I don't own anything associated with Kingdom Hearts or Silent Hill. They belong to Square Enix/Disney and Konami respectively.

Chapter 21

Her lungs burning, Aqua hacked up the last bit of vomit and shivered. She was in the washroom, slumped over the toilet, grimacing weakly as her stomach ached. What was wrong with her? She'd been fine just an hour ago, and now she couldn't stop puking.

Her stomach shuddered again and she gagged, preparing herself for the onslaught. This time, however, it settled and she groaned. In her mind, there was no reason for this. There hadn't been any warning signs of illness, not even a runny nose. She supposed it could be food poisoning, but Vanitas had eaten the same thing she had, and he wasn't bent over a toilet.

If he had been, it would have almost been worth it. But she was sure he was fine, not because it was impossible to picture him that vulnerable, but because he was sitting right next to her. The fact that she was constantly puking didn't seem to deter him any, and his legs brushed against hers.

"Shh . . ." She flinched as he rubbed circles into her back, just as her Master used to do whenever she had been young and sick. "Just let it out. You'll feel better."

She glared at him half-heartedly.

Eventually, he lifted his arm, checking an invisible watch, and said, "Okay, it's been ten minutes since you last threw up. I think it's safe to get you somewhere else."

He hauled her up, his shoulder under her armpit, acting as a crutch as he guided her back to her room. Truthfully, she didn't agree with him that her sickness was over . . . but she wasn't exactly opposed to vomiting on his shoes either. Maybe then she'd get some time alone.

She was actually debating whether to try and force that by the time they reached her room (at which point it became a moot point. She wasn't going to taint her own bed). He lowered her gently onto her bed, with a flood afterwards hopping on and offering her a bucket it had dragged along. She took it, then used it to shove the unversed off.

To her displeasure, Vanitas grabbed the chair from her desk. He shuffled up next to her, after which he laid the flat of his hand against her brow. With a tsk, he said, "You're hot."

"I've been puking," she reminded him flatly. Between that and the toxic mix of anger, fear and recently, pity she felt towards him, she was burning through calories.

The unversed scampered out of the room. Meanwhile, Vanitas looked at her and nodded paternally, like a father admiring the scribbled artwork of his young child. His ring finger followed the edges of her hairline, sweeping some wayward locks back away from her face.

She closed her eyes. Vanitas . . . his actions could be so very kind, yet at the same time, they were tangled with sinister intentions. Sinister in the view of a regular person, at least. But Vanitas was not a regular person; he was a boy with godhood thrust into his hands, a boy held fast in the jaws of pure darkness. He honestly thought that what he did was a good thing. In his corrupted, warped mind, he was a hero. It frightened her to think that he was that twisted; frightened her, and made her feel sorry . . .

No. She clamped down on that loose thought. She had to control herself, deny her own natural empathetic nature. If she began to sympathize with him, she might start to care for him. And if she cared for him, she would start diminishing his actions, justifying them, siding with him. The leap from Vanitas' captive to Vanitas' pet wasn't that wide; she had to be careful.

Vanitas remained at her side. He ran his thumb over her knuckles, watched her with that single-minded devotion of a dog with its owner. When she jerked, having the urge to vomit again, he helped her sit up. He remained there, offering her physical support as tremors overtook her again, unaffected by the mess created right in front of him. Then, when it was over, he helped her lay back down.

Wearily, she met his eyes. She didn't understand. Why her? What did he want from her? Last time she was at Silent Hill, he had tried to enslave her and Terra. She'd presumed that he intended to do that again, yet here he was, handling her so delicately, so tenderly, exactly how Terra would have behaved.

"Why are you doing this?" she asked.

"You're sick," he said easily. "So, I'm taking care of you."

She heard his excitement, and frowned. Usually, taking care of an ill person was nowhere near the top of someone's 'Fun Things to Do' list. She was certain about what she had heard though; in fact, he sounded just as excited as he had when he went on that rant about his trip to Beast's Castle.

He sounded just as excited, and just as relaxed.

The plan unfolded before her: let him take care of her. Weaken his defenses. If Vanitas wanted to rave on about something, she would let him – but she would control what he spoke about. She grew queasy with nervousness (or maybe she just had to puke again) as the potential of this plan opened up. She could milk Vanitas for information, find out exactly what his plans for the Princesses of Heart and her friends were. Then, once she knew everything and he was completely off-guard, she would escape. It was perfect.

Only, she'd have to figure out an escape plan.

That could come later though, once that time came a little closer. The situation could change by that time, so no use fretting about it right now. She studied her captor's face closely, hoping to see some kind of cue of what she should ask about. His face, however, even when slack, was difficult to read.

How do I begin? she wondered.

Vanitas was on the chair, leaning forwards, hands on his knees, sitting just like . . .

Ven. That was the answer. She had to speak to him as if he were Ven.

She waited for his fingers to glide across her knuckles again, and when they did she twisted her wrist, grabbing his hand tightly before he could pull it away. Vanitas did nothing for a second, but then he squeezed back, and a tiny smile flickered at the corner of his lips. She turned the tables on him, rubbing circles into his skin with her thumb, and he wriggled in excitement.

"How was your day?" she asked, the hoarseness of her voice masking the way it cracked.

He responded exactly as she had hoped. Words fell out of him, mostly worthless to her. Still, she listened closely, picking out what was useful. There wasn't much; mostly, he was complaining about that visitor to Silent Hill who just wouldn't leave, sounding like a little kid whose toy truck had been stolen by his older brother. But she let him talk, taking the time to gather her thoughts and plan out the next step in her attack.

Well, they were on the subject of Silent Hill, so she felt it fair to ask, "Have you ever met a boy named Sora?"

"Sora . . .?"

That slow repetition, the way he pronounced that word as if it didn't fit . . . she sighed. Ven behaved that very same way whenever she asked something he didn't want to answer, like whether he was the one who had painted happy faces all over the kitchen, or why Vanitas was trying to kill him in the first place. That behavior always led to the same result: no answer to her question.

But to her shock, unlike Ven, Vanitas did answer.

"He was here for a little while," Vanitas said. "He's gone now."

"Did you know him very well?" she asked.

He barked with laughter. "What's to know? He's a kid whose life revolves around his friends. Just like you, or a less violent form of Terra."

"And Ven," she couldn't help but say, "like Ven, too."

He sneered. "Don't kid yourself. Ven's interested in his own happiness, nothing else."

It was so hard not to snap back at him. Somehow, she managed to keep her manner pleasant. "What about Kairi?"

"Oh, yeah, her." He waved her off. "She was more useful than the kid, seeing as she had the whole Princess of Heart thing going for her."

"But not anymore," she said carefully.

He nodded. "Exactly."

There it was: the confirmation that he was responsible for Kairi's state. How did that fit into his explanations of justice and punishment, she wondered. Clearly, Vanitas was a paragon of justice only when it didn't get in his way.

"And Sora was the bait for her," she said, playing off the tidbits she remembered.

Vanitas smirked. "Sure, for her."

She went pale at those words, though she suspected Vanitas attributed it to her illness. The real reason, however, was that she understood now that while Sora may have been bait for Kairi, his role hadn't ended there. His arrival, it was the kick that gotten Terra and Ven off this world, her to follow, and Eraqus to follow her. Sora had been the bait for them.

"This was your plan!" she spluttered. "You knew he would find us, you knew –"

She must have gotten too excited, because her stomach suddenly flipped over. Reading her change in expression, Vanitas quickly pushed her up, though she managed to hold her sick back. It was a shame, she reflected afterwards, because Vanitas' chest had offered a perfect target.

"Just relax," Vanitas said. "We can have fun later."

She moaned, acid bubbling inside her. "I don't understand, why the princesses? What do they have to do with anything?"

He laughed wickedly, leaning back in his chair. "I don't really care about them," he confessed. "That's Maleficent who wants them. I just teased the princesses a bit so the Masters would react."

She closed her eyes. "So they would send Terra and Ven out."

"See, now you're getting it!" He raised his hand, as if for a high-five, and then dropped it.

He suddenly ducked down, whispering into her ear. "Of course, if Maleficent or someone else gets those princesses out of the way, I won't object. Certainly, it makes my job easier."

She looked at him, startled. So, Vanitas did have some sort of design on the princesses. She repeated that to herself several times, burning into her memory for later. If she could unlock the secret of why, maybe even find out where he had hid Kairi's heart, maybe she could use it against him.

"Maleficient doesn't know she's a pawn," Aqua said, lacing her statement with scorn as she catered to Vanitas' sense of superiority.

"Obviously not. Maleficent thinks she's running the show around here." Vanitas chuckled, shaking his head as he gazed into space. "Still, she's turned out a lot more useful than I thought. For starters, she actually did catch Ven for a bit, took down one of the Princesses of Heart and pushed her world over to darkness. Then, there's what happened with Terra . . . still working out the implications of that discovery."

Quietly, she asked, "What happened to Terra?"

He patted her on the head. "Don't worry about it."

She rolled away from him, eyes shutting in feigned exhaustion. The chair creaked as Vanitas moved about on it, though he did not leave. Instead, after a couple of minutes had passed, he reached out and touched, and she barely suppressed a yelp. To her great ire and mortification, he started to pet her, combing through her hair, nails grazing her scalp.

Then, it was gone. She felt the space between them increase as he pulled away. His fingers, still locked in her hair, stiffened before retreating. Annoyed, he barked, "What is it?"

Someone else, a male, said, "You wanted me to tell you if he . . ."

"He won again?" Vanitas groaned. "This guy's more trouble than Harry Mason was! Look, I don't know if she's still sick, so keep an eye on her."

"You want-"

"You just have to stand there," Vanitas said, "and do whatever she asks. Is that too hard for you?"

" . . . No, sir."

"Good." And joy of joys, Vanitas actually stood up to leave. "Don't you dare screw this up."

With the whoosh of a portal, the guard was exchanged. She remained in her false slumber, in no mood to exchange pleasantries with another of her jailers. The other person didn't seem keen to talk either, or may be was just wary of waking her, for his steps were light like a cat.

Much like Vanitas, this other person radiated darkness. A different type though; rather than the choking, pungent taste of Vanitas' aura, this one was pregnant, subdued. It was like a vicious dog chained up in a junkyard, balefully watching those who passed by, watching for that one that would get a little too close. Like a polar bear sitting at an air hole, just waiting for that glimpse of seal, whereas she would strike and make her kill. But despite the fact that she could almost see his violent fantasies, she was not scared. He would not go after her – why would he when every one of this town's woes could be traced to a single person?

She could hear him breathing. He must have been right next to her. With a sigh, he murmured, "Who are you?"

It was difficult to place exactly what kind of emotion was there. Anger? Curiosity? Exhaustion? Some mixture of those or something else completely? She couldn't tell, but there was one thing she did know. It wasn't the coldness she had expected.

If she opened her eyes, she knew what she would see: a man in a black coat, no face, only a shadow where that should be. All the Order dressed like that and it made them inhuman in a way, lowered them to the level of the monsters that prowled the streets. Hearing this person though, reminded her that there was a living being under there. But did it make things better? Not really, because now she had to grapple with the fact that some people actually chose to serve Vanitas.

Unprepared as she was, she let out a small scream as he touched her. The other person reacted similarly, even leaping back into her desk, head rapping against the wood. With a groan, he righted himself, using the desk as support as he stood.

Well, there went her cover. Rubbing her eyes, Aqua asked, "Who are you?"

"No one important," he said. "Besides, I asked first."

She sniffed, turning away with no intension of answering.

Turned out, she didn't need to. "Aqua, right?" the male asked.

"How did you know?"

He laughed bitterly. "Vanitas talks about you. A lot. I don't see who else it could be."

She nodded. Weaving her fingers together, she casually said, "Vanitas said you have to do whatever I ask. Well, I'm asking you to let me out of the castle."

"Not happening," he said flatly.

"But-"

"I'm not stupid," he said. "I know you don't want to be here, and I don't care. I have more important things to worry about."

She sneered. "No wonder you work for him."

His fists clenched, and he raised them as if to strike her. "I don't have to justify myself to you!" he snarled. "You're just his little pet."

"And you're just his slave," she said sweetly.

The tension, the hostility that crackled between them, it wasn't just anger or hatred, but desperation, fear. She could sense it, that his reactions – that both of their reactions – were no more than the panicked actions of cornered animals. Just as a wounded lion would claw at any that approached, so did they attack each other. Knowing that calmed her a little, though it did not dispel the instinctive aggression that lurked within her.

"Why don't you go?" she suggested. "I don't need your help."

"Vanitas gave me a direct order. He would have my head if I left."

He turned his head at that moment, catching a ray of light. Silver hair glinted, like the edge of a knife, and she saw yellow eyes. Just like Vanitas. Just like Terra when the darkness took him. Two contrasting figures: one representing protection and safety, one representing terror. Which one was the hooded stranger closer to?

"Why are you helping him?" she asked.

"That's my business, not yours."

This stranger, why was he so defensive? She supposed that she should be grateful that he was actually taking the time to speak to her, but it wasn't like she had started this little spat. No, that onus lay on him alone. Really, even if she had been a little snippy, could he blame her? She was imprisoned against her will, sick to her stomach (both facts he clearly knew) and being spied upon by a stranger. Had she been Terra, she would have snapped by now.

However, she wasn't Terra, which was why she hadn't summoned her keyblade to pummel the stranger. Plus, she wasn't Ven, which was why she wasn't sulking and ignoring the stranger's presence. She was Aqua, the girl who hated to fight with others (except Terra when he crossed the line, because sometimes he needed to be taken down a notch), so she took a deep breath to calm herself and tried again.

"I'm not working for Vanitas," she pointed out. "I hate him. Whatever you tell me, I wouldn't tell him."

He laughed mirthlessly. "Vanitas wouldn't be happy to hear that," the stranger said. It did not sound like an idle comment or a threat, just a warning.

"You don't seem pleased with him either," she said, and his silence confirmed that. "We're not enemies."

He said nothing, turning his head to the window. The light now outlined his chin, one lacking the sharpness of Terra's chin, one still rounded a bit with youth. The jaw above it was tense though, as if locked into place.

Then he spoke.

"Riku," he said. "My name's Riku."

Most people have already figured it out by now, but yes, the silver-haired person/lion was Riku all along. That's why Terra keeps utterly demolishing him in their fights.

Review Responses:

Anonomnom: Definitely going with Ansem, Seeker of Darkness! then. I'm thinking more of what would have happened if Ven actually got drunk... I predict the newest weapon of mass destruction -.-

maxx: Just with Sora and Goofy it's like 'Hooly, height difference!" And Ven's going to kick himself for that conversation once he realizes Aqua's been with Vani this entire time. XD

MoonLitSparklesofTwilight: Vani enjoys screwing with people. Even the audience XD And sorry to steal your thunder, but I did know both of those facts.