·§·§·§·
Everything was silent. A blanket of soundlessness had fallen over this world, it seemed. Silence Sora had learned to associate with the eerie atmosphere of Hollow Bastion. The dark corridors and the deep chambers: dead, forgotten, profoundly asleep.
Sora looked up, craning his neck as far back as it would go. The rain had stopped, but the tall buildings still glistened, wet. Bright neon signs and large screens greeted his sight, silent witnesses of Sora's leisure stroll through the paved streets.
The young man came to a stop in front of a building where a neon star –or was it a paopu?—blared its light, unblinking. He looked down, feeling his feet suddenly damp; he had stepped onto a puddle and splashed water all around, but it hadn't made a single sound.
Bewildered, Sora stepped more forcefully into the puddle. Nothing. Agitated, he tried his voice, but no sound came. Or rather, he couldn't hear it; he had definitely felt his vocal chords vibrate. At that, something icy flood filled his gut and Sora realized it was fear.
Was he deaf? It couldn't be—could it?
As this awful realization hit him, sending wrenching shudders down his spine, a dark figure stepped into Sora's vision field and stood still, only a few feet away, in the middle of the soggy street. Sora tensed; it seemed to be a cloaked man, not a heartless, but he couldn't be sure and now he couldn't hear, and and—
"We all lose something here, Sora," said a very peculiar, very familiar voice from the depths of the hood. Sora gave an involuntary step forward.
"Riku!" His voice said, but he heard nothing. Puzzled, Sora halted, raising a trembling hand to his left ear. Odd that, he had heard Riku's voice so clearly… He looked up in time to see the man draw back his trenchcoat's hood, revealing a mop of very pale hair. He was definitely Riku and he seemed to be wearing a blindfold, of sorts.
Two very distinct feelings surged on Sora's mind; he didn't know what to react to first. Here Riku was, he had found him at last, but…
"Why can't I hear myself?"
"We all lose something," repeated Riku, taking a steady step forward. "You're deaf, Sora." He sounded pained.
Sora shook his head; his previous certainty had given over to denial. "No, I can still hear you!"
The shadow of a smile ghosted over Riku's lips as he raised one gloved hand to remove the blindfold. Sea-green eyes glinted in the neon light as he focused them on Sora.
"Just as I can still see you."
·§·§·§·