Author's Note: Little bit shorter than the last one, but that's how the POV splits ended up happening, and for the most part, we're organizing the chapters by POV splits. Anywho, rar wrote this one (I wrote the last one with rar reading over my shoulder.) And that's enough of business, enjoy!
"He's trying to ask if you two are together, I think," Kairi finished.
Riku raised his eyebrows, a little shocked by the question. Though, he supposed, he shouldn't be, with Namine and Real Thing- and with them being on the subject of Sora and Kairi- and—
He coughed. "Well. Uh, we're- sorta. Ahm…" He cleared his throat again. It's not that he was uncomfortable. He just… wasn't sure how to explain it. "It's uh. There's been a lot going on."
He scratched his nose, fixing his eyes on the ground, hoping his cheeks weren't as red as they felt. "Ah, what's happened over here?" he asked, figuring a subject change was nice. "Since I… uh, left?"
"Well, I restored Sora's memories," Namine said.
Riku nodded. She'd mentioned. "Why'd it take so long?" he asked. "Unless it was supposed to take a year…"
"No, the Organization got involved," Real Thing sighed. "But, eventually, we got it all sorted out, and Sora was able to wake up."
Sora nodded vigorously. "Yeah, and we—me and Donald and Goofy that is—were a little confused at first because we didn't remember even going to sleep in the first place," he said. "So we pulled out Jiminy's Journal, seeing if he'd written anything down, but the entire journal was blank, except for the words 'Thank Namine'. Not that any of us remembered—"
"We defeated the Organization," Real Thing interrupted, speaking over Sora.
"—which we all felt- hey!" Sora frowned, clearly offended. "I was- and- and you left out—"
"We've got a lot to cover," Real Thing said. "We can summarize."
"Well, fine," Sora pouted. "Then they came back and we beat them again."
"Now you left out too much…"
"Make up your mind, will you!?"
Kairi giggled. "Well, if we're picking up after the Organization was defeated the first time, these two dorks—" she nodded over at Real Thing and Sora "—took their Mark of Mastery—meaning they took a test to see whether or not they qualified as Keyblade Masters."
"Wait a minute, you can wield a Keyblade?" Riku asked, looking directly at Real Thing.
Real Thing just rolled his eyes and summoned his Keyblade to him. "Yeah."
"Well, uh, good for you?" Riku chuckled. "Heh, it doesn't look much different from—"
"I know that."
Real Thing banished his blade.
"Hey, I like the design!" Sora said, elbowing Real Thing, laughing a little. "By the way, we both passed!"
"Good for you!" Riku said, figuring it was at least polite. Not that he exactly cared about this Mark of Mastery Exam. He frowned a little. "Do you think I can wield a Keyblade?"
"Can you now?" Real Thing asked.
"Nope."
"Maybe you will someday!" Kairi told him, smiling.
"I'm sure the potential's there," Real Thing added.
"Whatever." Riku shrugged. "It's not like I exactly want one. I'm just curious. Anyway." He shifted a little in the sand, stretching his legs out, leaning back. "Where'd you leave off?"
"Ah, we took the exam…" Sora made a face, thinking. "And then… ah… Xehanort Replicas?" He looked over at Real Thing, probably wondering if he was summarizing too little or too much.
Real Thing just shrugged.
"Xehanort?" Riku asked. The name sounded… familiar, but he couldn't peg a face to it or anything. Then he grimaced. "…Replicas?"
Sora nodded. "Yeah, they were awful!"
"But who's Xehanort?"
"Oh, he's uh-" Sora thought for another moment. "Ah… you know Xemnas?"
"Of course."
"And Ansem?" Sora asked. "The Heartless, Ansem."
"Yeah…"
That was the only Ansem he knew…
"Well, they're the Nobody and Heartless of Xehanort, respectively," Sora explained. "And since we killed 'em in the right order—Ansem first, then Xemnas—it meant Xehanort could come back as a Somebody."
"And, of course, that happened to the rest of the Organization, and they came back too," Real Thing said. He leaned back in the sand, too.
"Ahh…" Riku let out a long sigh. "So I'm nowhere near done with them…"
"Guess not…" Sora sounded about as disappointed as he felt. "How many have you already killed?"
"Four. But if they're gonna come back…"
"They shouldn't be a problem until Xehanort himself comes back, right?" Kairi asked, moving to cuddle up against Sora. Sora didn't say anything about it, just shifted so he could support both their weight, one arm around her.
"Well, they weren't for us," he agreed.
"That's good, I guess," Riku said, hiding a smile. He thought about it for moment. Of course, he wouldn't need to worry about the Organization coming back right now—he still had to deal with them the first time—but they'd mentioned the Organization had come back here. He assumed that meant everyone. Which meant… "Ah… did Larxene come back?" he asked.
"Unfortunately," Namine muttered, grimacing.
"Why do you want to know?" Real Thing asked, frowning a little.
Riku paused for a moment, then asked: "Can I kill her?"
"Why would you want to fight her?!" Namine demanded, all but leaping forward at him.
He chuckled, flinching a little at the sand she kicked up with her sudden movement. "Just cuz," he said, casually.
"Hey-" Sora scrambled to sit up straighter, too, just as urgent. "If you're plotting revenge- you- it's probably not a good idea! Revenge never ends well… And it's not the way to answer this problem, either!"
"So? I don't care."
"But-" Namine began, frowned. "Listen, I know how awful she was. But Sora's right! Revenge isn't the way to—"
"I only said I wanted to kill her!" he argued.
"You're lying…" Real Thing muttered.
"I-" Riku shot a glare over at him, growling a little. "I only wanna scare her a little. Then I'll drive a blade through her gut and be done with it!"
"But what if you can't kill her?" Namine argued. "What then? Do you want her knowing you're still alive? I mean, I'll doubt she'll hunt you down only if she knew, but if you attempted to kill her? Of course she'd hunt you down!"
"Across universes?" he laughed.
"Do you want to risk it?"
"It doesn't matter! I'll be able to kill her."
"Are you sure about that?"
He nodded. "Pretty sure. Besides, it's not like I need your permission or anything."
"Well, no," Real Thing admitted, grimacing quite a bit. "But I wouldn't—"
"I'm not you."
There was silence for a moment. Everyone stopped talking, and all the sound that was left was the sounds of their breathing colliding on top of each other, along with the constant sound of the waves beating against the shore. Real Thing let out a huffy breath, and Sora sighed a little, somewhere between exasperation and curiosity. Kairi definitely sighed with exasperation, however, and Namine made a sad noise. He frowned a little.
"Fine," she sighed. "Whatever. I guess we can't really stop you at this point."
"You're letting him off that easy!?" Real Thing glared a little.
"Ah… I don't think we're gonna be able to talk him out of this," Sora said.
"Besides, it is his life," Kairi added. "He can do what he wants with it. Even if that's doing something stupid and dangerous."
Sora grinned. "It's not like we haven't done anything stupid and dangerous before, right Riku? And we ended up fine, didn't we?"
"Yeah…" Real Thing let out a long sigh.
Riku smirked.
"You should probably take someone with you, though," Real Thing said, after a moment. "Just because that's the smart thing to do."
Riku granted him that, at least, and looked over at Sora. "Hey, Sora, you wanna go?" he asked.
Sora's eyes went wide. "Uh- now?"
Riku shrugged. "Why not? I'm already here."
"Yeah, but-" Sora grimaced now. "I'm cool with going with you, but I'm not sure if I want to go now."
"Hmm… good point, I guess." He chuckled a little, laughing it off out of habit. "Ah, why would I want to, huh? I'd have to find her first, anyway. Sounds like too much work. Besides," he scratched his cheek. "I do want to head back home sooner rather than later. Namine's probably getting worried about me…"
"If you need to go back now—" Kairi began.
"No, no," he said. "I can stay a little longer. Just not long enough to hunt Larxene down. Who knows how long that'd take? Maybe another time." He shrugged. "Ah, what was it you were saying about Xehanort Replicas?"
It was probably best to change the subject.
"Oh, well, Xehanort made Vexen make them," Sora said. "There were six of them, and they gave us a lot of trouble."
"Especially the one in the Badlands," Kairi added. The two of them had shifted so they were snuggling up against each other again.
Sora growled a little. "Don't remind me."
Riku raised his eyebrows. It took a lot to make Sora upset. Let alone growl. He hadn't forgotten that. "What'd he do?" he asked.
"Threw Kairi off a cliff," Real Thing answered.
He cringed.
"Thankfully, Axel was there to form a dark corridor, or they both would've been toast."
"Sora threw himself off after me," Kairi explained.
"Hey! Axel saved us!" Sora protested, though he was grinning down at Kairi. "Vertical dark corridors are lifesavers!"
Kairi smiled back up at him, their noses nearly bumping together.
Riku averted his eyes. "Tell me about it," he muttered, chuckling.
"Oh, Axel saved you too, didn't he?" Sora asked, looking up.
"Mm." His hand subconsciously went to his shoulder.
"Do you need me to look at that?" Namine asked, not for the first time.
He shook his head. "I'm sure it's fine. It'd hurt more if it was out of place again…"
"He dislocated it," Namine explained.
"Axel mentioned," Real Thing reminded her.
"I broke my wrist once!" Sora exclaimed.
"When'd this become a competition?" Kairi giggled, reaching up and booping Sora on the nose. He grinned again.
"Roxas broke mine," Real Thing mused, feeling his left wrist.
"I had all the fingers in this hand broken," Riku said, figuring he might as well add on. He held up his right hand and wriggled his fingers for emphasis.
"How'd you manage that?" Sora asked.
"Well, I-" He paused. This would take a little more explaining than just… "So, in my universe, the Replica Program's pretty huge, right?"
"Yeah," Real Thing said.
"Joseph mentioned it," Kairi added. "We ran into him once. He ended up in our Twilight Town."
"He might've mentioned that…" Riku muttered. "Anyway, so the Replica Program's huge, and guess who they have Replicas of?"
"Vexen?" Sora offered.
"Of course there are Vexen Replicas!" Real Thing said, rolling his eyes.
"Who?" Namine asked.
"Larxene."
Namine gasped a little, and Sora cringed with sympathy.
"Anyway, L—one of her Replicas—stepped on my hand, hoping to incapacitate me," Riku explained, chuckling. "Unfortunately for her, I can still fight left-handed. Not well, mind you, but…"
He trailed off, glancing in Namine's direction. She was tracing her fingers through the sand, very clearly trying to draw a picture. He frowned. "Where's your sketchbook?"
"I left it by the Paopu tree," she replied.
"Do you want to go get it?" he asked. "I won't mind. We can sit here and wait for you."