Riku was caught off guard by Kaida's request for a fight, but he didn't show it. He examined the girl again, the way she looked, her weapons, even her name. Something was extremely different about this Nobody, and Riku had a feeling he wasn't going to like it.

"Hey! I just asked you to fight me!" Kaida shouted. "Do you accept or are you afraid of getting beaten by a girl!"

Riku immediately held his keyblade in a duel stance, but Kaida's words struck him as oddly familiar. "I'm not afraid of anything, especially you!"

Kaida's eyes seemed to brighten at the challenge. The promise of a good fight seemed to fill her with some type of joy and the fans began to glow with a white aura from Kaida's 'excitement'. "Alright then! But let's take this somewhere...a little more open."

"What?" Riku was about to question Kaida but before he knew it, his surrounding began to distort and fade. Riku kept alert, making sure he wasn't caught off guard. Within seconds, Riku and Kaida were standing on a beach. Riku studied the new territory and saw that Kaida had only taken him to the cove near his house. He also noticed that the sky was turning grey.

"The boulders make a nice boundary, don't they?" Kaida said cheerfully. "Saves me the trouble of making it myself. Anyway," Her fans began to glow again. "Where were we?"

Silently, Riku went back to his duel stance. His gaze became narrow and icy.

"It's victory or oblivion…"

"Don't hold back." Kaida smirked.

She then swung her arm out holding one of the fans fully open. At first, Riku thought she was going to throw her fan like a boomerang, but the fan was still in Kaida's hand. Instead, she had sent out giant sharp crystals at him like darts and she continued doing this with one fan at a time at random angles causing the shards to go everywhere. The only thing Riku could do was block the crystal with is keyblade and advance toward Kaida.

Riku was only a few feet away from Kaida when she finally hit him with three of her shards. They had only grazed his arms but they still hurt, and he fell back a foot or two. As he gritted his teeth, Riku realized something. The crystal felt extremely cold. Using his peripheral vision, Riku looked on both side of him. As the shards hit the sand, they instantly turned into water, making dots of wet sand all over the cove.

"There's no way…"

Gathering his strength, Riku fended off the rest of the ice shards and attacked Kaida head on. He was preparing to slash her right across her abdomen, but she held up her fan in front of him as if to signal him to stop. When Riku swung his blade a huge barrier stopped him in mid-swing and repelled Riku backwards, off his feet, and caused him to land on his back.

"Come on, Riku! You're making this too easy!" The Nobody called as Riku stood up. His glare became colder.

"Ice…that's what got rid of the Nobodies on the island." Riku called back. "That's what was on Ichigo's grave when I caught someone there the last time I visited, but the used a different portal. It was you, wasn't it?!" He sent out a firga spell at Kaida, who quickly deflected it.

"Sorry, Riku, but you got me mistaken for someone with a heart." Kaida responded and her gaze went from overjoyed to serious. "Now fight me!"

Swiftly, Kaida raised her phoenix fan high, keeping it fully open, and her dragon fan down but fully open as well, and began spinning forward with her arms moving like a windmill towards Riku. This sent giant blades of ice hurling at Riku, and he put his keyblade up defensively and supported it with his hand on the flat of the blade. As the ice hit the side of his weapon, Riku was being pushed back further across the sand. All of this happened so fast, he was surprised that he was able to react so well.

Kaida wore a scowl as she sent her last blade. "Riku! I said to-!" She let out a shrill scream as she was hit by a thunder attack Riku had sent out immediately after the last ice blade hit his defense. Kaida was sent back a couple of feet and almost hit one of the boulders.

"I've heard what you had to say." Riku said in a cool voice. "Now, tell me, if it wasn't you who saved my friends or was at Ichigo's grave, then who was?"

"As if I know!" Kaida angrily sent out more ice shards for Riku to deflect.

"You have to know!" Riku lurched forward hoping to get a hit at Kaida, but she moved gracefully out of the way. "They're following you!"

His eyes followed Kaida and he noticed something different. She was so serious, but now her eyes showed something else. She looked scared. But why? Nobodies didn't have hearts, Kaida even admitted that she didn't, and she seemed so thrilled to fight. Why would she be scared of another challenger, if she was scared at all?

The fear in Kaida's eyes quickly vanished and she began throwing blades at Riku again. He quickly put his defense back up.

"Do you think I care?" She sneered. Riku gritted his teeth. Kaida's blows were getting stronger and wasn't sure if he could hold on much longer.

Suddenly, out of the corner of Riku's eye, he saw a dark shadow moving across the boulders. At first Riku thought it was the ice mage, coming to assist him, but this turned out to be false. Instead, a group of heartless appeared and tackled Kaida. More appeared and piled on top of her. Riku was stunned at the heartless' reaction to Kaida. Kaida was working for some other Nobody, wasn't she?

Unable to resist, Riku went to the pile of Heartless and started helping Kaida. Why he did, he wasn't sure. Eventually, Riku began to see Kaida attacking the Heartless. In an effort to free herself faster, Kaida held up her fan like a shield again, and when one of the heartless tried to claw her, the shield sent all of the Heartless and Riku flying. Riku ended up with his face in the sand, but the attack had destroyed all of the Heartless.

Riku jumped up in time to watch Kaida collect herself and scan for other Heartless. A dark portal appeared and Kaida turned to Riku.

"We'll finish this later." She said and then she ran off, pulling her hood back up as she entered her portal.

Riku could only watch her go. He wasn't willing to follow her into whatever world of Darkness she roamed, and risk not being able to return. A few moments passed and Riku's surroundings began to change again. He kept his guard up as he was taken from the cove back to the cemetery.

He looked around the area, but saw that he was alone. The only thing that had changed was the sky. It had gotten darker and threatened to rain. Riku ran back to his car and as soon as he got in, the rain began to pour down. Riku sighed and leaned back in his seat.

"Kaida…what are you?"