By the way…I HAVE warned you about the Kouichi/Riku shonen-ai hints, and I'm doing it here again. There will be brotherly-affection things mentioned, but these are mostly friendship-and-more scenes between our two favorite Denizens of the Dark. If you don't like it, don't read it, dummy! Having several homosexual friends, I don't take well to gay-bashings, especially after multiple warnings, so just don't say anything if you don't like it. (glaring at one particular reviewer…you know who you are)

Disclaimer: I don't own Digimon, nor do I own Kingdom Hearts. I'm just a rather creative person with an overactive imagination.

Elemental Hearts - Inside/Outside

Chapter 2: Promise of a Paopu

Kouichi blinked up into the dark branches of the leafy, jungle-like tree for just a moment, then took the dark staff he'd carried since arriving here and poked the purplish blob hanging from the thin stem. "You think these are eatable?"

"Beats me." Riku sighed, pinching a vaguely-carrot-like vegetable growing out of the ground. It looked like a very unappetizing cross between a potato and an old carrot. A really old carrot. "The Heartless in this dimension have to eat something…right?"

"I guess…" Kouichi groaned softly at the stench of a punctured fruit that lay on the ground. "But do we really want to eat Heartless-chow?"

"Good point."

In perfect unison, both boys sighed. For the past couple of months, Kouichi had tended to the fire while Riku and Mickey went looking for food, but once the dark-haired boy was strong enough to defend himself without help, it had seamed only fair to draw straws for their nightly duties. That is, until they got into the trees and realized that neither of the teens had any idea which foods were eatable and which would kill them at first bite.

"We could always get a little of everything." Kouichi volunteered. "And have Mickey-san help us sort it out."

Riku shook his head. He didn't really understand, even though Kouichi had quite kindly explained it to him, why the other teen couldn't just call people by their names. He had added the -san ending to Mickey's name since the day they had met, but for several weeks he had called the silver-haired boy Riku-sempai before switching to a simple -kun. Kouichi said it had something to do with the culture of the world he came from, but Riku didn't really understand it.

"Unless, of course…They've got poison in the skins and we'll swell up like balloons if we touch them."

"That would be unfortunate." Kouichi allowed, sighing again as his friend straightened.

Riku sighed, stretching his shoulder, then paused when something caught his eye. Something somewhat familiar. "Hey…Lookit that."

Kouichi turned slightly in the way his friend was pointing. About twenty feet away was a very large tree, one that would have been easily over twelve feet tall had it been growing straight. As it was, it grew in an almost horizontal pattern, sticking out over the outcrop of a small hill like a mast's head. It looked vaguely like a palm tree, except that the trunk was coal-ash black and its leaves were a wild blood red.

Riku was pointing to the large fruits sticking out of the red leaves. They were star-shaped and a kind of plum color, a very dark purple. In truth, it was one of the strangest things the boys had ever seen, and that was saying something.

"Well, these are…interesting." Kouichi muttered as they made their way over. He took one into his hand without removing it from the tree, running his fingers over it contemplatively.

"Yeah…" Riku's eye got a kind of faraway look in them, and his voice had gotten a bit light-headed.

Kouichi gave his friend a strange look. "Riku-kun? Is something wrong?"

The silver-haired figure shook himself. "Ah…It's nothing, really. I was just…thinking."

Kouichi let him stew on it a moment, keeping his face politely impassive and going back to examining the fruit carefully. It didn't take long before this was rewarded by the slightly-older boy's explanation. "It…looks like something that grew…on our island."

Kouichi's ears perked slightly in curiosity. "Really? The world you grew up in?"

"Yeah…" Riku looked up at the fruits contemplatively. "It was called a Paopu fruit. It looked just like this, except it was yellow."

"That's unusual." Kouichi mentioned, raising an eyebrow. "We've never found anything that looked like it came from our worlds before, have we?"

"Not that I know of." Riku looked up at one of the fruits, his hand still on the Soul Stealer's hilt, then broke into a laughing smile. "You know…there was a legend that went with the Paopu. Something the kids used to play with."

"What's that?"

Riku smiled, reaching up to take one of the fruits in his hand and pluck it deftly from the branch. "The legend was that if you shared a single Paopu with someone you really cared for, it would bind the two destinies together forever."

He laughed suddenly, a low, joyful chuckling sound. Kouichi turned to him with a slightly confused smile. "What? What is it?"

"Oh, just a flashback." Riku shook his head jollily, closing his eyes in wake of the wide smile on his lips. "I remember…Just before I left the island, I was teasing Sora about his crush on Kairi…The girl we hung out with."

Kouichi nodded in understanding, motioning for him to continue, which he did. "Anyway…He and I were arguing again, over the raft we'd made. Over the name. So we had a race, like we always did when we argued. And I told him that whoever won got to share a Paopu with Kairi. The look he got was priceless!"

"That's kinda mean." Kouichi said softly, though he was still smiling. "Didn't you like Kairi, too?"

"Nah…" Riku's face relaxed slightly as he opened his eyes again. "She was our friend, and the reason I thought about going to other worlds…but I didn't like her in that way. She was Sora's girl, through and through, even if he didn't have the sense to realize it."

Kouichi shook his head. He was getting to know this as 'Typical Riku'. "So…Who won?"

"Hm?"

"The race. Who won?"

"Me." Riku's grin widened even more. "You should've seen that look of his, too, especially when I told him it was a joke. Priceless, simply priceless."

Kouichi couldn't help himself. He chuckled softly, shaking his head in a 'tut-tut, bad boy'-mothering manner, his shaggy, dark hair blowing back slightly in the wind. He reached out and took the strange purple fruit out of Riku's hand. The silver-haired boy, who had almost forgotten he was holding it, glanced at his companion in confusion.

Kouichi didn't pay him any mind, taking the odd produce in both hands and deftly pulling it into two pieces. He held one out to Riku. "Wanna try it?"

"Huh?" Riku raised an eyebrow, slightly taken aback.

"It's the first thing we've found that looks eatable." Kouichi shrugged, still holding out half of the strange fruit. "We might as well see what it tastes like. Same time?"

Riku's eyebrow raised a bit, but took the piece offered to him. It was warm and juicy, with a very tangy, almost inviting smell. He sniffed it once, then glanced at Kouichi. "On three?"

The dark haired boy nodded, lifting his own half. "One…"

"Two…" Riku added, bringing the fruit to his lips as they both took a deep breath.

"Three!"

With the close of their simultaneous command, the two boys bit down on the soft, gooey flesh of the fruit. The juice squirted into their mouths, filling their senses with a wonderfully sickening sweet-yet-sharp flavor that didn't quite remind them of anything they'd ever tasted, but was somehow pleasantly filling all the same. They swallowed at almost the same time as well, enjoying the cool, refreshing feeling as it ran down their throats easily.

For a moment, they just glanced at each other. Then Riku spoke. "So…Feel anything?"

"Nope. You?"

"Nothing." Riku sighed and smirked. "Guess it's safe then, huh?"

"Guess so."

Riku glanced up into the tree, taking another bite of his half of the fruit. "There aren't too many of them. Looks like three more that might be ripe…I think."

"That'll do it. One each." Kouichi nodded, reaching up to pluck another one, then settled down to take a small nibble of his own half. "Think Mickey'll mind having one fruit for dinner?"

"Nah. He's pretty easy going about this kind of thing." Riku finished off his part of the first fruit, pulling out the Soul Stealer to cut a stubborn one loose. "Besides, if he did mind he'd have taught us what to get."

Kouichi couldn't help but lick his fingers a little, getting the last bit of juice from his now-eaten half. Taking his staff in one hand and the whole fruit in the other, he followed behind Riku as they made their way back with their 'spoils'.

And somewhere above them, the darkened stars winked into existence as though smiling at each other.

TBC…

Riku doesn't understand the endings, but I do. -San is the equivalent of 'Mr.' or 'Mrs.' -Kun is what you call young boys (and sometimes young girls with more boy-like names like Tohru or Botan) who are your friends. -Sempai is an ending or a name by itself for upperclassmen, superiors or older co-workers. Kouichi called Riku sempai at first because they're two years apart, but started calling him Riku-kun when he got to know him as a friend.