The large fortress loomed just ahead. If it wasn't for the castle, the prison would be the tallest structure from this perspective. Kairi took a deep breath and turned the corner out of the dark alleyway, straight for the prison entrance. She shook the nerves out of her arms and face and summoned the best damsel in distress expression she could.

"Excuse me?" she asked sheepishly to the singular guard posted out front. When he turned his uncovered face to her, however, she immediately recognized him, and her act shifted. "Hey! You're the guard who pushed me!"

The guard's eyes blew wide open, and she knew he recognized her too. "Oh, miss, I'm terribly sorr-"

"Yeah, you said that already." She stopped and put her hands on her hips. "Do you have any idea what you interrupted?"

"Ma'am, it's not my business. My job is to keep the city safe."

The growing worry on his face made Kairi feel terrible for how she was treating him. Sure, he'd ruined a moment with Sora, but he obviously wasn't an officer with any power or pull. Regardless, Sora and Lea needed a distraction, so a distraction they'd get.

"What about keeping me safe?!" She resummoned her dejected eyes and gestured to herself. "Could you imagine what would've happened if I'd actually fallen into the water? Is catching one criminal really worth the risk of me drowning?"

"I-I'm sure the young man with you would've prevented-"

"That's not the point," she interrupted. "Look, you were just doing as you were told. I need real change. Real compensation. Take me to your commanding officer," she held her chin up high.

The man was practically shaking in his boots. "I'm really not supposed to leave my post until I'm relieved."

Kairi tilted her head down and looked up with the saddest eyes she could muster. "Please?"

"Well, I-I suppose I could find someone along the way," he rubbed his head.

"That would mean so much to me." She batted her eyes. "Thank you."

The guard sighed, shaking his head as he opened the door for her.

"You go first," she insisted.

Sora and Lea skirted inside the door just as it closed, seemingly unnoticed by the guard escorting Kairi. Her display reminded Lea to never stray onto her bad side, with her threat to him back in Radiant Garden echoing in his mind:

If I sense even the slightest waiver in your loyalty, I won't hesitate to take matters into my own hands.

He shook his head free. He and Sora had a task, to rescue Flynn, which both Keyblade wielders were more than eager to participate in. Sora ran beside him with a smile on his face, and it was no wonder the kid attracted new friends wherever he went.

Thanks to Kairi, they made it past the first guard easily enough, but they were on their own the rest of the way. Max had done his best to gesture to which side of the prison Flynn was likely being kept, but being a horse, he couldn't communicate much.

They snuck their way through the prison slowly. They couldn't go too quickly, for Kairi needed time to get back outside and wait for their escape. The hallway corridors, though narrow, had multiple crevices to hide in whenever they heard footsteps coming. Lea was used to sneaking around since his early years, but it came surprisingly easy to Sora too. There wasn't a hint of fear or hesitation in his eyes.

"How are you good at this?" Lea whispered. "You don't strike me as the trouble-making type."

Sora smirked. "I may have helped a few pirates out here and there."

"Right, right…"

"How are you feeling?" Sora whispered. "Still hurt?"

"It's tolerable," Lea said, though that was only a half-truth. It was still there, but moving slowly and carefully kept the pain at bay. As soon as a fight or a run broke out, it would flare up and begin to grow again.

Soon, they reached a long stretch of holding cells, and Sora's focus switched to examining the prisoners. It wasn't until nearly halfway down the corridor where a small cell held a single man, clutching the bars of the space's only window. The incoming morning sunlight illuminated his face, and even Lea recognized him.

Sora leaned in. "Psst, Flynn."

Flynn startled and turned around, and his dejected look quickly gave way to wide eyes. He rushed to the front of the cell.

"Sora! Rapunzel's in danger. You have to-"

Lea shushed him, and Flynn gave him a puzzled look.

"This is Lea," Sora said as he drew his Keyblade, "And we know about Rapunzel. We're here to bust you out first."

"Where's the other redhead?"

"Kairi and Max are waiting outside," Lea whispered. "Now hurry."

They knew their advantage of stealth had been lost as soon as the bright beam of light shot out from the Kingdom Key to the door lock. Lea just hoped they'd be quick enough.

"What happened?" Sora whispered as they ran in the direction they came from.

"We were ambushed by former...colleagues of mine," Flynn's face coiled at the mention of them, and Lea knew the look of mutual betrayal well. "I tried to return the stupid crown they wanted, but they said she was worth more."

"So they took her?" Lea asked.

"I thought so, but now they're here in prison too, so there's more to it." His face fell. "If it were just them, I'd know where to look for her, but now I'm not sure where she is."

"We might know," Sora said. "We'll explain outside."

They rounded the last corner and came face to face with half a dozen guards. Luckily, they seemed just as surprised to see them, but their daze wouldn't last long.

Lea reacted quickly and pulled the two brunettes into the nearest staircase that led to the next level. The pain in his side was already beginning to flare up again, but he pushed it aside like he'd done many times before. After ten years in the Organization, he was well used to it. He shuffled his companions in front of him and threw up a wall of fire between them and the guards. Flynn reeled back from the flames instinctually.

"What are you people?!" He shouted.

"Just friends lookin out," Sora said. "Now, let's get to the rampart. Time for plan B!"

Flynn raised an eyebrow. "What's plan B?"

"Jumping!" Lea answered with a wink.

Sora nodded. "Also known as the fun plan."

Flynn laughed, "Sounds like my kinda plan."

The minutes of walking through the maze-like corridors felt like hours. Then the alarm sounded, and all devolved into chaos around her.

"Stay here!" The guard commanded her.

"Yes sir." She saluted, then sprinted away as soon as he rounded the corner.

Adrenaline seemed to make the hallways fly by much faster compared to her walk into the fortress. When she met fresh outdoor air again, she breathed a sigh of relief and hurried to the rendezvous point, hoping she was still early enough.

She was too early, it seemed, and all she could do was pace nervously in the partially hidden street just outside the stronghold. Max just watched her from his strange sitting position.

"Did I do enough?" she asked herself. "Are they okay? How long do these things take?"

Max whinnied in response and tugged at her hood to make her stop.

She smiled and gave their steed gentle scratches from his snout up to behind his ears. "You're right, Max, I'm overthinking. I should be prepared for when they'll need me again."

At that, loud warning bells rang out through the rampart, which could only mean one thing - they were close.

"Okay, deep breaths." Kairi bounced on her toes in anticipation. "Get ready, Max."

He was already on his feet, in position to bolt the second Flynn landed in his saddle. Kairi summoned Destiny's Embrace and kept her gaze on the upper wall. After what felt like an eternity, she finally heard the shouts of familiar voices and heavy footfalls approaching the ledge.

Just as three figures leapt from the wall, Destiny's Embrace went flying up into the air. By then, mounting her sail-like glider as soon as it transformed was second nature. It was riding it armorless and catching someone else that she was unsure of. Accelerating straight up the wall, her eyes quickly honed in on Sora's falling form. His own eyes found her as well, and though they were wide with surprise at the sight of her, all she felt from him was trust.

She reached out and gripped his hand easily. The sudden lurch of his weight threw her glider to the side, but she used the momentum to swing him up. He did the rest of the work, finding his footing on her board and gripping wherever his hands could.

One of those places happened to be around her waist before he found the hand rail, which nearly sent her off of her glider for reasons that had nothing to do with balance.

The excitement was nearly pouring from his voice. "Why didn't you tell me you could fly before?!"

She laughed in an attempt to hide her abashment. "I wanted to surprise you." She and Lea had told him about their gliders while planning their escape, but she was glad she'd waited until now to show him.

He laughed again before adjusting his grip comfortably and shuffling closer to her. "I was hoping to show you how to fly someday."

Lea met them in the air on his own glider, and together they dived back down and flew over the rooftops. Flynn had landed seamlessly on Max's back, who was already bolting through the awakening cobble streets.

Kairi glanced at Sora, hoping that their speed, along with the dim morning light, shielded her reddening face. "You can still show me."

"Maybe one day." His face fell ever-so slightly, and she knew that the weight of their fated battle still rested heavily on his shoulders. Even if his smile could mask any pain he felt, it was still there, and Kairi knew him well enough to see it.

Lea cleared his throat and snapped them both out of their trance. "Don't mean to spoil the fun, but where to?"

Sora fixed his gaze ahead. "We gotta clear a path for Flynn and Max to Rapunzel's tower."

"If Marluxia's involved, he'll put Nobodies in our path," Lea said.

Kairi nodded. "Then that's our task. Too bad we can't fight while our Keyblades are transformed."

With that, Sora summoned the Kingdom Key. "Don't count me out just yet."

They flew low to the ground and passed Flynn with an acknowledging nod, before flying into the forest to brace whatever had been set for them.

Thick bramble vines greeted them first, which made flying all the more difficult. Sora hacked through what he could with the Kingdom Key while Lea burned away the dry stalks with his own hands. After flying through the endless expanse of space, Kairi discovered that it was much more difficult to weave through a forest, and having Sora as a passenger made her even more cautious.

Soon enough, Kairi found a rhythm to weaving through the trees while Sora and Lea cleared a path ahead. Out from behind a large cluster of vines, however, a group of Nobodies leapt right at their gliders. Kairi swerved out of its path, avoiding their reaching scythes but not the tree branches. They collided with the bark hard and were thrown off of her glider.

Kairi's hip took the brunt of the impact, stinging as it skidded along the forest floor. She looked around frantically for Sora, but not before hands were already on her shoulders. How had he recovered so quickly?

"Kairi! Are you okay?"

"Totally," she grunted and stood with Sora's help. A quick once-over didn't reveal any major injuries on him either. "Sorry."

"Don't be." His concern changed to a gentle smile, but the moment was cut short by their recurring assailants.

Kairi resummoned Destiny's Embrace in its original form. Both Lea and Max skidded to a halt beside them, but she held her hand out.

"Keep going. We'll handle them." She turned to Sora. "Right?"

He nodded confidently and gripped the Kingdom Key tighter.

"Hurry and catch up," Lea said before taking off once more. Flynn and Max followed behind, with an earnest 'thank you' coming from the thief.

They'd taken out a group of these Nobodies already, so a second round was even easier. With each new encounter together, Kairi felt more in sync with Sora's fighting. Between their combined agility, as well as his elemental magic and her light magic, she couldn't have asked for a better fighting partner.

Kairi barely broke out into a sweat by the time all of the Nobodies had been dispatched, but who knew how far they'd fallen behind the rest. With a quick nod to Sora, she resummoned her glider, and they were off once again. They passed familiar scenery, patches of flowers, unique trees, and rocky cliff faces, only now they were flying through them in a hurry.

They were prepared to skirt right past every possible distraction until a flash of red caught her eye through a clearing. Kairi spotted Lea's glider thrown across the forest floor and brought her own to a halt. He couldn't be fighting, or else he would've resummoned it already.

She got her answer when she spotted him against a nearby tree trunk. His face showed immense pain, yet there were no visible wounds on him. She and Sora skidded alongside him.

"Lea, you're still hurt!?" Sora cried.

He grunted with an arm draped over his side. "It seems so. I sent Flynn ahead, though. You two should catch up."

"We're not leaving you either," Kairi scolded.

Sora didn't seem ready to move on either. "Atleast let us see."

Reluctantly, Lea pulled aside his cloak and lifted his shirt on one side. Sora turned him so the sunlight shining through the trees illuminated the wound but immediately recoiled once he saw it.

"Is it that bad?" Kairi asked.

She looked for herself, and felt sick at the gash in his side. It looked less like a scuff and more like a deep, infected wound. The skin around it barely looked human, swollen and stained purple.

"If it looks how it feels, then yeah," Lea said.

The growing urgency suffocated Kairi's mind. She still worried for Rapunzel, of course, but she found that Lea's safety had taken quite a priority in her mind. "I'm so sorry, Lea."

"Heh, it's not your fault. I'm the one who was stupid and followed Marluxia," he croaked "I don't suppose you know any healing spells against Darkness?"

Kairi shook her head, quietly cursing her weakness yet again. She supposed she could rush him back to Radiant Garden, to Aerith's masterful healing hands. Or even to Yen Sid's tower, if more powerful magic was required. Both of those options were less than desirable, but well worth it if Lea's heart was at stake.

"Yes you do," Sora interrupted her racing thoughts.

"What?" she turned to him, genuinely confused.

His eyes held hers in a soft, serious expression. "Don't you remember? In Hollow Bastion?"

"Hollow Bastion? Don't you mean-" it clicked in her head. Her eyes must have given it away, for a gentle understanding smile soon met her.

"You restored my heart when nothing was left but Darkness."

"That was a...special case," she glanced away from him, "I don't even know how I did it. I'm not sure if I can do it again. "

I'm not sure if I can do it for anyone other than you.

He leaned down to find her gaze again. "Well, that power lies within you somewhere, Kairi."

"Sorry to rush," Lea grunted, "but I'm willing to try anything at this point. I can't-" he winced, and his eyes grew more pained with each passing second. "I can't deal with this!"

Kairi had never seen pain affect Lea so intensely before. Even when she'd pulled him from a burning collapsed building, he'd waved off any injuries and refused healing. He would only be so panicked if he'd known the pain before, known what it led to.

"Lea," Kairi said, "has this happened to you before?"

"Of course!" By now, Lea was hunched over, hands shaking. "It's absolute torture. I can't-"

"Panicking won't help either of you," Sora moved between them. "You can tell us more later, but right now, we need to focus on helping you. We can't do that if you're panicking. And Kairi," he turned to her, and his stern expression turned much more gentle. "Have confidence in yourself."

His intervention was enough to stop Lea's hysteria and Kairi's inner self-doubt.

"You're right." she nodded, filled with determination. "If I did it once, maybe I can do it again."

"That's the spirit," he smiled.

She turned her attention back to Lea. "Can you sit up?"

He answered her by doing so, slowly and with suppressed pain in his expression. "Don't get rid of too much Darkness, okay? I'd like to keep a little bit," he winked.

The return of his humor was reassuring.

She laughed, though a part of her felt like crying. Something about the complete confidence and trust from the two men beside her felt overwhelmingly sentimental. One was more important than anyone else, and the other had become a much bigger part of her life than she could've expected.

He exposed the wound on his side again. She had no idea what she was doing, but she had some ideas on where to start.

"Direct contact might be best," Kairi began, remembering her embrace to bring Sora back. "I need to...put my hand on the target wound." She mimicked Aerith's professional demeanor with her own medical patients. "Is that alright?"

Lea grunted his consent. Kairi found herself looking to Sora as well, almost asking if he was okay with it too. He showed no signs of jealousy, only determination.

She wasted no more time and gently placed her hand over the area on his side. Lea winced at the contact, but otherwise remained still. Her focus narrowed in only on her hand.

She'd never willingly used Light magic without Destiny's Embrace before, but she'd restored Sora's heart long before Destiny's Embrace appeared within her grasp. Like Sora had said, that power lay within her somewhere. She pictured the Light within her heart. Pictured it flowing from her fingertips to expel the Darkness infecting her friend.

But nothing came, and she felt only the swollen, heavy pulse of the wound beneath her palm.

A bead of sweat dripped down the side of her face. "I'm trying. I-I can't do it."

A warmth settled over her free hand, and she didn't have to look to know whose it was, having become familiar enough with Sora's touch.

"It's okay, keep trying." Sora's voice was close, and now she was really afraid to pull her eyes away from her task to find out just how close. She hummed in response and began to try again. "Don't worry about what you should do. Just remember how you felt."

How she felt? How could she even begin to describe it?

"I...I knew it was you," she began. "Out of all of the Shadows."

"How?" he asked.

"I saw your heart," she paused before chuckling. "My own had been inside of it long enough to recognize it anywhere."

A long pause, but the hold on her hand never wavered. Perhaps now had not been the best time for humor, but she couldn't resist flustering him.

He hummed, "Then find it again."

She closed her eyes and tried to shut out her doubt, her worry about her friends' safety, her butterflies about almost kissing - no she definitely couldn't think about that. She allowed every intrusive thought to float on until nothing was in the way of her Light. Her own senses dulled. Even Sora's hand over her own felt distant and dreamlike. The voice from her Dive to the Heart came to her again:

Embrace the Light, Kairi, for it is you.

With the voice, two hearts made themselves known around her. Like viewing two dim lanterns behind closed eyes.

One she immediately recognized as Sora's, though more Darkness existed within his heart than the last time she'd seen it. Her lack of expertise on hearts couldn't tell her why, but they'd address that later, she told herself.

The other she deduced to be Lea's, still familiar, though not as much. His heart held more Darkness as well, but it was sick, infesting, and growing.

"There you are," she said. Her eyes stayed closed, afraid this sense of hers would disappear if she moved a muscle.

Sora provided no further instruction, only giving her hand a squeeze of encouragement. She could do this. She'd know what to do.

"Let's restore the balance," she spoke.

Her focus turned to her Light once more. Already, it wanted to reach out towards the Darkness infecting Lea's heart. To cleanse and purify what should not exist there.

With a deep breath, she opened the floodgates and funnelled Light through her body, out of her hand, into the wound, and around his heart. Lea winced under her touch, but made no move to pull away as she continued to focus and pull away the parts of Lea's heart that weren't his. She couldn't touch the Darkness or Light that already existed there, and she hadn't wanted to anyways.

Finally, her Light returned to her. She opened her eyes and began to pull away.

"Gah!" Lea cried and arched his back while Sora held him still.

His pain became clear when her hand separated from him completely, and a thick ichor of Darkness followed out of his wound, floating a few inches from her hand. The resemblance was not unlike that of a defeated Shadow as it disintegrated into the air.

Lea breathed deeply before patting at his wound and turning to her. Sora's eyes were on her as well, and all were speechless for a moment.

"Are you…?" Kairi asked Lea, unsure how to even word her question.

Did it work? Are you healed? Can I actually...heal?

Lea nodded. "I have no idea what you did, but yeah."

"You did it, Kairi," Sora smiled, "you can heal."

Millions of thoughts raced through Kairi's mind, but none found their way out of her mouth. All she could do was stumble forward and bring the two men into a hug. Now, hair spikes tickled both sides of her face, but she didn't care. She sobbed tears of joy and relief as they returned the embrace.

"I can…I can heal," she finally choked out.

"I don't know," Lea said, "that was alot more than any old healing potion or spell could do."

He was right. The only part of him her magic had touched had been his heart.

"Maybe I can't heal peoples' bodies, but I can restore their hearts."

"Hearts are all connected," Sora said, and if anyone was proof of that truth, it was him.

Her determination to face the growing Darkness, to thwart Xehanort's plan, only grew. As long as she was around, he couldn't hurt or corrupt any of her friends. She wouldn't let him touch any of them.

She stood and offered both of her hands to her companions. "Let's save Rapunzel and show Marluxia who he's up against."

A/N: Wow, it's been a few months since I've updated this fic, haha. I hope you all had a great SoKai week back in early July! Thank you all for your patience, it's refreshing to come back to this passion project with fresh eyes. As always, thank you for reading and for all of your feedback :)