Disclaimer: KH belongs to Square-Enix and Disney.
A/n: This really could have been the last chapter, but I decided to end it a bit better next chapter for all you faithful readers. I do like how this one turned out, though. Thanks so much to everyone who has reviewed, I really appreciate it!
Chapter Eleven
Yuffie gasped painfully as the air was knocked from her lungs. She hit the ground hard and cried out as the shock went up her arms, leaving her stunned for a moment as she tried to breathe. A loud thud sounded right beside her and she shifted slightly to come face to face with her Conformer, sticking out of the ground mere inches from where she was sprawled. She struggled to her feet and stared around her nervously, pulling the heavy shuriken from the dusty ground.
It was dark, with a reddish glow emanating from the horizon. The dirt beneath her feet was cracked and dry, and she kicked at it slightly in suspicion. A terrifying howl rose up from somewhere in the distance and Yuffie cursed to herself. Gripping her weapon tightly, she dashed forward in the direction she supposed the sound had come from.
It had hardly been two hundred feet before she skidded to a stop again, staring down in amazement as the ground dropped away several feet ahead. The distant sound of running water echoed through along the cliff, and Yuffie noticed a river down below, glimmering slightly in the darkness.
'You're more trouble than I expected…'
Yuffie spun around when the voice whispered past her ear again, making a shiver go down her spine. She stared up into blood stained teeth, too shocked to move as a long hand darted out and wrapped itself around her throat. She let out a loud gasp and struggled, kicking against the creature's arm as it lifted her up into the air. Its grip began to tighten, and in panic Yuffie slammed her giant shuriken through the muscles on its forearm.
Her feet hit the ground, and she fell backwards, landing gracelessly on her rear. She clamped her hands over her ears in pain as the creature let out a pained shriek and fell back several steps, clutching its wounded arm in fury. It ripped the shuriken out again so violently that it nearly ripped the muscles off with it, flinging the weapon back at her as she ducked quickly out of the way. Blood splattered across her leg as she scrambled off the ground and dashed along the cliff's edge.
xXx
Riku groaned loudly, rolling over onto his stomach as he pushed himself up on all fours. His head was pounding, and when he felt behind his ear he noticed blood covering his fingertips. Glancing around him in confusion, he noticed the rocky hillside he found himself on. He pushed himself up to his feet and looked around a bit more, checking to see if any of his friends might be in view. The hillside continued on several hundred feet down before disappearing out of sight in the darkness, and he quickly gathered himself to jog down the hill.
He could see flat ground ahead as he made his way precariously down the rocky slope, and just as he looked down to avoid a rather large rock in his way he felt something catch him by the shirt and yank him back. Looking over in surprise, he held a hand to his pain filled head and glowered into Sora's innocent face.
"What the hell, forget my name?" He asked, shaking the younger boy's hand off his shirt and kneeling down behind the boulder beside him. The keyblade master was gasping tiredly, and sweat was running down his face as he grinned up at his best friend.
"I did call your name." He said defensively, the teasing grin widening at the obvious joy he felt at having found someone in this wasteland.
Riku rolled his eyes, "What have you been doing, anyway? You're sweaty and you're starting to smell bad." Sora laughed at the forced attempt at casual humor, leaning around him to see the blood soaking his long silver hair.
"I was running around looking for people, duh. What happened to your head?" He poked at it childishly and Riku slapped his hand away.
"Stop, it hurts." He growled as Sora starting laughing at him again. "I guess I must have hit my head when I got here." He muttered, looking around them again at the dark scenery.
"How long have you been here?" He asked curiously as Sora leaned back to relax.
"Maybe forty five minutes, I'm not really sure. I heard some noises down there at the bottom of the hill, I was going to check it out." Sora replied, getting to his feet again and brushing himself off.
It took them another half an hour to hike all the way down the hill, and Riku stepped forward to stare down into the bottom of a canyon that cut right across the hillside. He spun around in surprise when he heard Sora let out a loud laugh, only to find the boy pointing out across the canyon to the barely visible other side.
"It's Cloud!" He cried happily, waving enthusiastically to the mercenary.
They watched in awe as Cloud cleared the expanse in one great leap, soaring out over open air and landing solidly beside them with his huge sword angled across his back. He stood up and stared down at the two young men, nodding slightly before checking their surroundings.
"You haven't found anyone else yet?" He asked almost worriedly.
"Just Sora." Riku replied, pointing towards the brunette as if he wasn't there. Cloud didn't seem very amused, and slammed his sword into the ground beside him seriously.
"We need to hurry, chances are we were split up so we would be easier to kill." All humor seemed to melt out of the situation and the two boy nodded, following the blonde's lead as he walked along the top of the canyon.
xXx
Yuffie let out another angry shriek as she struggled out of the creature's grip, falling on the ground when it refused to let go of her ankle. Her giant shuriken tumbled out of her hands, so she clawed and punched at the monster viciously, desperate to get away. It lifted her up into the air, flinging her overhead and howling once again as she managed to lodge a small shuriken into the back of its hand.
Her eyes went wide as she watched her surroundings spin around her, finally rushing up to meet her as she hit the dirt and rolled several feet. She was wounded and limped along, trying to reach her Conformer before the monster caught up to her again.
Her fingertips barely brushed the smooth metal before she was hoisted up again and spun around to stare into the creature's face as it screamed at her. She wrinkled her nose in hatred and cursed at it, landing a kick to its face as it brought up its other clawed hand. Yuffie saw the claws out of the corner of her eye, and she held her arms up defensively to shield her face from the attack.
The next thing she knew, the creature had dropped her again and was reeling back in pain. Blood splattered across the dirt and she stared up at Leon in shock. "Come on." He growled, grabbing her arm and pulling her away from the monster. She managed to grab her Conformer again before he forced her into a mad dash towards the edge of the cliff.
"What are you doing? We need to fight!" She cried, staring over her shoulder at the dark grey mass barreling after them. Leon glanced over at her sharply.
"We don't know how to kill it yet, fighting won't do anything but get us all killed." He said. Yuffie stared over at him in anger for a few moments before the full impact of his words sank in.
'You don't want me to get hurt.' She thought to herself, watching him suspiciously as he pulled her along. 'You know it's after me and if I fight it I'll die…' She wasn't sure what to think, it seemed like he had spent the last few years trying to find ways to get her killed.
A loud roar from behind them made her snap her attention back to the demon chasing them down. It swiped it's remaining claw straight at Leon, and he fell back on one knee, narrowly dodging the long fingers before darting back up to stab it in the leg with his gunblade. It cried out again and grabbed the brunette by the arm, yanking him roughly off his feet.
Yuffie leapt up past him, clenching her teeth as Leon swung his gunblade at the monster's leg again. It noticed the young ninja too late, having been preoccupied with Leon's attacks. It swung it's arm at her as she raised her shuriken, seeming to forget that its hand had recently gone missing. Kicking of the creature's chest and flipping gracefully in the air, Yuffie landed on her feet and looked up at her favorite weapon sticking out of the monster's neck as it choked on its own blood.
She yelped in surprise as the monster gave an angry yell and threw Leon at her, knocking her off her feet. She winced in pain as he landed on top of her, staring down at her with wide eyes as the creature behind them fell heavily on its side. It writhed wildly, squealing as it threw up clouds of dust around them. Yuffie braced her hands against Leon's chest nervously, heaving with all her strength. He scrambled off of her immediately, staring at the thrashing form of the monster as Yuffie sat up and cradled her sore ribs. She watched in disgust when Leon finally killed the creature, its hunched form going limp as the sound of the gunblade cutting through bone reached her ears.
"Are you alright?" Leon asked, offering her his hand as she stared up at him.
"Ugh…" She groaned, letting him haul her to her feet again. "That was way too easy…" She huffed, leaning over and resting her hands on her knees.
"They're not done with us yet." Leon replied casually, scanning their surroundings as the silence started to creep back in around them.
xXx
Sora sighed heavily, wiping the blood from his keyblade and glancing over to his two friends. Riku fell back onto a rock, resting his chin in his hand in exhaustion.
"Well that could have gone better." He groaned, looking at the gash in his forearm. Blood ran down onto his hand, staining the rock he sat on dark crimson.
"Yeah…" Sora agreed, laughing nervously. He looked down at his own blood soaked leg and holding his keyblade tightly.
"Don't bother." Riku called over to him, gesturing towards the raised keyblade. Sora gave him a confused look for a moment.
"Cure spells don't work, I already tried." He said, leaning back and rubbing his forearm.
Sora sighed in frustration. "Where did those things come from, anyway?" He muttered, looking over at the three hunched corpses sprawled on the ground several feet away.
"We need to move." Cloud said somberly, placing his giant sword across his back once again. The two younger men looked up at him for a moment before following his lead.
"Right, we need to find Yuffie." Riku replied, putting his weapon away and making his way around the rock he had been sitting on to join Cloud.
The rocks were getting smaller as they walked along, the soft crunching under their feet the only sound echoing in the darkness around them. The ground was slowly turning more to barren dirt, and Sora leaned over to look down into the canyon on their right. He wasn't close enough to see the bottom, but peered over at the sharp drop down into darkness hundreds of feet below. Kicking several nearby pebbles, he listened to them clatter along before disappearing before disappearing over the edge. He never heard it hit the bottom.
"What's that?" Riku asked quietly, squinting into the black fog covering the landscape. Several shapes were moving around up ahead, and after several more moments of waiting, a faint shriek reached their ears. All three men broke into a run, dashing towards the shadowed figures up ahead.
xXx
"Where are we even going?" Yuffie whined, her feet dragging in exhaustion as Leon walked close beside her.
He didn't respond, but Yuffie noticed when he forgot to flash her one of his dirty looks. Usually he would have started yelling at her to stop being so obnoxious by now, but he had hardly said a word since helping her with that bloodthirsty monster.
"You're unusually mad at me, aren't you?" She wondered out loud, staring at him bravely when he refused to look at her.
"What gives you that idea?" He said suddenly. She sorted and struggled to keep up with his quick pace.
"It's because of Riku, isn't it?" Yuffie asked curiously. She thought she saw the look on his face darken for a moment, but it quickly disappeared.
"What you do in your life is none of my business." It seemed like a growl, and for some reason she felt proud that her relationship with Riku was making him angry. She smiled to herself.
"You're jealous." She grinned widely at his bewildered expression.
"Yuffie-" He stopped himself before he said something he might regret.
'You're not trying to leave, are you..?'
Yuffie stopped in her tracks, eyes widening as she spun around looking for the source of the voice.
"Did you hear that?" She asked worriedly.
Yuffie didn't see anything, so she turned back to Leon. There was a familiar clawed hand wrapped around his gashed neck, blood pouring down onto his white shirt as he choked for air. The toes of his boots scraped the dirt uselessly and his bloody hands tore at the fingers around his throat. Yuffie let out a horrified shriek and leapt back, promptly tripping herself and falling roughly in the dirt.
"Yuffie! Are you alright?" She stared up into his worried eyes in confusion as he kneeled over her.
Her chest heaved as adrenaline pumped through her system, making her hands shake. She dug her fingers into the dirt and she felt tears well in her eyes as she tried to understand what was happening. He put a hand on her should when she didn't respond, looking down at her in worry. The terror in her eyes made him nervous, and he looked around them for a moment to make sure there wasn't another one of those monsters lurking nearby.
"Yuffie, it's alright. Calm down." He gripped her shoulders gently and she refused to look away from him. She was breathing heavily and after several tense moments she finally eased a trembling hand up from the ground to grip his arm.
"What did you see?" Leon asked urgently. He heaved a sigh when she didn't respond, and leaned forward and wrapped his arms around her to pull her to her feet.
"Squall…" She whimpered softly in fear, the sound of the name he hadn't used in so long making him stop and nearly fall back down into the dirt.
He stared into her stormy grey eyes, watching her jaw quiver almost comically. He might have laughed if she hadn't been so completely terrified. Their faces were mere inches apart, and he could feel her rushed breath on his cheek as he held her awkwardly in his arms. He knew everything about this was the wrong thing to do, and he wanted to stop, but he found himself leaning in closer to her ever so slightly. The terrified look in Yuffie's eyes shifted to shock when she realized what he was doing, but she didn't pull away from him. It was when his lips had brushed over hers and he felt her back tense that he stopped. Quickly releasing her, she nearly tumbled back onto the ground.
"I'm sorry, are you alright?" He said quietly, avoiding her gaze as she caught her breath. She shook her head, trying to forget everything about what had just happened.
Yuffie clasped a hand to her forehead, closing her eyes momentarily as the images of his dying form flashed through her mind.
"I'm fine…" She breathed, eyes snapping open as she felt hands begin to wind around her thin waist.
"Leon-" She started angrily, looking up to see him standing several feet ahead, staring out at the dark expanse around them.
"What?" He turned to look at her questioningly.
End of Chapter Eleven
And before you say it, yes, Yuffie is very whiny in this chapter. But you would be too, if you were going crazy.