Not only was the attack unexpected, but Sora and Xehanort were outnumbered. Master Xehanort had sent his most powerful pieces to capture the two: Xemnas, Ansem, Saïx, Xigbar, it might as well have been everyone except the old man himself. Sora and Xehanort's younger incarnation were strong. An ambush coupled with all of their most powerful foes at once were stronger.

Of course to add insult to injury they'd been separated.

Xehanort the younger had slipped back into his crowd- and the old mask of disillusioned dullness -with slight difficulty, but he reassured himself he could find a way to pull his secession stunt again, to get himself and Sora away from the conflict again. He wanted out, now knowing this Organization was a gilded cage. His fists balled themselves as an oath to that. But for now all he could do a as wait for orders (or punishment, he feared), and hope that Sora was okay.

"So, punk, you looking for something?"

Xehanort paused and took a deep inhale. How he loathed working with Xigbar in any way. "Yes, I am."

Xigbar waltzed in front of him, "Well, what would it be then?"

Xehanort had little patience to hold back his growl, "What have you done with Sora?" He could still see that last glimpse of him before darkness. His eyes were as wide as they could be, exposing all of the precious sapphire within, lined with streaks of blood from a cut and sick purple bruising caused by debris. There was more injury than that, too. His mouth was open to wail out this ghastly scream that was more of concern than fear or pain. Xehanort. His name. A terrible shriek of agony born from worry.

"Well, I don't think you want to hear it." Xigbar continued dancing around with a teasing smile. The man loved to torture people far too much. A fisherman with irresistible tackle who always pulled it away before someone could take the proper bite.

"I do. What did you do with him?" Xehanort hissed.

"Hmm, well, what do you think?" Xigbar waved a hand nonchalantly, "You're the one pulling puppet strings here."

"Xigbar, I have no time for your follies-" Xehanort stopped himself. The cool and distant expression he had adopted once more widened into alarm, and tightened with suppression. They didn't... They couldn't! It was far too soon!

"And thus the squirt realizes I don't make any 'follies'." Xigbar triumphantly declared, "Yep, we took little sunshine off to get a full membership with the club of darkness." He chuckled at his own jokes and the horror in Xehanort's expression. Xigbar began walking away, "Man, you are so good at acting attached. Brought him right into our hands-"

"I'm not acting you pathetic, asinine, imbecile!" Xehanort roared at him.

Xigbar only rolled his good eye as he stopped walking. Kiddo fell for the bait. "So you DO feel something." He laughed.

"What, are you surprised, you clown?" Xehanort snapped at him.

Xigbar shrugged, "Surely you must've heard Spikes screaming."

Xehanort's rampant blood pressure dropped, "What?"

"Oh, you didn't?" Xigbar asked, "Or were you just pretending not to hear?"

His laughter slipped through the cracks of his lamenting impersonation of Sora, "Xehanort! Oh, Xehanort help me! What did you do with him? What did you do with Xehanort?! I don't want this! I don't! Please," Xigbar paused to cackle and wheeze, "please... Heh heh, s-surely you have it in your hearts to let me go! I'm not of any worth to you...!" Xigbar seemed to not notice the dark, murderous intent Xehanort's gaze was sinking into as his laughter rose to a level where he couldn't finish.

He caught his breath and sighed, "Man, when we told him that you had handed him right over... His face was priceless. You should've been there-"

Xehanort grabbed Xigbar and pinned him to the blank white wall, "SILENCE!"

Xigbar held up his hands, "Touchy, touchy..."

"Where is he?" Xehanort snarled in response, "WHERE IS SORA?!"

Xigbar then seemed to realize he was a bit older than Xehanort, and pulled the youth's hand off, "I dunno, you can probably find him somewhere."

Xehanort wasn't satisfied with the response, "As someone of superior rank I demand-"

"As a traitor," Xigbar cut him off with a leer, "I don't have to listen to you anymore. The Xehanort or not, you turned your back on us for something as stupid as a make-believe romance. You lost your power the moment you left." Xigbar finally let Xehanort be, "I'll see you around, punk."

Xehanort merely left himself, heading the opposite way. Fine. He'd find Sora himself then. He'd find his Sora. The sweet blue eyes and the gentle, uncorrupt manners of his heart. There was no way Sora would've have broken enough to become a vessel this fast. No possible way that he would break away from his footing in the light so easily.

Eventually the young man was able to pinpoint a lesser member who was willing to listen to him after his "betrayal". They pointed him in the direction of where Sora was being kept, but what unnerved him was how no one had confirmed or denied what Xigbar had claimed.

Sora's door was the same cold gray and white as the rest of their base of operations. Xehanort's hand hovered in front of it. It trembled, hesitated, refused to knock. It was confusing to him? Feelings were a detached experience for Xehanort, so it took him minutes to find that something was now shaking his very core.

Fear.

Quietly he tapped against the door. There was no response. He waited. His blood roared into his ears and he was so sure that his mouth was a parched desert. His hand continued trembling in anticipation to knock again, but seemed to freeze up just as badly as last time. A firmer knock resonated in the hall. Xehanort heard footsteps come and go behind him, and perhaps a confused snigger. Why would he knock? Sora was a prisoner here and he was the master.

"Sora? M-may I come in?" Xehanort finally found his voice to ask. Still nothing. Xehanort wondered if he had the wrong room. He walked in, "Sora are you eve-" and stopped.

Sora was sitting on his bed, slumped like his bones had vanished. He seemed to be staring at the dark sky outside. His frame looked suddenly so frail, and sharp, like he was almost starved, with the clear cut of a new black cloak for him. His normal clothes were a colorful huddle a short ways away on the sheets.

Xehanort was still lingering near the doorway, afraid to continue any further. Sora hadn't stirred yet, like he didn't notice him entering. A troubling sign. Xehanort cleared his throat. Sora didn't move a muscle. Xehanort decided to wait for Sora to do something first, and cautiously closed the door behind him as he dared to take a step closer to Sora. Sora was still gazing through his black window, as if it was a mesmerizing, wondrous sight instead of a bleak and empty frame. Minutes passed. Xehanort cleared his throat again, hoping to goad Sora into doing anything except his lifeless staring.

After another round of continued silence, Xehanort began walking forward. His hands reached for the boy he loved so much, "Sora-"

Sora's voice cracked with tears, "Don't talk to me."

Xehanort stopped. His hands fell to his side, "Sora-"

"Don't talk to me!" Sora sobbed at him. His face was still turned away, the dark side of a once luminous moon. "Don't you dare talk to me!"

Xehanort felt his expression quavering. He held firm and insisted on diplomatically resolving what was wrong with Sora, "Sora, please-"

"JUST SHUT UP YOU LIAR!" Sora wailed at him. He finally turned around in a violent snap. A few of his old wounds had yet to fully heal. One eye was still bruised.

Both were golden and puffy, trained on Xehanort while their tears poured like the floods of old, "SHUT UP YOU LIED TO ME!"

Xehanort had no time to correct Sora before he grabbed his pillow and chucked it at him, "YOU WERE JUST USING ME! ALL THOSE STUPID 'I LOVE YOU'S WERE NOTHING BUT A GAME TO YOU, WEREN'T THEY?!"

Xehanort held up his hands, "Sora-"

He had to dodge Sora's old jacket, "A SILLY LITTLE GAME WITH A BOY WHO DIDN'T KNOW ANYTHING COMPARED TO THAT STUPID BIG HEAD OF YOURS! YOU NEVER FELT ANYTHING BUT HUMOR AT HOW EASILY I WAS DUPED INTO THINKING YOU LOVED ME!"

Xehanort pleaded with Sora as the boy chucked his old clothes at him, "Sora they're trying to-"

"ALL YOU WANTED WAS MY HOLLOW, EMPTY SHELL!" Sora screamed as he scrambled for a lamp and threw it. Xehanort finally had enough and paused the lamp in mid-flight in a rapid flurry of magic. Sora had spent all of his energy, though, and collapsed face-forward onto his bed, bawling inconsolably.

His sentences ran together in incomprehensible phrases and pieces of his broken heart, "Y-you made me think... I fell f-for it all! I f-fell for it! W-why did I ever think... I got so-so close to you... So close... A-and I lost s-so much... So much..."

Xehanort's own eyes stung. It took him a moment to remember that these were tears. Real tears and not just fake ones used to manipulate others. Sora's cries sounded like a dying animal; every straggling breath was another gush of blood rushing from a mortal wound. The wail ripped at Xehanort's heart, leaving not one inch of it unscathed in its violent vengeance on being equally broken.

Xehanort walked forward once more, "Sora, please-"

"No!" Sora cried, "No! I won't listen to you!"

"Please, listen to me," Xehanort continued, begging, "Sora they're trying to drag you away-"

"SHUT UP!" Sora screeched. His hands covered his ears, "Just shut up and leave me alone! Quit taunting me!" He wept, "You were my first love... And I gave you EVERYTHING... You stole it all from me... Let me just mourn that in peace..."

Xehanort did so, for a moment.

"You expressed doubt to me," He said, "and yet, you act as if you trusted me wholly from the very beginning." Sora wiped at his eyes. Those golden eyes. Xehanort was stubbornly holding back his own tears (Xehanort didn't cry that just never happened) as he was once again smacked in the face from how meaningless his promise was.

"I trusted you so much." Sora replied. "I-I just thought..." He sobbed, "I just thought maybe if I loved you enough... Maybe if I could change you make you good again... It'd all stop and we could just live our lives out in peace." He laughed through his tears, bitter, scorning himself, "I had doubt, but I still- like the blind, stupid, idiot I am -let you have everything I could offer."

And more, Xehanort silently added.

"You..." Xehanort paused to try and get rid of the lump in his throat, "You aren't an idiot, Sora. You just have a different way of thinking that makes you brilliant in some places and lacking in others-"

"Be quiet." Sora whispered, "Don't think your... Your flattery will get you anywhere."

"I am doing as I have always done; telling you the truth." Xehanort closed his eyes in anticipation of Sora's next violent outburst, but it didn't come.

"Are you aware of what they have done to you?" He asked.

For a painful moment, Sora was silent. He said, "They took the wool off of my eyes. You're a liar." He scoffed, accompanied by a wet sniffle, "You always have been, and you dare say that you told me the truth."

Xehanort realized Sora must not have known about his condition. Too enveloped in the despair of a broken heart to notice. Darkness was hard to find in darkness. Xehanort reached for Sora, one last time, to try and at least get one more tender, comforting touch. He never admitted it but caressing Sora in comfort always reassured him so much more than it did Sora.

Sora turned and slapped him, "Keep away from me." He raised his fists, "If you really 'love' me you'll stay away!"

Xehanort's hand was hovering around his cheek with his composure dropped into a ring of shock. Maybe his own tints of betrayal. A few tears finally found freedom, and slid down the raw sting of his cheek. Xehanort finally seemed to find himself again, and he turned around, "V-very well then."

He left Sora with a parting soliloquy that had slipped into the same distance he had introduced himself with, "Light has given way to darkness, and yet darkness has been moved by light." Sora didn't see how tear after tear was falling off of Xehanort's cheeks, "Goodnight, Sora."


PLOT TWIST HE GOT NORTED HAHAHA I HURT