A/N: Well, I hope y'all liked the first chapter. I'm gonna have fun with this fic, let me tell you, and I so can't wait to do the fight scene between Maleficent and Riku! BTW, I'm playing with the break format thing again, so be warned.
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Acting purely on instinct, Riku held the card for Hollow Bastion up to the white marble door in front of him. He didn't know what he was expecting, but it certainly wasn't what he got! As soon as his eyes were done watering from the unexpected flash, he pushed on the doors, expecting to have to strain to open them, but to his surprise, they glided open silently and easily.
His eyeballs nearly rolled out of their sockets in surprise at what he saw.
"This is Maleficent's castle!" he blurted before even thinking about it. "How'd I end up here?" He closed his gaping mouth and crossed his arms thoughtfully, trying to puzzle out the recent events. "Someone must have brought me here while I was sleeping," he reasoned. "But who?"
"What you see is not real," the voice Riku had heard earlier answered. Riku nearly jumped out of his skin, not expecting to hear the voice again so soon, then gritted his teeth. It had been a rhetorical question, after all! "It's the world of your memory."
"My memory?" Riku blurted without thinking again.
"The things you remember of Maleficent's castle from your time there," the voice answered. "Those memories became a card, and that card made this world. The things you see - you've seen them all before, haven't you?"
"Yeah," Riku admitted softly, the memories quickly coming back to him. He shook them off, though, and concentrated on the immediate situation, and looked off into the depths of the castle, not knowing if he was actually looking towards the owner of the voice or not.
"So what now?" he demanded. "Am I supposed to learn something while I'm here? Maybe run into someone I know?"
"Ordinarily," the voice admitted after a short, thoughtful pause, "yes. You would meet the people in your memories."
"Ordinarily?" Riku mocked, turning it into a question. His temper frayed just a tiny bit more at the lack of an answer he recieved. "Hey, I'm asking you a question!"
He waited in vain a moment more, then snorted contemptuously and scowled, hoping the speaker saw it.
"Fine," he spat. "But it'd better be you I run across next, Voice. I'm sick of talking to thin air."
He turned on his heel and began to walk off, shoving his hands into his pockets, and coming in contact with a new set of cards. He pulled them out and looked at them, noting the familiar designs. One was a crowned heart similar to the pendant Mizu had given him when he last saw her, another card was emblazoned with the Heartless crest, and the final one bore the Kingdom Key Keyblade. For a second he puzzled what the cards could possibly be for, but the logic - or lack thereof - was fairly obvious. They were keys, like the card of Hollow Bastion had been. He needed them to get through this palace. Floor. Room. Whatever.
Deciding that any direction was as good as the next, he set off in the direction he was facing, looking around for a door, and keeping an ear open for danger. Lucky he did, otherwise the Heartless would have made short, easy prey of him.
There was a soft scrabbling noise behind him, the sound of claws trying to find a decent purchase in the smooth tile of Hollow Bastion's floors. Riku's muscles tensed instictively, and he listened hard for any accompanying Shadows. He made the mistake of forgetting that some Heartless, such as the Dark Balls and Wizards, could fly.
He was hit from behind by a large, blunt force, knocking him to his knees. In a blink, he wipped his Soul Eater out and around behind him, aiming for the Dark Ball that was bobbing tantalizingly out of reach. The Dark Ball made to swoop again, and Riku swung his blade out before him, but the Dark Ball got in past his defenses yet again. Riku knew there was a parry that would be perfect in this situation - in fact, he had just tried using it! - but he couldn't remember how to do it!
What's going on? his mind screamed in a near-panic. Why can't I remember how to fight?
"Try the cards!" someone shouted, but it was a completelly different voice than the one from earlier. This one was soft, high, and feminine - and completelly unfamiliar, which was not the case the last several times he heard a female voice in his head.
"Cards again?" he growled under his breath, ducking another blow. Then he realised what she had meant - there was another set of cards in his pockets besides the keys! He fished one out, glanced at it, and noted a detailed drawing of a move that, though effective in normal circumstances, did him no good at all right now! He tried another one, simultaneously jumping behind the Dark Ball right into the Shadow's path. Right now was actually a good time for that first card...
Remembering the technique on the card, he tried it, and performed flawlessly, dropping to one knee and swiping his sword out in front of him, taking the Shadow firmly in the shoulder with the sharp, uneven edge of the blade. The Shadow immediatelly disolved into darkness, and the card vanished.
So, he reasoned, once I use one of those cards, I can't use it again. So what happens when I run out?
That was something he really didn't want to find out when he was outnumbered by Heartless, no matter how small the margin, in the middle of a disturbingly-familiar castle. So he thought of an attack he hadn't used or tried yet, and decided on one that was completelly unorthodox at the best of times, but just might be useful against the astoundingly stupid Dark Ball Heartless.
He chucked his sword at the damned thing.
When the Dark Ball had finally dissolved into darkness, Riku fell over on his rump, out of breath, and stared at the card and jems lying on the floor where the Heartless had been.
"You have got to be kidding me," he groaned, staring at the pile in disbelief. "More cards?"
He fished around in his pockets for the cards he had used to fight with, and noticed that there was almost an entire deck of them! Each of the cards had a familiar move inscribed on them, as well as a number. One of the cards was green and showed a potion bottle on it. He could just imagine what that was for!
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A/N: Okay, I know there aren't any cards in Reverse/Rebirth, or even any combination of cards, that will allow Riku to pull of a Strike Raid, but I like the concept anyway and it's just so damned fun to pull off! Besides, Riku seems more like the "chuck things at enemies, ask questions later" type than Sora does.