The Night Within My Eyes

Description: A sequel to Kingdom Hearts II. When a Gummi Ship crashes into Disney Castle, King Mickey calls on Sora and Riku to help a previously unknown world rid itself of some very familiar Heartless. Eventual pairing: RikuxOC, plus some SoraxKairi because they're cute. Rated T because I can't see myself ever writing K.

Disclaimer: Kingdom Hearts and its characters are the property of Square-Enix. But you knew that already.

A/N: Good grief this chapter is long! But it's a really important one, so I didn't want to cut it down any.

Some sweet SoraxKairi here. Also, a summary of KH, COM, and KH2. I know I warned against spoilers at the beginning, but I'm doing it again. Seriously, read at your own risk.

Ten

"Okay, then it's decided," Sora announced. "Donald, Goofy, and Kairi will stay here to guard the camp and push the front line while Riku, Yuko, and I go around the line to attack Dilan and Braig and take out as many Heartless as we can in between."

He paused and ran his blue eyes over everyone present. When his gaze met Riku's, the older boy nodded in agreement.

Sora continued, "Once we've secured Midgar, the three of us will move on to Balamb, break into the fortress, and defeat the remaining apprentices. Once they're gone, we should be able to get rid of any leftover Heartless without trouble."

"Sounds good," Donald said.

"Yup," Goofy concurred.

Riku glanced out of the corner of his eye towards Yuko. I've been doing that a lot lately. Well, she needs more support than the rest of us right now. The girl sat in complete silence, staring hard at Sora and no one else. After she had stormed out, the President had told them that a close friend of hers had fallen while she was away. That had caused the anger against King Mickey, and that Riku understood. But she had completely closed herself down, speaking only when necessary, as if she were some kind of robot.

Braig said something to her. Riku remembered the evil sneer on the apprentice's face as he ran towards the fountain in Sora's wake. He had clearly been talking to Yuko, waving his arms about and grinning like an idiot. What had he said to upset her so much?

The meeting around him concluded, and Devalin stood, offering to show them to places where they could sleep. Riku rose along with the others and followed the President out. He noted with confusion that Yuko did not come along, but then he realized she must already have a room of her own somewhere else.

Devalin led them to an abandoned office building that the soldiers had turned into a barracks through the addition of several cots thrown into various rooms. He found three unoccupied rooms with two cots each and, after apologizing for the meager accommodations, left them to rest. Donald and Goofy immediately plopped down into their beds and fell asleep, but Sora and Kairi agreed that they were not tired yet. They decided to explore the city a bit and wished Riku a good night before leaving together.

Left alone with the snoring duck and dog next door, Riku lay back in a cot and tried to sleep. He soon realized the attempt was hopeless. His mind kept playing back images from the day, most of them memories of Yuko's face. The sadness in the Gummi ship. The terrible fury directed at the King. The cold emptiness following the encounter with Braig. And over and over again, the pure joy that had held her for one fleeting moment.

She's so unstable. Her mood swings are insane. Why do I care so much about them? She smiles at me one minute and then screams at me the next. Why do I want to help her so much? Because she reminds me of me? Because I know what a horrible experience she's been through? Why do I even care?

Because her smile is so wonderful it hurts?

Riku sat up in defeat. There was no way he was getting to sleep tonight. He swung his legs off the cot and stood up, deciding to take a walk in the hopes that it would clear his head.

Outside, he wandered through the empty streets of Midgar. The lights he had seen from above sparkled down on him, but they had a coldness to them that they hadn't had before. They were, after all, simply illuminating a glorified ghost town. Without the people to fill it with life, the city had no heart. Like a giant Nobody. He shook his head violently to force the thought away.

As he approached a corner, he heard the soft sound of voices. He stopped and listened until he recognized them. Sora and Kairi. Riku smiled and continued walking towards them. But as he rounded the corner, he stopped and slowly slid back into the shadows.

They had found a small playground and had climbed up to the top of a covered slide made in the shape of some kind of animal. They were sitting on its large plastic head, their backs to him, gazing out at the night sky and talking. Kairi had her head on Sora's shoulder, and he had slipped an arm around her to support her back.

"You believe in me, right?" he asked her, continuing their conversation.

"Of course I do," she replied. "It's just that you'll be gone awhile and … I'm gonna miss you while you're away." She lifted her head and gazed into his face.

I should definitely not be here, Riku thought as Sora turned his head to look at her. Their faces were very close together. I should go and give them their privacy. But his feet did not move. He rather wanted to see if Sora would finally go through with it.

"I'm gonna miss you too, Kairi," he said to her softly.

Go on. Kiss her.

His face broke out into a wide grin. "But we'll be back before you know it. You'll see."

Idiot. Riku shook his head to himself, partly at Sora's continued obliviousness and partly at his own desire to see them finally together without question. Wait. What? He raised a hand to his chest in surprise. Where was the pain he normally felt when they were together?

Kairi had continued to talk. "I know, but I wish I had something to help me get through the long wait." She lifted a hand and gently touched Sora's cheek. "You know, something to remember you by." Before Sora could react, she leaned up with her body and pulled down with her hand to bring his lips in contact with hers. His eyes blinked in surprise for a second but soon fluttered closed, and his other arm wove around her waist to hold her to him. They kissed sweetly for several seconds before pulling away to smile lovingly at each other, foreheads touching.

In the shadows, Riku smiled. There. As it should be. Now I should leave. This time, his feet obeyed, and he turned and walked back the way he had come.

He had no idea how long he walked; he only knew that his feet continued to move in a forward direction. Eventually, he realized that he had found some train tracks and that he had automatically begun to follow them. Lifting his head slightly, he noticed he was coming up on a small station. Once he reached it, he jumped up on the platform and continued to walk, seeing no reason to stop.

"Hey, are you stalking me or something?"

The unexpected voice made Riku jump. He turned towards it, blinking in surprise, and saw Yuko sitting on one of the benches.

"What? No, I --"

She smiled and laughed gently. "It's okay. I could see you weren't really looking for me." She lowered her eyes and leaned back against the wall. "You can go on back to your walk. I'm sorry I interrupted you."

This far from the city center, the number of lights had decreased, and shadows coated the corners and walls of the station. Even so, Riku could see the pain on Yuko's face as she hid within the darkness. He knew she probably wanted him just to move on, but he could not bring himself to do it. Not if there was even the slightest chance he could clear that expression from her face.

"I wasn't going anywhere important," he told her. "I can keep you company if you want."

She raised her eyes at that and stared at him. He held her gaze, trying to seem nonchalant about it even though inside he fervently hoped she would not turn him away. He understood the desire to be alone, to deal with things in your own way, but there came a point when a heart needed help, even if it didn't want it, and after what had happened today, he believed she had reached that point.

After a long, tense silence, she answered, "Okay."

Suppressing his sigh of relief, he walked over to the bench and sat down next to her. She refused to look at him, staring instead at the space between her feet. He leaned his head back against the wall and looked up at the stars. "Can I ask you a question?"

"Sure, but I may not answer it."

"Fair enough. What did Braig say to you?"

She winced slightly and turned her head even further away. When she said nothing for several heartbeats, Riku thought she would not answer him, but finally she said, "He asked me to join them."

Riku sat up straight with a jolt. He had not expected that! "What? How could he be dumb enough to think you'd even consider it?" He nearly laughed at the idiocy of the idea. "Join them to fight against your home and your friends? No way!"

"I know," she replied. "I told him I'd rather die."

The way she said this caught Riku's attention. He thought a minute about how upset she had been, how upset she still was. Surely one empty offer of alliance would not shake her this badly. He asked her, "Was that all he said?"

Again, she did not answer for a long time. Then, instead of responding to his question, she picked up a photograph that had been lying next to her and handed it to him without explanation. Riku looked at it. Two boys and a girl smiled up at him. One of the boys, a blond with a fair amount of muscle, was waving at the camera and grinning madly. The other boy, taller and thinner than the first, smiled more subtly from under his black bangs. The girl stood between them, each arm linked with one of their elbows. Riku blinked at the picture of the girl in the dim light. Her face looked a bit like Yuko's, but she was blonde with sparkling blue eyes. A sister maybe?

Yuko began to talk. "When I went back to my room, I started looking through my old things. I wanted to find something to remind me of happier times, and I came across this picture." She pointed to the taller boy. "This is Vincent. He's the one who …"

"Devalin told us," Riku informed her quietly so that she would not have to explain.

She nodded and continued. "The other boy is my friend Zell. I haven't seen him in years. I don't know where he is or if he's even still alive." She fell silent again, seemingly finished.

"Who's the girl?" Riku finally asked.

Yuko smiled although there was no happiness in the gesture. "That's me."

Riku's head shot up, and he stared at Yuko who was watching him carefully. "You?"

"Yes. That's what I looked like before they put me in the machine." She turned her head away again, as if she could not bear to see herself as she once was. The movement brought the single lock of golden hair directly into Riku's line of sight. He felt the urge to reach out and run his fingers along it, but he kept his hands to himself. She would definitely not take it the way he intended.

"Yuko, I … I don't know what to say. 'I'm sorry' seems so meaningless."

She shrugged. "You don't have to say anything. As Dev would say, it's in the past. The girl in that picture is dead." She carefully took the photograph back and replaced it on the bench next to her. "I just wish," she sighed, "I understood who I am now and where I belong. I am not going with Braig, but I don't belong here either. There's just so much darkness in my heart." She lifted a hand and covered her chest sadly. She continued softly, "I'm fighting it all the time. I'm not even sure why anymore. I thought at first I could beat it and get my old self back, but I know now that will never happen. A heart that has fallen into darkness can never resurface back to the light."

"Sure it can," he told her. And when she raised an eyebrow at him in skepticism, he added, "Mine did."

Yuko's hand fell away from her chest. She stared at him with a mixture of confusion, doubt, and hope. "What?"

And Riku told her. About how much he had wanted to get off his little island and how his heart, responding to that desire, opened the door to darkness. About meeting Maleficent and how she used his natural jealousy of Sora to convince him that the younger boy had forgotten him and Kairi and replaced them with Donald, Goofy, and the glory of the Keyblade. How she had found Kairi for him and how he had grieved when he discovered she had lost her heart. How Maleficent had fed on that grief to fill him with thoughts of power and darkness: He should have been the Keybearer, not Sora. If he could take it back through the strength of his heart, he could use it to obtain Kingdom Hearts and save Kairi.

"And I did take it, briefly. But then Sora won it back from me, and I fled in despair. And that's when Ansem found me."

"Ansem? Ansem the Wise who the King told me about?"

"No. The Heartless of Xehanort who took Ansem's name after banishing him to darkness. He convinced me to open myself to darkness, and then when I did, he took over my body and threw me away."

Riku talked about walking through the world of darkness, nothing but a strong heart clinging to his identity. About hearing the King's voice call to him and guide him to the door where Sora waited. About closing the door with him and the King still inside, seeing Sora's face disappear.

He told her of waking up in Castle Oblivion and of climbing through the basements. Of fighting the Organization with the King's help. Of dealing with DiZ's tests and mind games. Of struggling with Xehanort who wanted his heart and body back for himself. Of his realization that he could embrace both the light and the darkness he possessed and walk the path between. Of meeting Naminé and deciding to refuse her offer to lock Xehanort away forever, wanting instead to triumph over him in his own way.

And he told her of Sora's destroyed memories, the handiwork of Naminé. How DiZ surmised that using Roxas would aid her as she rebuilt them. How Riku had sought Roxas, found him, fought him, and lost. And how he had realized that, in order to beat Roxas, he would have to call on the darkness again.

"When I first looked into a mirror and saw Ansem's orange eyes staring out at me from my own face, I nearly backed down and gave up. But then I thought of Sora -- how much he meant to me, how strong our friendship was even after all the stuff I did to him -- and I knew I could and would go through with it. So I bound my eyes and went after Roxas again. I won … barely."

"Riku …"

And Roxas did help Sora recover, thanks to the connections that existed among the hearts of Sora, Roxas, Kairi, and Naminé. But by then, Riku's appearance had completely changed to that of Xehanort, and he could not change back. In spite of this, he fought to help Sora, giving him clues when he could, trying -- and failing -- to keep Kairi from the Organization, helping DiZ with his plans to encode Kingdom Hearts so no one could abuse it again.

Through most of his explanation, Riku had spoken directly to Yuko, holding her eyes with his own. But when he came to the moment that he reunited with Sora, his shame forced him to look away. His friend's overwhelming forgiveness had hurt so much; he had not deserved it. For his betrayal, he truly believed he should suffer in darkness as punishment, but Sora and Kairi had insisted. They could see the light in his heart, even though he had lost sight of it. So when DiZ's machine exploded, covering him in light and purging him of darkness for good, it was as if the strength of their beliefs had returned him to his real form and given him a second chance.

"I can't rebuild DiZ's machine," Riku said, finding Yuko's eyes again, "and even if I could, I don't think blowing it up would be a good idea, but I believe there's a way you can change back too. And I know if we look hard enough, we'll find it."

A small smile pulled at her lips. At the moment, she seemed almost shy. "We?" she asked.

"Sure," he answered, smiling himself. "We're friends, right?"

She just blinked at him. He knew he was pushing his luck, but he wanted to let her know that, even if she didn't consider him a friend, he thought of her as one. While she struggled with his question, he watched her eyes and wondered what they would look like once they were blue again. They looked so pretty in the picture, happy and without care, like a cloudless sky. They still are the color of the sky, he realized. Only now they're the sky at night.

"Nevermind," he told her when he realized she was still trying to admit to being his friend. "I don't need to hear you say it now. I'll wait."

The lines cleared from her face. She murmured, "Okay. Sorry."

"Hey, don't apologize," he said quickly. Only half-thinking, he covered one of her hands with his own in a gesture of comfort. "I don't mind."

"Okay," she repeated. The smile returned to her face, and she looked up at him with an expression that told him that, even if she was unable to say it in words, she did care for him as something more than just an ally.

A comfortable silence grew between them. He realized he still held her hand, but since she did not seem to mind, he did not withdraw it. In fact, he rather wanted to take the other one too. Maybe draw her into his arms and give her a reassuring hug -- if she would let him which he really doubted. But who knows? She was in a good mood again, so maybe she would. And then, when they pulled back, he could lean down and kiss her …

Waitwaitwaitwaitwait … WHAT?

"Hey, you okay?" she asked, noticing the shock on his face.

"Y-Yeah," he stammered. Then, recovering, he added, "I just realized how late it is." He pulled his hand away quickly.

She laughed lightly, not seeming to notice the retreat. "Yeah, neither of us are going to be of much use tomorrow. We should really go back and try to get some sleep." She stood up, determined to follow her own advice. "See you," she said, looking over her shoulder at him with a smile. "Oh, and Riku …" The smile softened to one more serious and heartfelt. "Thanks."

He nodded at her. He had managed to recover from his surprise enough to act normal. "You're welcome."

She left, disappearing into the darkness of the night. When she had gone, Riku leaned back against the wall and placed a hand over his chest. He could still feel her. Walking away towards the city, but also here with him. He sighed. He had wanted to have a connection to someone else, and he had received his wish. His heart had, without his knowledge, interwoven itself with the most hot-tempered, stubborn, volatile person he had ever met.

"Yuko," he whispered to the memory of her that remained, "I'll help you rescue your heart from the darkness. I promise." He laughed gently, tilting his head up to look at the stars. "I don't have a choice anymore. I'm falling in love with you."

A/N: Finally, the "L" word appears. Took me long enough. (grins) Since Riku is well-adjusted now, or at least as much as any of us are, it seemed fitting that he would realize it first. Yuko, on the other hand, is so messed up I can drag her along for ages. Uweeheehee (ooh, Kefka laugh!)

Hope you enjoyed the fluffiness!