought over Kairi, so much in fact that Riku, in his obsession to outdo Sora and save her first, had fallen to the darkness.

Now Riku was older and wiser, he was 19 now. He could see a little clearer, but was still blind sighted to some things. There were times when he still felt superior to others, but he never compared himself to his best friend anymore because Sora had changed too. Sora fought with his heart, his light and his love, and it wasn't fair to compare that to Riku's strong sense of honor, duty and guilt that propelled him forward. Riku had known, when he felt Ansem's glee at Sora stabbing himself to revive Kairi, that Sora had won her affections once and for all. He had been bitter for a while, but he accepted it now.

When he had met Midori he had thought that maybe he had finally found his Kairi (so to speak), but he wasn't so sure anymore. She seemed so resistant against him. That wasn't the only thing that bothered him though. Yet another change had occurred.

Roxas and Naminé.

Sora seemed to be spending more time with his brother, and if he wasn't with Kairi then Roxas was sure to be close by. Riku didn't understand how brothers could stand one another like that and had voiced this to Midori, who lived with them and could probably understand. She had shrugged and said that it was probably because Roxas' soul was conscious inside of Sora for well over a year, and if they could put up with one another day and night then, they could do it now.

He also felt like a permanent third wheel to Sora and Kairi, who could contain themselves around most people, but didn't seemed to mind public affection in front of Riku (actually they didn't care where they were when they got all touchy-feely, but it wasn't as bad as it could have been). Then again, if Kairi wasn't with Sora she was out and about with Naminé and/or Selphie.

Long and confusing thoughts short, Riku hated life on the islands at that moment.

He suddenly became aware of a tanned hand waving wildly in front of his face and finally looked up. Midori was standing in front of him with confusion etched on her face.

"You alright there Silver?" she asked him while tilting her head lightly.

"Just thinking."

"When aren't you?" Midori sighed. "That's all you do. Think, school, think, spar, think eat, think, sleep while thinking, rinse and repeat."

He actually cracked a small smile at her and chuckled while shaking his head.

"Soooo…" Midori said jokingly. "I've put the kids to bed. Which movie are we going to see dad?"

Riku let out a laugh, feeling his spirits life up. Even if they were still unsure around one another, she could always get him to laugh when he was down.

"You put Sora and Roxas to bed now, did you? Make sure to lock their doors and windows so no one climbs in or out?"

Midori snorted and said, "Are you crazy? I left Roxas and Naminé alone in the house. Hades only knows where Sora and Kairi are."

"You realize if you allow this you're going to be stuck with grandchildren soon."

Midori placed a hand over her heart (her complete heart!) and said, "Well, I'm not getting any younger and I want to be able to keep up with my grandbabies."

Her fake old-lady voice was too much for both of them; they started laughing hysterically as they walked towards the theatre.

"Let me guess Midi," Riku answered sarcastically. "You want to go see some sappy chick flick, right?"

"As much as I know you love those type of movies Riku," she started after a moment of silence. "I would rather see that new action movie. You know, the type with no plot but a bunch of cool special effects and explosions to make up for it?"

Riku laughed again. That's right, this was why he liked her so much.

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"Soooorrraaa."

"No, you cannot have that."

Kairi pouted and crossed her arms in front of her. "Why did you say we could come to the mall when I'm not even allowed to get anything?"

"Because somebody's birthday is in a week," Sora said happily. "And you never know what anybody is going to get you."

"Is that a hint?"

"Maybe it came from this mall, maybe not. I'm hungry, want to get something to eat and then maybe go to the Island for a bit?"

"I dunno," Kairi asked, still disappointed that she had yet to figure out what her present was.

"Aww come on. Your choice of where, even that nasty sushi place you like so much. Besides, it'll only be you and me on the island later," he said while throwing an arm around her shoulder and drawing her closer to him.

After a moment of thought Kairi said, "OK, but let's go to that sub shop where Roxas works." She had to giggle at the thought of Roxas actually working since he and Sora had so much money, but then again Namine, Riku and Midori all worked too.

"He's not there right now, he's at my house with Naminé, remember?"

"That's ok," Kairi said as she took his hand and started leading him towards the glass doors out of the mall. "I just feel like having a good sandwich, and that place is so clean. Unless you want to go to Island Sushi—"

"Subs it is!" Sora said as he started leading her towards Subsaway, which was beside the rather unhealthy choices of WcDoonolds and The Queen of Burgers. As much as Sora enjoyed those places, Kairi was more likely to go for a healthier choice, and he liked the place Roxas worked…it was better than any sushi place any day.

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Midori started laughing as she and Riku walked back to her home. It had been a fun night at the movie (which, as she said, had no plot but many explosions to make up for that fact). They had even done the immature thing and got into a food fight with one of the snotty little grade nine kids, which resulted in all of said kids to be kicked out while they stayed to enjoy the movie like the 'mature' young adults that they were.

"Wanna come in? That popcorn sucked and I can make a—well anything not using a stove since it'll probably smoke thanks to Roxas."

"You let Roxas near the stove?" Riku asked with amazement. "Again?"

"I was half asleep when I told him to use it! And don't even talk about last time! The firemen still make fun of it," she snapped. "Now do you want to come in or not?"

"Like I have to wait for you to ask," Riku snorted. "I've been barging into this place years before you showed up."

"Yeah well—"

"ROXAS!"

Both of them seemed to freeze in time as their eyes slowly shifted to the ceiling.

"Umm…" Midori said slowly.

"DAMNIT!"

"I SAID IN ROXAS! PUSH IT IN FARTHER!"

"Maybe we should leave," Riku said after a moment. Suddenly there was a loud bang and a loud 'whoop' from Roxas.

"Maybe we should l-EAVE," Midori started to agree as she started to back up, but ended up tripping over the turned up end of the carpet.

There was the sound of footsteps as Roxas and Naminé appeared at the top of the stairs, looking down in confusion.

"Are you alright?" Naminé asked curiously.

"She's fine," Riku said quickly.

"Couldn't have got here like five minutes ago, could ya?" Roxas said as he walked down the staircase. "We could have used your help."

"Really?" Midori asked while standing up, a skeptical look on her face.

"Yes," Naminé said with a growl. She held up a long, thick cardboard tube and said, "I was trying to get my actual dress design into this, but Roxas couldn't seem to understand what I meant by it's supposed to be pushed in, not yanked out."

"Is that what you two were just doing?" Riku asked.

"Yup," the said together.

"Oh…well we thought…ok then," Midori said while shifting uncomfortably. "Sora and Kairi back?"

"Nope."

Naminé rolled her eyes and said, "Sora called my cell earlier when you were struggling with this tube (she gave Roxas a very light smack over the head with it) and said that they might be a little late coming back since they were going to the island. He also said that this would be a great time to plan her birthday while Kairi's distracted."

Midori clapped her hands together and said, "Alright! Party planning time!" It was amazing how fast she could go from being amused, to being horrified, to skeptical, and than to being excited.

Riku and Roxas exchanged a glance and the blond said, "Actually we er…"

"Need to go mow my lawn," Riku said quickly. "Roxas promised to help me."

"You want to go mow your lawn, with Roxas, at nine o'clock?" Midori said while rolling her eyes. "Sit down and help us plan the party. So we're having the party here."

"Yup," Roxas said reluctantly as he sat on the couch. Naminé sat beside him and he couldn't help but stare as she whipped her sketchbook out of thin air (at least that's what it looked like to him…and everyone else…) and started writing ideas on a piece of paper.

"We need a theme," she said happily.

"Agreed. Kairi's favorite colors are pink and purple, right?"

Naminé laughed and said, "She does like color rose-pink, but her favorite color is cerulean blue."

"Right, so we should go with those two colors."

Riku and Roxas sent each other bored looks. These were the moments when both of them, no matter their history together, understood one another completely. So much, in fact, that they could understand what the other was saying even in silence.

'How the hell did we get dragged into this?'

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Kairi couldn't help but giggle as she watched Sora float in the waters off of the small play island, grinning at his relaxed features and closed eyes. He takes her out to an island, with no one else on it, and what does he do? Falls asleep while floating in the water.

Despite being in only her school uniform, she quietly went in the water, swimming over to him as silently as possible. She wasn't quiet enough though. A loud, yet happy scream escaped her lips as he rolled over and wrapped his arms around her.

Kairi let out another small scream as he picked her up and spun her around and around until he got dizzy and fell backwards into the water. They stared at one another, Kairi with a small smile and Sora with his goofy grin for a moment before leaning into one another.

Unfortunately, neither made their target as something smacked Sora's head, causing him to let out a string of curses. He reached into the water and grabbed what hit him before it could sink to the bottom.

Kairi's hysterical laughter reached his ears and he said, "Find this funny do you Miss Yamada…or Miss Aijou…actually forget that, it's all too confusing."

"That's why I'm going out with you for your looks, not your brains."

"Hey!"

Kairi laughed again and started swimming away, but he was too fast for her and ended up tackling her into the shallow water. She giggled and rolled around to face the boy that was leaning over her.

"You wanna see what hit me?"

"Sure."

Sora moved so that he was at her side and not hovering over her and showed her what it was, a yellow, star-shaped fruit.

Kairi took it from his hand and said, "You know, despite our drawing in the secret place, we never shared one of these."

Sora placed his hand over hers, causing her to look up at him. The smile that had been placed on her face since they got to the island had vanished at his serious look.

"We don't need it," he said. "What we've got is stronger then something a silly little fruit that grows on an island has." He looked away and at the sunset, his serious face not leaving.

"Sora?" Kairi asked as she leaned onto him a little more. "What's wrong?"

"Haven't you seen it Kairi?" he asked while motioning to the sunset. "It's different. Something about the islands is changing."

"You don't think—"

"I don't sense any Heartless," he said bitterly. "And I think that's almost worse than if I had."

Kairi looked at the fruit and took a bite of it. She held it up to his face, causing him to look at her again and grinned slightly as he took a bite too.

Sure, they didn't need some silly fruit to bind them together, but in an ever-changing world it definitely wouldn't hurt.

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Author's Note

The scene where Riku and Midori thought they heard Roxas and Namine fooling around really happened to me and my friend. No joke. A group of us were coming back from the movies and I was staying at her house as we heard that coming from her sister's room and it turns out they were trying to shove something into a box. Let me tell you awk-warrrd.

You know, my favorite part of this chapter to write was the Riku and Midori scene. I dunno why though…

I don't have much to say…and I have to go to work in like 10 minutes so I should get onto the replies to the reviews!

The Key of Hope – Actually there's not much of a difference…haha I can't write that with a straight face. Yeah, Roxas doesn't really have a good concept of how hot something is before it burns down a house…yeah sorry about the longer waits but…haha I don't regret them because I'm going to Disney World!! D

Catharsis25 - …there are A LOT of names that start with B so I'm not even going to try and guess. Midori is kind of stringing Riku along, especially after a year…but I did this for a reason! It's going to make life…and this story…more interesting later on! Promise!

Whole Yet Hollow – LMAO don't worry, it's not REALLY a test. That's ok about the review thing, I'm just glad people actually like these stories.

DAN88 – Namine wasn't leading him on purposefully…much…er…ok yeah she was. Glad my grammar is good so far. Can't say as much for my Harry Potter stories. Looking back I wonder why so many people liked them…

RockCityRoadStar – Yes at my head! I wouldn't trust the squirrel if I were you…they've gone rogue! XD Wow, that sounds like one hell of a dent and you have as much self-esteem as it. Nice. Yes, I'd say all your friends are insane. Then again, there's a girl in my class who thinks she's Japanese when she's not -.- Now I know that there are a lot of people like this, but this is my first time exposed to it! I have nothing against it in general, but she's freaking annoying about it!! Now why would you think I'd say they were spam? Lol. I remember for some of my (really crappy, looking back now) Harry Potter ficks, I got like 20 or 25 reviews at a time and it was the best feeling EVER! Yeah…you on a sugar rush scares me…and I don't really know you so your friends are awfully brave -.-

Syrena Li – lol I'm glad you like this. Riku and Midori won't actually get together for a while yet, and it's not like I'm hiding why they won't, just look at the summary! Yes, Axel turned Roxas into a complete pyro! Lol

Iaveina – Yay, Sora's wallet survives! Yeah…that stuff in that report is just inside jokes between me and my friends for when we were writing a history report about Napolean…don't ask. I wish I could make something that wouldn't give me cavities!

So thank you to everyone, and remember to review! Now I better go to work cause I'm going to be late…oh well…

Krystal Lily Potter