Warnings

Boy/boy pairings, the use and abuse of stereotypes, hints at original pairings, regular updates (I know people are not used to this), a sometimes excessive level of cuteness and a useless Warnings section at the beginning of each chapter.

Chapter Notes

We're never so vulnerable than when we trust someone

Reviewers

Ongaku Dream: So glad you liked the way I wrote this chapter. I actually wrote it years ago, so when I re-read it and corrected it I was like: "Meh, it's not that good...". But stop hating Riku, he didn't do anything bad. That bad ;).

Streliziafangirl: Thank you so much, . Though, shouldn't it be "StreliTzia"?

Chapter 26: Void Gear

"Wha-wha-wha..."

Vanitas, one of the few guys in the world that had managed to earn Sora's hatred, in little more than 24 hours no less, was now standing in front of him, smiling viciously. "You really need to improve your conversation skills, you know?"

"What... what are you doing here?" Sora finally muttered, completely paralyzed, his literature book still in hand.

Vanitas buried a hand in his hair, a calm yet scary look painted on his face. "Never heard of the transfer students program? I visit your school, I stay here a little, ..." he lowered his voice while getting closer to Sora. "...and I screw your friend Riku, of course."

Sora was having a hard time resisting the urge to choke him. "I've heard about it." he answered, ignoring the last part of the other boy's sentence "But apparently you didn't: you have to request a transfer half a year before the beginning of the semester, so you're like... eight months too late."

Vanitas put a hand on Sora's locker, practically forcing the other boy against it with his body. "Details, when you're the favorite nephew of the principal of the school: uncle Xemny was really happy that I wanted to spend some time in his school." He smirked. "Not that he had much of a choice when I showed up here yesterday. My dear cousin didn't look really happy to see me, though..."

'This guy is totally crazy!' Sora thought, starting to get really nervous, yet trying not to show it. "Why are you doing all of this?" He realized he was nearly screaming.

"Are you dense?" Vanitas answered coldly. "I already told you why: Riku is mine, so no touchie, is that clear?"

"You... I..." Sora's nerves were definitively failing him. "You came here just to tell me this?" He was keeping on trying as hard as he could not to sound scared. Vanitas took a step back at those words.

"Actually there's more." the black-haired boy said, suddenly turning completely serious. "You see, Riku talks way too much about you for my tastes."

Sora couldn't help but feel sincerely surprised at those words. "He... about me?" he murmured incredulous.

"Verily." Vanitas kept going on. "So I think that the best option is to... well, take you out of commission."

Sora did not have the time to realize what he had just heard that Vanitas quickly grabbed him by the shirt, pulling the brunet towards him so fast that Sora could barely see the grin on the other boy's face before their lips clashed violently against each other. Then, with the same violence, the black-haired boy threw the other boy away, making him bump against his own locker.

"I'm sorry, Sora." Vanitas declared, loud enough to be heard by all the people that, after that little show, were inevitably staring at them. "But I don't like you, you can't just kiss me like that."

The words echoed through the perfectly silent crowd of students that was surrounding them, and Sora realized that whatever he could have said wouldn't have changed the fact that it actually looked like he had just kissed the new student, who had promptly rejected him.

Sora wiped his mouth with a hand, disgusted. "You bastard! What do you hope to obtain by humiliating me?"

"I'm sorry that you're taking it that bad." Vanitas answered, quietly continuing his show. "Look, we can still be friends if you want." Someone whistled from the crowd, someone laughed. Then, lowering his voice to be heard only by the brunet, Vanitas spoke again. "Just wait until Riku will hear about this. That should be a lot of fun..."

Sora knew that punching that brat in the face would have only made things worse, so he picked his literature book that had fallen to the ground and silently walked towards his class, trying to ignore the comments of the students he had to get through. 'Welcome back to school, I suppose...'

It's incredible how fast time pass when you don't want it to. At least that's what Sora thought when the bell announcing the end of the literature class rang. The same bell that was announcing that chemistry was only fifteen minutes away, with Riku inevitably waiting for him.

Sora entered in prof. Vexen's class five minutes before the beginning of the lesson, partly because he couldn't afford to be late once more and mainly to take shelter from the venomous comments from the students in the corridor. 'Funny how the bravery of people is directly dependent from their number.' he thought, noticing that none of the barely ten students in the room was laughing at him, limiting themselves at jabbering between them while looking at him.

He spotted his usual place: Kairi and Riku weren't there yet. And... Sora wanted to scream when he saw that Vanitas was sitting at his usual place! Great, that idiot was probably taking the same classes as Riku. He walked towards the last row, thinking that, any case, it was for the best to delay as much as possible the unavoidable confrontation with Riku.

The bell rang precisely when the brunet had ended taking out his books from his bag, a depressed flow of students entering the room, clearly resigned at the perspective of spending the next two hours with prof. Vexen. And Riku entered too, clearly surprised to see Vanitas on Sora's place. The brunet turned his head to the other side, facing the periodic table on the wall, like it was the most interesting thing in the world.

"Can I sit here?"

Riku's voice made Sora jump: the silver-haired boy had reached the last desks where he was sitting all by himself. "O-of course."

The voice of the old professor echoed emptily in Sora's head, focused as he was on his friend. None of them said anything else for a while: Riku had just quietly sat next to him and had diligently opened his book. It was only after ten or more minutes during which Sora couldn't understand a single word of the professor (not unlike any other chemistry class, actually), that he finally talked.

"So, Riku, you... uhm... with Vanitas..."

"I guess I can't deny it anymore, uh?" Riku answered, evidently expecting that question, his eyes fixed on the blackboard on which the professor was writing. "Yeah, we're dating." Those words crushed Sora.

"But... but I thought... I mean... all your girls..."

"What about them? Let's just say that... I go both ways. I hope this is not a problem for you..." Riku was perfectly controlled as usual, but he had not looked at Sora once since the beginning of the lesson.

"No, no, of course!" the brunet hastily answered, shocked by Riku's apparent nonchalance at admitting that. "I mean... it's just that he..." Sora breathed deeply. "That guy is crazy! I mean, he followed you here, he acts weird and he..." He considered for a moment telling his friend what had happened that morning, but he quickly dismissed that thought, knowing that the truth wasn't believable at all; he just hoped that Riku hadn't heard about the 'accident' yet. "I think he doesn't like me." Sora simply concluded in the end.

And then the upperclassman finally turned his attention on Sora, ignoring prof. Vexen's blabbering. Man, since when Sora had started liking so much staring at him?

"Sora, we've already talked about it." He wasn't angry, more like disappointed. "I don't need you as a bodyguard. I can take care of myself, me and Vanitas talked a lot yesterday and he told me that he already wanted to come here for some time. Besides, he also told me that he likes you. I mean, not romantically speaking but..." That last part left the younger boy stunned. "So I don't really get why you hate him so much." The brunet hoped that Riku didn't catch him blushing. "Anyway I told him that that was your place, so next time you won't have to seat here, ok?"

"O-ok." Those were the only words that Sora could say to his friend.

The rest of the two hours passed in reciprocate quiet silence. What really bugged Sora was lunch: Riku had introduced his 'something-more-than-friend' (Sora refused to use the word 'boyfriend') Vanitas to Kairi, Tidus and Selphie, who had been so much nice with them that after only ten minutes, Sora had started wishing to torture that hypocrite in the most painful way possible. The absence of Roxas didn't help his mood and before the end of the lunch, Sora had taken his bag and had left his friends with some stupid excuse.

He needed to see someone, but he made the mistake to stop by his locker: the -SORA LOVES RIKU- once written on it had been replaced by a much less cute -FRUIT-. Furious, he put his books in it and slowly started to cross the meadow in the direction of the dormitory.

End Notes

So... yeah, Vanitas is bad, I hope you won't hate me too much for writing this chapter (I'm talking to a certain reviewer ;). Until next time, see ya.

Next chapter (06.29.2019): Brightcrest