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: Here's the rest of the scene as promised. A big thank you to all reviewers!

Thirteen

"I'll protect you, Vincent. I promise."

He turned his dark head and gazed at her from over his shoulder. "I don't need you to protect me, Yuko."

She smiled gently at him. "Well, I'll do it anyway." She inclined her head to the book under his arm. "So you can take that thing back to the library where you found it. I swear, only you would try to learn how to use a gun from a book."

His thin lips curled into a small smile. "It's not the most practical of methods, I grant you, but it's a start."

"And it'll be the end, too," she insisted. "You aren't a fighter, Vincent. You're a thinker. Dev needs you to stay here and help him."

He sighed and looked away from her. Quietly, he asked, "Do you remember how you once told me I'd look back on my childhood and wish I could be back with you and Zell?"

"Yeah."

"I've been thinking about those days a lot lately. You were right, you know. I do want them back. Not so that I can suffer through you and Zell being immature, but just so I can see him again. So I can see you again," he turned and fixed his soft brown eyes on her, "the way you used to be. So much has changed, Yuko, and we can't get it back."

She stepped up to him and took his hands in her own. He jumped a bit at her touch, but he did not pull away. "I know," she told him. "But that doesn't mean that you have to change, too. Stay here, Vincent. Stay as you are. You're the only thing I have left of my past now, and I want to protect it. I want to protect you."

He smiled gently. "To save me from marauding space pirates?"

"That's right," she laughed. "From space pirates and monsters of darkness and anything and everything that would try to take our innocence away from us."

"Vincent!"

The beast shuddered to a stop. It blinked at her, and in that moment, she saw it. The light of recognition. The soul of the boy she knew.

"Y … Y-Yu … ko?" It had a voice like stones scratching on glass.

"Vincent!"

It threw back its head and screamed, but this time the voice was human. The sound of a young man in intense pain. Horrified, Yuko watched the wings begin to shrink and the crown begin to flake away. His body glowed with red light, and it shook and convulsed as various pieces of him changed. When it had finally ended, he fell to the ground: a young man in black with a tattered red cape, a red headband holding back disheveled black hair, and a great golden gauntlet covering his left arm up to the elbow.

Yuko ran to him, fell to the ground beside him, and scooped his head up in her arms. She could hardly breathe from the pressure in her chest. When he opened his eyes, she cried out softly in sorrow and disbelief. Instead of the warm brown eyes she knew, he gazed at her with orbs of pure blood.

"Yu … ko …" he whispered, struggling for each syllable. "Run. … Hur … ry …"

"Vincent! What happened? What have they done to you?"

"Even, he …" Vincent's breath hitched and caught painfully. His whole body trembled with the effort of speech. "Heart … less .. inside me. … Run. … I can't …"

She gazed down into his face and saw flickers of blue run across his skin. His eyes began to threaten with a glow of gold. "Fight it!" she cried. "Don't let them take control! Fight them!"

"I … can't …"

"You can!" she insisted. He had rolled his head away in pain, but she grasped his chin and forced him to look at her. "I'm not going to run, you understand? And I'm not going to fight you. So you fight them and you get control because if that thing comes back, I'm not going to defend myself."

"Yu ... ko …"

Internally, she quaked with fear and worry, but she pulled everything out of her voice except pure strength. It was the only thing she could do for him right now. Holding his stained eyes firmly with her own, she continued, "You always told me you didn't want me to protect you. You always said you could take care of yourself. Well, do it! Save yourself, Vincent. Fight!"

He stared at her, mouth agape as his lungs sucked in great shuddering breaths. Then, suddenly, he threw his head back in a silent scream. His body bucked upwards in her arms, and she wrapped them tightly around his torso in an attempt to give him whatever support she could. He twitched and shook, muscles spasming uncontrollably, and gradually but steadily, his body grew warmer.

Yuko drew back when the heat became unbearable, and her eyes fell upon his chest. The dark fabric of his shirt rippled and rose. With a cry of surprise, she tumbled backwards from him, realizing all at once that she was watching a head emerge. Mere seconds later, the large Heartless had clawed its way completely out of Vincent's body; it lifted dangerous glowing eyes and stared at her.

"Neoshadow!" she heard Sora cry from behind her. In her shock and despair of finding Vincent in this state, she had completely forgotten about the other two boys. Now Sora slid in front of her before it could pounce and began to battle it with a calm air of experience. A second Neoshadow began to pull itself from Vincent's body, and Riku approached it, waiting for it to move far enough away from the suffering boy to engage. Yuko carefully crawled along the ground, avoiding the monsters, until she found Vincent's right hand. She took it gently in hers and watched.

As a third head appeared, Yuko wondered how many of the dark creatures Even had stuffed into her dear friend. Each emerging body sent a fresh stabbing pain into her, but with it came shimmers of hope. Vincent was forcing them from him. He was fighting and winning! As long as the effort of expelling the Heartless did not kill him, he would eventually be free. Yuko clung to this thought as she gently stroked the hand she held with her thumb and whispered words of encouragement she knew he could not hear.

The Neoshadows jumped and clawed with great agility, but Sora and Riku never panicked, even at the times when they were outnumbered. They methodically fought the large creatures, Sora every so often showing off another quick reflex move, until, several minutes later, they had disposed of the last one. Since the beginning of the ordeal, a full half-dozen had risen from Vincent and fallen at the end of a Keyblade.

Yuko settled beside Vincent, now lying quietly on the pavement, and took him up in her arms again. His breath was shallow but steady. When she touched his pale face gently, his eyes fluttered open and gazed blurrily at her.

"Vincent," she whispered, "you did it."

Slowly, his lips lifted into a small smile. "Yuko …" he managed before his eyes rolled up and he fainted.

Somewhere behind her, the quiet voice of Even drifted through the silence. "Interesting. Very interesting indeed."

Sora turned on him, anger blazing in his young face. "You sick monster! How could you do something like that to him?" Even answered him with only a small laugh and the appearance of a portal which swept him away. "Come back here!"

Riku knelt down beside Yuko and ran an evaluating gaze over Vincent. He laid a hand on her shoulder and said, "Looks like he'll be okay."

"I know," she answered in a strained whisper. "I just …" Her fingers brushed gently through Vincent's dark hair. It was longer than it used to be and so unkempt. Memories rose in her mind of how she would sneak up behind him while he was reading and ruffle that hair just to hear him holler at her. He had been so uptight and yet so sweet. Gruff and yet gentle. Aloof and yet caring. Her obnoxious, wonderful friend.

He was cursed now. Just like she was. But he was alive.

"I just …" she tried again, but the words would not form under the emotional onslaught that gripped her. The fear that she had hidden gushed forth and took control of her limbs, causing them to shake, while the relief bubbled up into her chest and pushed against it with painful pressure. She gasped for air as if drowning. Her mind spun with dizzying speed. The world before her had shifted out of focus.

"Yuko?" Riku's concerned voice spoke into her ear, but she could not acknowledge him. Desperately, she clutched Vincent's limp body to her chest and sobbed. From joyous anxiety. From distraught ecstasy. From everything that had happened to her, to him, and to the world they had once shared. Her entire body shook from the force of her emotions. Riku carefully wrapped strong arms around the both of them as she cried and cried.

But, as they had been ever since the machine had tried to take her heart, her eyes remained completely dry.