A/N: A special thanks PIcaRDMPC and once again to Maxine and Angel Bliss ^.^ As before there are notes at the bottom to you! And I've not much else to say, so on with the story!
Falling…unable to stop….cannot get away…I looked up from my plummeting state to see the faces of Riku, Kairi, my parents, and other familiar faces from the island. Riku's hand dangled uselessly over the side of their platform they were on grasping air instead of my hand.
The air was knocked from my lungs as I hit the ground. I cringed, but when I retrieved the air lost, I rolled onto my side into—someone else?
Painfully I opened my eyes again, but the sun shined brightly into my eyes forcing them closed again.
"At least he's awake." A sing-song voice commented. There was a giggle and another voice spoke.
"So you noticed. Opening your eyes is typically a good sign."
Kairi and Riku, and…I shifted in the sand beneath me, iDestiny Islands?/i I opened my eyes again, but not before holding up a hand to shield them from the sun. Kairi and Riku stood over me, now blocking the sunlight. I lowered my hand from my face back to the warm sand.
"Oh! Sora," the girl in the purple skort said, "you're alright! Don't ever do that again, do you understand?"
"Do…? Do what, Kairi?"
"You walked out in the middle of that storm last night…don't you remember?"
I stared blankly at her as she continued.
"You walked out into the ocean as if you were in a trance…We, Riku and I, tried to get you ashore but you kept going. Sora, you got so far out there, none of use could reach you!
"We ran back to get Mr. Letavish who runs the ferry, but when we came back, and started searching for you, we couldn't find you in the dark…
"Early this morning, we all went out looking for you, and luckily you'd washed up on a small rock out in the middle of the ocean a ways off shore. Tidus found you thanks to that necklace of yours. The light was glinting off it just right to attract his attention…"
iSo that's what happened?/i? I opened my mouth to speak but was cut off by Riku.
"Sora? …Sora! Sora come on, now! SORA!"
I found myself in the water with our raft close bye. Sputtering, I swam a few strokes back to the floating vessel carrying my friends. I'd swallowed quite a bit of water, and found I had to put more of an effort into getting back. Riku lent me a hand and, carefully as not to over turn the boat, helped me up.
I braced myself on hands and knees as coughs racked my body causing water to spill from my lips. Still coughing, I began to wonder whether there was still ocean left beneath the raft that I hadn't swallowed.
"Sora, are you alright? What happened? Why are you soaking wet?" Kairi, who had been startled awake by Riku, but disoriented for the past few minutes, shot questions at me. I couldn't answer her, for a moment as I and tried to give an answer.
"I cleverly—and gracefully—rolled off the raft for an early morning swim." I gave her my trade mark smile.
Riku burst into a fit of laugher, obviously amused with my poor excuse. "Surely, Sora, you could have come up with," more laughing, "something better than that." Riku laughed hysterically, it had been forever since I had seen him do that, and I felt my blood rush to my face, giving it a red hue.
"Well, maybe it wasn't that graceful."
"Or clever" Riku supplied and I shot him a glare. What was he trying to do? Nevermind, that's a stupid question, trying to have a one up on me with Kairi. "What really happened, Kairi," he turned on his charm, "Sora, here, was having a nightmare and in his sleep managed to roll around on the raft and finally fell off, and if it had been for yours truly, Sora would have drowned." It was then that I realized Riku was wet too, had he jumped in to save me? But then how was he on the raft and helping me up first?
"Riku, you--?" I was promptly cut off by my silver haired friend.
"Well, it sure has been an eventful morning, how about breakfast?" Kairi nodded feverishly and I gave my own nod. Kairi, being the better cook of the three of us, busied herself with readying the food.
"Riku…" I pulled him to the opposite end of the raft compared to Kairi. Luckily, she was too engrossed in what she was doing to notice, much to my advantage, now I might have a chance in getting Riku to tell me the whole story. "Riku," I began again, "what really happened?"
"What do you mean? You heard me tell Kairi what happened." He feigned innocence. This frustrated me—greatly.
"Riku, this morning, I woke up in the ocean, and when I made it back here, to the raft, I discovered you to be wet too. It didn't rain last night, you and I both know you aren't going to get sopping wet just by sitting on the raft. So tell me, what happened?" I managed to keep my cool through this one. Yay! Go me!
"I see someone has been thinking," he gave me a wink.
I pouted in response. "Stop avoiding my question, and just answer me."
My older friend took a deep breath and slowly released it, running a hand through the wet platinum hair, "You were crying, then shouting, and then whining." He began abruptly. "You shouted my name, once, and then terror that possessed you was disturbing." He paused momentarily. "So naturally," Crap, he'd returned to that 'I'm Riku-unable-to-be-touched –and-nothing-affects-me state. "I tried to wake you, and for whatever reason, you latched on to my arm, which turned into a slight struggling match, till we toppled off the side, and you let go of my arm, and started falling to the bottom, and I needed air." He shrugged. "I simply went back to the raft to get a rope in hopes I could pull you back up, and you know the rest from there.
He said it so nonchalantly it made me want to puke, How does he does he do that?
"Come on guys! Breakfast is ready!" Kairi chimed happily. I turned from Riku, feeling my now empty stomach calling for food. Kairi lied on her stomach which may cause some major indigestion later… was the only thing I could think of. On the other hand Riku was lying on his side, and seemed to be the more comfortable position; so naturally, I followed his example and lied on my side. My copying of Riku wasn't unusual, we had the same fighting style due to my copying, we ate (for the most part) the same foods, and odd things such as sitting as he was weren't out of the ordinary, despite our rivalry. Before Kairi came, we were practically joined at the hip, or that's what my mom said anyway.
~*~flashback~*~
A five-year-old Sora was trailing his 6-year-old friend jumping over some of the missing planks in the bridge in a race with the boy to the tree with a star on it.
"Looks at them, the only time I see them apart is when I put Sora to sleep at night." A woman with beautiful brown hair resembling Sora's said to the lady next to her who nodded in agreement.
"They're joined at the hip almost, aren't they, Sunny?"
Sora's mom nodded, "Well, let's finish up this laundry, then we can have a cup of coffee and my place…"
~*~end flashback~*~
~*~another flashback~*~
"Aww, come on, Riku, I don't want to just sit here. It's boring." The little brunette pulled at the taller boy's sleeve.
"Then why don' you go, and I'll catch up with you later?" replied the other, staring out at the sea still, "I want to stay here a little longer…" The blue eyed child pouted and dropped his hand to his side from Riku's sleeve.
"No, I wanna be with you. And if you're staying here, then so am I." Sora plopped back down on the paopu tree stubbornly next to his friend. "I wanna be with you forever, Riku. I'm not leaving." The older boy smiled softly then ruffled the spiky hair of the younger one.
"Ok, then. We'll stay here for a little longer, and then we can go back to the main island and duel, ok?" The platinum haired boy looked to his bright who gave him his trademark smile.
"Alright, but be worried, I'm gonna beat you this time!"
~*~end flashback~*~
"Sora?"
"Hmm, what?" I looked up from my plate.
"Is something wrong? Do you not like my cooking? Are you mad at me--?"
"Huh? Kairi what are you talking about? Of course I'm not mad at you, I've always liked your cooking, and no, nothing's wrong, but what brought that on?"
"You haven't even touched your breakfast." I looked down at my pate of food again, and sure enough, the same amount of breakfast was still lingering on my plate as had been originally.
"Sorry…guess I spaced out a little." I grinned. The food was absolutely delicious, Kairi's amazing, who'd have thought we'd eat well on a raft exploration.
After a minute amount of talking, and a lot of sitting, and a little more eating of Kairi's cooking, and some more sitting, and a little bit of steering the raft, and more sitting, I decided I'd had enough; a little conversation would do everyone some good.
"So, Riku…is every day gonna be" I faked a yawn in the middle of the question to portray my boredom, "like this?"
His aquamarine eyes didn't move from their fixed spot on the horizon while he talked to me.
"Hopefully not. Depends on what we find." He paused momentarily, "if things continue like this, I guess we'll have to make adventure the old fashion way, otherwise, we'll be exploring" another pause "or something."
"Uh…how do you 'make adventure?'"
He turned to me to reveal his sparkling teeth in a large grin. "We'll cross that bridge when the time comes." He shrugged. I pouted giving him my most pitiful face I could conjure up. "Nice try, Sora, but I've been around you too long, those little puppy faces don't work on me. That's not going to get you anywhere."
"But Riku…" I whined, "How do you 'make adventure?' Come on, tell me!" Riku started laughing and I looked to Kairi for support but she was laughing too, blushing profusely. iWhat were they talking about? Arg, I don't get it. /i
"Riku!" Kairi protested, leaving me still completely in the dark as to what was going on.
Riku had the biggest grin on his face I had ever seen before. "I was only joking." He winked at her.
"So, Kairi, do you think we'll find something out there tomorrow, still?" I asked, hoping to direct the conversation to one I could understand.
"I don't know, depends on how far we get tonight, I guess."
"Then you still think there's something out there?" Riku commented more than asked.
"Well, I don't think there's any reason why there wouldn't be," Riku nodded, "What do you expect to find then, Riku? Another world still?"
"Maybe, though if fate decides to toy with me, we may find nothing, or even worse, another island."
"Well, at least we can say we found something if we find an island." I said, "And we can get off this raft, it's so small."
That evening, we watched the sky be painted with radiant pinks, oranges, and reds. It was perfect. Three friends on an adventure of their own, enjoying each other's company and nature, an ideal setting for a painting or utopia.
I sighed and leaned back against the wood of our raft. Maybe tomorrow would bring something more exciting, but it was nice to be out here with them; just the three of us.
The sun disappeared beneath the water allowing the stars to show of their brilliance to the fullest extent, and the moon to compliment them. We laid on our backs gazing at them like we'd done on Destiny Islands.
"Their pretty, aren't they?" I said softly, more to myself than anyone else.
Riku got up almost with an angry air about him. "I don't know, Sora. Do you think we can't see them? Have you ignored our former comments on Destiny Island's?" he almost shouted at me.
"What are you talking about?"
"You asked if they were pretty, do you think we can't see. Or can you not—are you blind, Sora? I thought you weren't so air headed as to ask a question as dim-witted as that."
I was stunned and paralyzed to say the least. iHad I said something wrong? I didn't mean to offend him…/i Tears slipped from my eyes rolling down my cheeks. I wasn't strong enough to hold them back. I didn't understand. i Why did Riku blow up like that? It wasn't like him…/i
"That's right," he continued to batter me, "cry like the baby you are, Sora. You'll never amount to anything more."
That stung, especially to hear it from Riku. More tears spilt from my eyes, leaving small dots on the wood of the raft.
"Sora…" Kairi said from behind Riku, but I shook my head. I didn't want to talk now.
Silently I slid into my sleeping bag and cried myself to sleep with unheard tears. i What happened? /i I was so confused.
A/N: Ahhh! Please don't kill me!! I'll explain it all in the next chapter I promise, though it may take a little longer for me to get it up, as all this before has been pre-written, and I don't have the rest of it. Sorry I didn't get this up on Friday, I was so busy packing for the beach—which was the best! Even though it was cold. ~.^ Well, what do you think? Review please!!!
Maxine: Nice to hear from you again, I'm glad to see you're still reading ^.^ I'll try to keep updating quickly, but we'll see what happens when I have all the prewritten stuff updated already ~.^ Hopefully it won't slow down too much. This really isn't intended to be a RikuxSora, though I know parts, such as the last update, could be seen that way, and that's almost intended to be so that it could be looked at from either perspective, I suppose. Hope to hear from you soon!
PIcaRDMPC: Thank you so much for the title, it's wonderful! Much better than the other one by…well a lot. ^.^ Thanks for the review! I'll look forward to another review from you again!
Angel Bliss: I'm so happy to see that you reviewed again and hopefully the end won't be bitter…well too bitter anyway, and at the moment, I have all intentions of finishing—unlike most of the other short stories I've played around with. I have the ending planned though, so that's a plus. Hope to hear from you once again! ~.^
RIA: I'll try to put his thoughts in italics, though I'm not sure if I know how, so we'll see. Yeah, general idea and I'm running! J Thank you so much for the review, I really appreciate the feedback!
~*~Sora~*~
