No Promises
25
"I can't believe you went that hard on a child," Cloud commented, arms crossed. He blew a wisp of breath out his nose, nonchalant and collected, but since there was a young, unconscious boy laying on the ground next to them, the boy who was no doubt the "Keyblade Master," things couldn't be left tossing in the wind. It would do their mission no good if they were to accidentally kill him before he accidentally killed himself.
Leon sheathed his sword, brushed the stray locks from his face that'd fallen out of place during he and the boy's short fight, and said, "Hey, he wasn't as bad as he looked. He needs a lot of work--a whole lot--but I have to admit he isn't the worst candidate."
"So he's really him?" asked Cloud, looking at Sora skeptically from the side.
"Yeah," Leon answered. "The Key is real."
"But look at him," Cloud retorted. "He's the youngest Keyblade Master I've ever heard of. This can't really be…"
"It is."
Cloud stared at the Spiky haired boy lying on the ground who's arms were spread so wide you'd think he was making a snow angels and studied his adolescent face with a passive grunt, then turned away to face forward, seemingly disinterested. "Well then…this ought to be interesting."
"No kidding," Leon smirked.
Cloud cracked his knuckles together and loosened a stiff shoulder joint. "In any case," he said, "it hardly has anything to do we me at the moment. I still have things I need to take care of."
He started to walk off, leaving Leon with the unconscious boy, and while Leon wasn't looking at Cloud, he was very aware of him departing. "Strife," he called. Neither of them faced one another.
"Yeah?"
"Just don't get yourself killed. Giving out…doesn't leave you with the most pleasant feeling in the world."
After a moments silence Cloud answered, "Yeah…I know from experience."
As Cloud's footsteps died away Leon sighed to himself. "Me too."
*-*-*-*-*-*-*
"They found him?!" Yuffie shouted in alarm. The most emotion she'd felt in weeks convulsed into one lurch inside her chest, making her heart stop, but not in the drowning feeling she'd been plagued with as of late. It was an unexpected lifting feeling, dizzy with happiness and excitement. Riku! She cried inwardly. Yuffie was very aware of her reaction and the feelings whirring dangerously inside her rib cage, making the better part of her sick with disgust. How dare she feel this way after all she'd done?
But still…Riku. Riku was here. Here. Here.
Yuffie met Sid inside his accessory shop moments ago, which wasn't exactly overflowing with customers at the time, and right as soon as she walked in the door he smacked her in the face with this kind of information. "Nearly killed him right in front of my store," Sid told her gruffly, lighting his pipe with a quick flick of his fingers. It was a tiny spark of fire magic he'd gotten Merlin to teach him for that very purpose. A little hypocritical of him, everyone thought, since the old man had always been opposed to magic. To him, fighting was all about strength. That and wit. Even Merlin had the gall to call him old fashioned over that one.
"W-What do you mean 'almost killed him?'" Yuffie asked.
"Those two morons Squall and Cloud," Sid snorted, shooting smoke out his nose. "What kind'a business do people think I'm runnin here? If they were goin to pulverize the squirt the least they coulda' done was do it behind my shop."
"That's not the point old man!" Yuffie scolded, gripping the counter roughly. Somewhere inside her she was a little shocked that someone would call Riku a "squirt," but there were more important things that had to be addressed. "Where is he now?"
"Aerith and Squall took the boy to a safety room in the second district."
"The hotel?" Yuffie asked. 'Safety room' is what they referred to it as since heartless never ever appeared inside the rooms. They've been known to pop up in every other place except there, and though no one knew the reason, they figured it best not to question it if there was no real purpose.
"Yeah," Sid responded.
"They're going to explain things to him then?" Yuffie said, more to herself than to him, and more as a statement than a question.
"Sumthin wrong with that?" Sid asked. "The kid doesn't look like much, but he is what we been waitin' for. For a helluva long time, too."
"No, it's just that…" Yuffie's words were lost on her. This was what she'd been trying to prevent. She did terrible things so Riku would never get caught up in this, in this dangerous business of heartless and the overwhelming expanse of other worlds. She sacrificed her friendships and her second family for that. All for him. And now, just like that, he was here?
The fact that Yuffie could easily stride a number of yards to his side and punch him in the arm for being such an idiot nearly brought tears to her eyes, tears of happiness, and even at this very moment she was doing all in her power to restrain herself from going to see him. But every time the joints in her knees twitched with movement, forcibly she'd remind herself that it would destroy all she'd worked for in the past months, even though most of those efforts were already smothered in ruin.
No matter what she felt or what the situation, Yuffie thought it best that Riku never saw her again, and vice versa, since it would only complicate things to nearly irreparable degrees. Just as well, what had transpired between she and Riku could not be redone nor erased, unsaid or undone. It was there, in her mind and surely in his. If she met him again, what in the world would she say? My bad, I didn't mean to backstab you like that?
Yuffie clenched her hands into fists.
She only hoped Aerith and Leon didn't reveal their relation to her. It was a very slim chance, but it was still there…
"You met him before, huh?" Sid noted unexpectedly, puffing smoke rings from his pipe. "The Key boy."
Yuffie was so shocked she couldn't form words. Undoubtedly a reaction Leon would have enjoyed very much.
"I ain't no fool," Sid told Yuffie in his fatherly guff of a voice. "And you ain't that good at hidin' things. Some ninja you are." Sid closed his eyes with another snort, releasing a cloud of smoke through his nostrils.
"Sid…" Yuffie began pleadingly, and was abruptly interrupted.
The doors to the accessory shop swung open, revealing two very peculiar, yet familiar, characters.
"Donald?" Yuffie gasped in surprise. "Goofy!"
*-*-*-*-*-*-*
"I don't get it," Sora told Aerith. "What does the Keyblade have to do with any of this? Where did it even go and…why did it choose me?"
Leon, who was leaning against the door to the hotel room, crossed his arms and said, "The Keyblade is the primary weapon of destruction for darkness. The Keyblade Master uses it to rid the worlds of Heartless. But it's not as if it's just any other weapon. The Keyblade has a life and a will of it's own, therefore it chooses it's own master."
"And it chose you," Aerith explained. She sat on the bed beside Sora, hands folded neatly over her lap. The pity she felt over Sora's confusion was relayed through her eyes, and while Leon more or less felt the same way, at least he took the effort to avert his gaze. His disappointment at the chosen Master, however, was not so well concealed.
"That's why it was necessary to get the Keyblade away from you," Aerith continued. "Because that is what the Heartless are attracted to. They are products of the darkness in people's hearts that mold and take living forms. These forms come in all shapes and sizes, as well as in different statuses of power, and they feed off the hearts that have not fallen into oblivion. The purer the heart, the more desirable, and no purer heart can be found than that of the Keyblade Master."
"M…Me?" Sora echoed.
"That's right."
"But…I didn't ask for any of this!"
"Tough luck," Leon retorted, waving a dismissive gesture to his complaint. "The others didn't ask for it either, but they still did what had to be done."
"How could this have happened?" Sora asked into empty space. "It was all so fast. The last thing I remember was being on my island. I was with…"
Sora's eyes flew open with horrid realization.
"My friends!" he cried, jumping out of his seat. Aerith, appearing quite startled, jerked back in surprise and put a hand to her mouth.
"What happened to my island? My mom! Riku…Kairi…"
What happened to my home?
The look in Aerith's eyes only made things worse. Worse even then Leon's passive response.
"You know what, I really don't know," he said monotonously.
Sora didn't know how much time at all had passed since that horrible event on the island, because different worlds surely meant different time schedules, but to him it felt like only hours. Hours since Kairi had gone missing…hours since Riku had disappeared into darkness…hours since he'd been separated from his mother. His home. And what of Wakka and other others?
And what of him?
*-*-*-*-*-*-*
"So that's what the King has been up too!" Goofy exclaimed, pounding a fist into his hand.
"Yup, that's right!" Yuffie explained. She leaned against the counter with her elbows resting on its edge while Sid cleaned the surface around her, wiping in circles with a rag. Goofy and Donald sat together on the couch across from them, side by side with attentive ears. "He's been gathering pages from Ansem's journal. It has all kinds of information about Heartless and their origins."
"This Ansem fella has been studian' Heartless for some time now," Sid added. "Devotes his life to it, from what I heard. The King has been moving from world to world tryin' to find these scraps o' paper. When he's found out enough he thinks he'll be able to put a stop to them Heartless."
"But there are so many worlds the King can't possibly do everything by himself," Yuffie continued. "And even though he himself is a Keyblade Master, in the end, he still needs the help of the other Master in order to properly defeat the monsters that spawn from darkness. King Mickey has always always played an invaluable role in destroying them, but the Keyblade Master is the one who ultimately lands the final blow."
Yuffie did as she was expected to and relayed what information she could about Riku, or the Keyblade Master in general, and even though she knew they would eventually find out he was here, she would absolutely not be the one to tell them. No matter what she couldn't allow Riku to know her involvement. She'd run away if she had to…
"And then there's them other dogs in black hoods that have been terrorizin' the worlds," Sid informed with a puff of smoke.
Together he and Yuffie explained the Organization's (that's what they called themselves) connection to everything, including the necessity of their obliteration.
It wasn't long before the dreaded subject of the Keyblade Master surfaced. Sid, of course, was the one to set it afloat.
"But as luck would have it that runt of a Keyblade Master--"
"Would you stop calling him runt?" Yuffie snapped. Her reaction was quick an unexpected, even to her, but Sid dutifully ignored her.
"--Suddenly showed up here. Leon ought to be with him right now, so you prolly should head over to the second district."
"The key is here?" Donald cried. "Well then let's get going, Goofy!"
The noisy duck jumped high to grab Goofy by his collar and together they fled from the Accessory shop. "See you guys around!" Goofy shouted, stumbling behind his partner.
"Didn't try to stop em, eh?" Sid asked through a cloud of freshly born smoke.
"What would be the point of that?" Yuffie responded without a glance.
"True," Sid agreed, closing his lips around his pipe. "Just don't go runnin' off again, girl. Leon won't forgive you a second time."
Yuffie couldn't help it. She grinned. Damn, she really wasn't good at hiding things.
"No promises."
//******************************//A/N//******************************//
Merry Christmas guys!!
*Note* Yuffie has NO idea Sora is the Keyblade Master they're talking about.