Author's Notes: So here's the answer to the cliffie! I'm sorry if it seems a little flaky. I'm not satisfied with how all the bad luck and such ties together, but let's just ignore it and have fun with the plot, hmmmm? Good.

Knowing me I'm probably going to find some way to tie up all these loose ends later.

THANK YOU FOR YOUR REVIEWS! Now let's see some more. The muse demands more food. (She's a fickle pig, anyway.)

WARNING: This chapter contains no lemons BUT IT COMES DAMN CLOSE. If you don't want to hear half-assed brinkmanship descriptions of a lemon (of which there is none, as has been stated, but it's an ALMOST-LEMON), then skip it.

Chapter 22

"Full Circle"

Tidus was worried when Sora didn't come back five minutes after they got to the house.

Roxas joined him in that worry when fifteen minutes passed, and looked warily at the phone.

"Hey…man…" he whimpered, "Dude, I think Sora…"

Tidus stared out the window at that terrible house, biting his lip. "We should call the police…" When silence passed, Tidus rushed for his phone and picked it up. He was instantly given a rapid beeping noise, like a busy tone…or a dead line.

"FUCK!" Tidus slammed it down into the phone cradle.

"What, what?"

"The lines are dead!"

"How the hell?" Roxas stared at the piece of machinery incredulously. "What if we tried to warn someone?"

Tidus paced frantically, fingers running through my hair. "It's my fault. I should have seen this coming…fuck, Jesus Christ, it's all my fault!"

"Forget about that! Come on, hurry, let's find someone who's home!"

So Tidus and Roxas rushed outside, and rushed to a one Mr. Lorry's house. The man was in a wheelchair, so when he opened up the door, he was at their level.

"Mr. Lorry!" Tidus cried, "You've got to help us! Our friend got kidnapped by Ansem, and—"

"What's all this?" Lorry demanded. "Shouldn't you boys be in school?"

"Feck school!" Roxas snapped. "Ansem's got our friend Sora hostage!"

Lorry frowned. "I hardly find that believable."

"It's true!" Tidus waved frantically to Ansem's house. "Ansem's a pedophile and he's home! He's home right now!"

Lorry coiled back. "A pedophile? Absurd! You boys are horrible! Ansem is at work. His car isn't even in the driveway. Shouldn't you be in school?"

Roxas and Tidus both stared at Mr. Lorry with dumbstruck expressions. What. The. Fuck.

"Come inside. I'm going to keep you here until I've phoned your parents."

"You can't, the lines are dead!"

"I have a cell phone."

Tidus stuttered. "But Sora—"

Lorry turned around and started wheeling inside. "Is probably at school like you two should be. Now—"

But the boys were gone with the door slammed shut before Mr. Lorry could protest.

It was the same at every other house they tried. And so the boys ended up running circles until their parents came home and yelled at them. Tidus was the one who tried hardest to argue with Edea.

"Please, Mom, please just go check Ansem's house!"

"Ansem is at work," Edea growled, "I'm surprised you skipped school, Tidus! And for this! Of all things, I would have thought better of—"

"MOM! Ansem is a pedophile!" Tidus' voice was frantically loud now. "He's got Sora in his house and he's been hurting Riku! You need to listen to me!"

"How can I believe what you're saying when you've already lied to me to skip school?" Edea said, crossing her arms. "Tidus, I am very disappointed in you."

"EDEA!" he screamed. "PLEASE! This is important! If you don't go and check, Sora's going to get raped! It's my fault, I dragged him into it! I made him go inside to take pictures in Ansem's house!" It all came spilling out now, and Edea's eyes widened.

"You did what?"

"We wanted to get proof that Ansem was a pedophile! He's been beating and raping Riku for the last FOUR YEARS, Mom! We had to do something!"

"I don't believe this! If Ansem is such a horrible man, why didn't you think to tell the adults!"

Tidus threw his arms up. "Because you would never listen!"

"Of course I won't listen now, I can't even be sure you're telling me the truth! Tidus, don't you remember how to think straight? Ugh…" Edea rubbed her forehead. "What happened to the boy I raised…where's Sora?"

"IN ANSEM'S HOUSE!"

"You mean he got on the bus, unlike you two."

Tidus got caught up in his panic and made a grave error. "Yes—I mean, no! NO! Dammit!" He clenched his hair. "No, no, he's in that house! Please just check!"

"Go to your room, Tidus."

"Mom, please!"

Edea thrust an angry finger at the stairs. "I won't hear any more of this garbage! Go to your room! You're grounded until I say you've served your sentence, Tidus. No phone, no Internet, and no going out to play Blitzball with your friends. You will go to school every school day, and when school is over you will come straight home and do your homework. Other than that, the only activity you can do is read. Am I clear?"

"This isn't fair!" Tidus shrieked. "I'm telling you the truth, Mom, I'm—"

"YOU are grounded and are slimming your chances of being ungrounded!" Edea snapped. "Go to your room—now!"

Tidus yelled out all his anger in one clear roar, and bolted up the stairs, slamming the door behind him and locking it. He would find a way to fix this. He had to. If he didn't, Sora was doomed.

It had been simple, really. He "drove home" around two o'clock, thus sealing his alibi, and with plenty of time to have fun with little Sora. Riku was cooperative, of course, like he was in everything else. He had to be. He owned this house, and he owned Riku. If Riku disobeyed, well…

His life would turn to Hell.

Ansem descended into the basement, closing the door behind him, a smile on his dark face. Riku was sitting in a chair, staring at the ground beneath his feet, ashamed to look at the form of his naked friend roped to the wall. He chuckled and tilted Riku's face up.

"Don't feel bad, pet. He was misbehaving. He deserves this punishment." Ansem leaned in close and whispered in Riku's ear, "Don't you agree?"

He heard a thrashing from the wall. "Get away from him!"

Ansem looked over and smirked, seeing Sora's angry glare. Ooooh, that was delicious. He was gorgeous when he was angry. What a pretty catch. He should foster someone from the country next time. And Sora must be so innocent…untainted… It's perfect, Ansem thought.

"Aah good. You're awake. I hope the chloroform didn't make you too drowsy."

Sora glared hatefully at Ansem. "Let me down from here!" He snapped, pulling at his roped bonds. Never mind that he was naked (and more than a little scared), he wanted to be out of here and report this fucker!

"Riku!" Sora looked at the teen. "Riku, help me down!"

Riku's fingers twitched, but there was no other response. Sora was awestruck.

"What's the matter with you? Why are you helping him!"

"He's helping me because I own him." Ansem explained, picking out a knife from a nearby table. "Good pets obey their masters."

Sora snarled at him. "You're a sick, twisted, motherfucking bastard, and you're going straight to Hell!"

Sora was answered by a slap across the face. He bit his lip, his cheek stinging. "I'd think it wise that you stay quiet," Ansem told him. "I'm much nicer to my toys when they don't talk back to me like little brats."

Sora spat at him, "Fuck you!"

Ansem slapped him again. Riku flinched where he sat, but remained stone-still. Sora shook his head to regain his senses and tried to talk to him.

"Riku…you don't have to listen to him! He doesn't own you! You're your own person, you can make your own decisions!"

"Quiet!"

"He can't hurt you if you don't let him!"

Ansem sliced that blade through the air. Sora yelped and flattened against the wall as a clean streak of red appeared across his chest. It wasn't deep, but it was bleeding. He gasped when Ansem wound an arm around him and he squirmed, but Ansem held him tight and grabbed his ass, giving it a squeeze. Sora thought he would hurl.

"Get your hands off me!"

"I can't," Ansem said with a grin. "That would be neglecting a perfectly good toy."

Sora hissed as Ansem stroked his thighs, thinking he was going to be sick. "I'm not a toy!"

"Maybe not yet, but you will be." Ansem nuzzled Sora's neck, and no matter how far away Sora craned his neck, Ansem followed and kept his lips there, kissing him. Sora knew he was going to hurl. Right after the butterflies and his racing, panicked heart slowed down or went away.

"Riku—"

"Crying to him won't help you." Ansem murmured. "Riku listens to everything I tell him to do. He brought you to me, after all."

"That's because he's scared of you!" Sora cried. "How can you do this to him? Riku was so beautiful, and you destroyed that! You're a demon!" And that was putting it lightly, as far as Sora was concerned.

Sora gulped when the bloodied blade of Ansem's knife pressed against his throat.

"One more word out of you, and you will go home dead."

It was an empty threat. Sora could already see a tent forming in Ansem's pants (which made him once again fall ill). Unless the fucker was a necrophiliac, he wasn't going to die any time soon…was he? Sora was starting to lose some of his confidence as Ansem's hands roamed his body. He knew he had no way of fighting back; he knew he couldn't stop it. But he tried his damndest. He had to. He wouldn't let Ansem rape him—at least, not without a fight!

Sora squealed and flinched away when Ansem tried to grab him below and thrashed out of the way whenever Ansem tried again. Ansem snarled and slapped him, pinning him to the wall.

"Stand still, you brat! I want to see what you're like when you're hard…"

Sora shook his head. "In your dreams! I'd never get turned on by a bastard like you!"

Ansem laughed. "Teenagers have such a substantial amount of hormones in their body. I don't think you'll have much of a choice. I can always give you an aphrodisiac."

Sora felt his knees get weak and wrenched his eyes shut. Tears pricked the edges of them as Ansem started to touch him. He knew what an aphrodisiac was—Kairi explained how rapists in her home town always used them—but either way, he didn't want to give himself over to this man.

"Stop!" he begged. "Stop touching me! Get off!"

"Are you a virgin?" Ansem asked, completely ignoring Sora's pleas. Sora didn't answer to it. Instead, he looked desperately over at Riku, who was sitting there doing nothing, hands clutching the sides of his head.

"Riku—"

Ansem slapped him again. "Leave my pet alone! You're mine for the day, boy, so you'd damn well better listen to me if you want to leave here in one piece!"

Ansem's fingers thrust into a bodily hole that was not meant to be probed by fingers, and Sora wailed. The pain shot right up his spine. His brain was rattled with it. His resolve dropped like a rock, and the tears that had gathered streamed down his cheeks to make fresh rivers. If Ansem was going to rape him...he didn't even want to think about how much that was going to hurt. This pain was already unbearable.

Ansem just grinned with delight, his fingers buried between the cheeks of Sora's ass. "I love it when they're fresh," he said, the sentence more of a primal growl. Sora lurched inside and clenched his fists, his toes curling, every hair on his body standing up on end from the agony.

He couldn't escape this…could he?

He was screwed.

Literally, Sora thought, and that made him even more upset.

Riku closed his eyes and covered his ears. More to drown out the sound of the Voice than anything else. The minutes passed by, and all he did was sit there, listening to Sora's screams and pleas for help, and Ansem's angry shouts and satisfied purrs, the way he talked dirty like he always did with him. It was enough to make him spill out his entire stomach, but he blocked it, and he tried desperately to ignore the Voice in his head.

You had to do it. He was going to endanger you!

Sora doesn't deserve this…

He was going to expose Ansem. He was going to ruin you. Ansem would kill you!

Ansem's going to rape him!

It's a dog-eat-dog world out there. Sora just jumped into the fray.

Riku shook his head and mumbled something to himself, and then he suddenly got his head yanked up. He looked into Ansem's eyes for only a fraction of a second before the man backhanded him, and he was flung sideways, crumpling to the floor.

"No!" Sora cried. Ansem pointed to the sybian machine that he was demanding Sora sit down on to penetrate himself, having him strapped on a collar and leash.

"Do it, or I'll have fun with my pet instead."

Riku looked up momentarily from the floor to see a confused and horrified Sora with his backside hovering over a cruel rubber penis. Ansem had the control in his hand, and was ready to start it up. He just wanted Sora to sit. Sora was clearly torn between submitting to rape or letting Riku take the hit, and Riku just stared at him with dull eyes.

"Trust me, this is a brilliant way to break you in." Ansem explained. "It worked very well with Riku."

Riku cast his eyes down. Yes, he remembered that thing quite well, and it had been horrible. Ansem made him use it for hours at a time, and more recently it would just be to watch him climax multiple times. He heard more arguing from Ansem and Sora and retreated into his own world again.

Does Sora really deserve this?

He deserves every bit of it, the Voice said. He was going to destroy you.

Ansem destroys me! I hate him! Riku grit his teeth.

And Sora was going to—

I HATE him.

The Voice froze again. This reaction wasn't expected. The fire flared up again, and the Voice burned. Riku clenched his teeth behind pursed lips, hearing Sora whimper in protest to entry.

I want you to hold on, Riku. His mother's voice echoed in his head. I want you to hold on and to never let go.

That sentence reminded him of one of his fantasies. The fantasies he kept secret from Ansem when he thought about him. He could see his hands wrapping around that cursed neck and cutting off its air, he could picture Ansem's eyes rolling as he clawed and gasped for air to try and be pulled back into his lungs, and Riku wouldn't allow it. Keep your fire strong, Riku.

The hatred boiled.

Sora cried.

And the Juggernaut snapped.

Riku saw red as he jumped up and rushed that motherfucking bastard that he'd hated for the past four years of his life. His ears tuned out the world as his fist connected hard with Ansem's jaw. The man crumpled to the floor, and Ansem tried to fight back, and Riku caught the fist Ansem flung at him; he grabbed that control and snapped it in half.

"Riku, what are you doing!"

Riku glared at Ansem with such a high concentration of anger and hate that, for once, Ansem was the one looking up in fear. All in that moment, Riku's fantasies suddenly poured free from his mind, and he ran so rampant that even he lost track of what was going on. He took a broken piece of the plastic to the controller and dug it into Ansem's shoulder, pinning him down, straddling his torso with his other hand pulling at Ansem's silvery hair, gray with age unlike his own, young and starved of pigment. Ansem screamed painfully and Riku ignored him. Just like Ansem always ignored him.

He cut at Ansem's body, left him bleeding at the arms and sides and even a slice across his collarbone, and he punched him with uncontrolled strength, the rage of four years bottled up suddenly exploding in less than a second. He beat and battered that disgusting body until he couldn't tell what was bruised and what was blood. Then he stared down at it, and when he lifted up his hands Ansem flinched and covered his face. Riku got a psychotic grin of satisfaction on his face, and he clamped his hands down around Ansem's neck, cutting off his air. He squeezed until his knuckles were white, and he could see dents in the flesh where his nails dug into it.

Now DIE, you fucking BASTARD!

Sora watched on, stunned. He'd never seen Riku so mad. He'd thought it had been bad before… Wait, Riku!

Sora looked hesitantly at the sybian machine under him and quickly clambered off. Ansem had the foresight to cuff his hands when taking him down from the wall, and he was still naked with the collar and leash around his neck.

"Riku!" he cried. "Riku, stop it!"

Riku didn't listen to him. He mumbled a few things under his breath, watching as Ansem clawed uselessly at his arms, bleeding and probably with several broken bones and a dislocated jaw. Sora crawled along the floor.

"Stop it, Riku!" He knew Riku must be angry now, but he didn't expect for him to kill Ansem! To Sora, their safety was more important than the death of the attacker. They had to get away from here. He got up on his knees and flung his arms over Riku's head, pulling him over, and Riku shouted a muddled curse that Sora couldn't translate.

"Riku!" Sora grappled with the other's strength, gritting his teeth. "Ansem's not going anywhere!" he hissed. "Riku! Riku, listen to me!" Ansem's eyes started to roll as he slowly fell silent. He wasn't dead yet, but he would be.

"Let's get out of here, Riku…we can leave now! You've done enough!"

"I haven't done enough until this motherfucking pedophile is DEAD!" Riku snarled, his fingers making bloody crescents in Ansem's dark flesh. Sora held him tight and hissed in his ear:

"You've done plenty! Enough is enough! You can be free, Riku!"

It worked. Riku stopped quite nearly on a dime. He kept his pressure steady for a moment, and then, slowly, his fingers released Ansem's neck. Sora kept his arms around him.

"See? He's a mess. It's good enough. You can leave here and he won't stop you…"

Riku tuned out Sora's words as he patted down Ansem's body. His fingers brushed over the half-hard bulge in Ansem's pants (he grit his teeth when he felt it and gave it a painful squeeze just for spite), and to the left, metal that jingled. He shoved his fingers into Ansem's pocket and pulled out his car keys.

Keys near your keys, he thought. Predictable fucker.

He blindly wrapped a fumbling arm around Sora and stood up, and he cautiously scurried away from Ansem's body, staring at it like a work of art to be admired. Ansem didn't even twitch. As far as Riku could care, he was as good as dead. He took careful steps backwards up the stairs, still clutching the keys in his hands. Sora was still naked as he carried him, and then he slammed the basement door shut, and ran for the front door.

He could leave.

He could leave.

"R-Riku? What are you doing?" Riku ignored Sora and flung open Ansem's passenger car door, pushing Sora inside. Get away, get far away—he had to do that, and Sora had to come with him, or else they would both be hurt.

"Riku…?" Sora's voice began to express worry as Riku got into the driver's seat, both doors shut, and turned the key. He'd earned his driver's license, but Ansem never let him drive. That didn't stop him from keeping it in his pocket. The brick-red Sedan hummed to life, and Riku shifted gears and locked the doors. Sora's eyes widened.

"Riku?"

"Shut up and buckle!" Riku snapped, glaring at him without meaning to, his knuckles still covered in Ansem's blood as he slammed on the gas and staggered the car out of the driveway at thirty miles an hour, all in broad daylight as he sped out of the cul-de-sac. Sora didn't even have the time, nor the mental strength to protest, except to look frightfully out the window as they drove towards the freeway.

For the first time, successfully, Riku ran away.

Author's Notes: And thus ends the explosive "Part One" of this story. But is it over yet...? NO, I SAY!