Disclaimer: I do not own Kingdom Hearts. I do, however, approve and encourage teasing between guys.
Warnings: This fiction contains and is not limited to boy/boy moments, the use and abuse of stereotypes, hints at original pairings, very despicable people, emo-Riku, lustful teenagers, underage drinking, a mix of the last two points, questionable situations, morally ambiguous choices and a few, occasional and really shy attempts at humor.
Chapter 17: Plans
"Riku, we made it!"
Riku's eyes darted immediately towards the direction Sora was pointing at. He slid the list of names on the small notice board until he found his own. Next to it, a list of scores were displayed.
"It looks like they took the people who scored the most in the four events." Roxas noticed, standing behind the two of them, in the middle of the school hall.
"Looks like it." Riku conceded. "The first three trials were worth... let's see... eight points each, while the competition round was worth sixteen."
"Which makes a max score of forty." Sora smiled widely, and Riku couldn't help but notice how beautiful his smile was. "It looks like you did pretty good, Riku, you scored a total of 33 points. It's third place, on par with Saïx, which means that you both entered by a wide margin."
"You did better, though." the upperclassman specified. "You scored 34 points. And you lost points because you let me win our match."
Sora's smile quickly turned into a grin. "I have no idea what you're talking about."
"Looks like Axel also made the team." Roxas added after having carefully checked the list. "And Seifer, even if just narrowly."
Riku's enthusiasm was cut short by that news. Then again, he couldn't help but grin when he checked the blond boy's performances.
"Oh, my." Sora exclaimed, midway through incredulous and discretely amused. "Coach Auron really gave him a whopping zero points at the speed trial."
Roxas was studying minutely his score, seemingly intent in trying to extrapolate some breathtaking conclusion. "But despite that, he still managed to pass: that's pretty impressive." Damn, he was absolutely right, and that also confirmed that he was dangerously skilled, as Riku had already noticed during the exhibition match. "Watch out for him, Riku!"
What was that? Was Roxas giving him advices? Showing him sympathy? Tolerate each other was one thing, but now he was becoming a little too familiar with him...
Sora must have caught sight of Riku's fists clenching, because he coughed noisily enough to catch his attention.
'Right. Truce.'
"I will." he finally answered to the blond boy, who seemed pretty satisfied with that answer. Before he could add anything else, though, a certain redhead closed in.
"Hey guys, checking the Struggle tryouts?" Axel waved his hand enthusiastically, showing just a moment of uncertainty when he spotted a silver mane in the middle of them. "Oh, hey Riku."
Riku chose to ignore him.
"Axel! You passed too, you and Saïx both made it to the team!" Roxas informed him happily.
"Aw, Rox, you spoiled the surprise." Axel retorted, theatrically offended by the lack of consideration for his feelings. "Not that I had any doubts, any case."
"Well, you should have had: there were ten places and you scored ninth." Riku felt the need to precise, as to pointing out that his passing wasn't to be taken for granted.
Axel looked at the board, surprised. "Uh... looks like you're right. You're third, though, on par with Saïx. Never known you to be that much into Struggle, man."
"Riku is a natural." Sora intervened. And the musicality of his voice made Riku forget that he was having a conversation with at least two people that he couldn't really stand. "You should have seen how easily he took down Seifer."
"Wow, you did?"
Riku didn't like how the situation was evolving and, a few moments later, his fears became reality: Axel decided to have breakfast with them, which meant that the small table at the cafeteria, usually limited to two people tops, was now hosting no less than four guys. The space was too small: chairs were crossing, trays were overlapping and, more importantly... just too many people around him!
And yet... It wasn't that bad.
For the first time in longer than he could remember, Riku really felt like being part of a group again and that feeling...
...it wasn't that bad.
"Hey, Riku, why are you smiling?" Sora asked curiously, causing him to snap out of his thoughts.
"Nothing important." he quickly dismissed the matter. Or at least tried to do so.
"Oh, come on. I'm curious now."
He looked at the brunet, whose impossibly blue eyes were staring at him inquisitively. "Uh, seriously, it's nothing."
"If it's nothing you can tell me!"
"If it's nothing you don't need to know it!"
"Cute, when's the wedding?" Axel asked jokingly to Roxas, who was calmly observing the friendly skirmish between the two boys.
"Why? You think you'll be invited?"
Riku turned his head towards the two boys. "Remember me why I didn't already kick you two out of my table." He wasn't smiling, but his voice betrayed a too happy tone to be taken seriously.
"Who? Adorable little me?" Axel asked, trying to put on a cute expression which resulted in a weird grimace. "How could you not appreciate my company?"
Riku couldn't help but laugh at his face. Whatever: maybe he could afford to relax a little; that wouldn't change the feelings that he harbored towards Axel and Roxas, of course.
"You should totally come with us this evening." the latter then added. "We're thinking of going to this new place, it's called... damn... what was its name?"
"...'No Name'?" Riku asked drily, his mouth curving downward and his head slowly turning towards the brunet sitting on his right, who had put his hands behind his head and was now offering him a huge smile.
"Oh, didn't I tell you, Riku? Roxas and Axel will come too."
Riku was keeping on glaring at him, his eyes reduced to slits. "You mean that you'll go with them."
"You can't back out, you promised!"
"You didn't tell me that other people would have come with us."
"Well, you never asked."
Axel leaned slightly towards Roxas. "We could be best men at the marriage, don't you think?"
That quickly earned a glare from Riku. Finally, he sighed. "Whatever, I'll come. You're a sly little bastard, though."
Sora kept on smiling.
On the central table, five people were eating breakfast quietly.
"So, have you thought about my proposal?"
Kairi didn't even look at the tall boy that was talking to her, her focus being on the small table in the corner of the cafeteria. "I'm sorry, Seifer, I have other things to do."
She was lying, of course, as that day her agenda was as empty as they come, but she didn't have the slightest intention of spending the lunchbreak with a guy who couldn't stop looking at her chest.
"Oh, come on, it will be fun." he winked, clearly failing to notice the bored look on her face. "You should relax a little, you didn't date anyone since you broke off with that gay loser."
"Really classy, Seifer, seriously." she answered. "You should learn a little bit of humility from Sora."
"Sick burn, Seifer." Larxene chimed in, elbowing him. "Looks like you got another rival, now that Riku is out of the games."
Kairi couldn't help but snort at those words. Still, she couldn't deny it: she was perfectly conscious of her feelings towards the small brunet and the fact that Larxene had figured her out wouldn't have stopped her from getting Sora. Nevertheless, the glare that Seifer was addressing to Larxene was funny enough to make her chuckle.
"So... have you got any programs for this evening, Kairi?" Hayner asked, just before Seifer could strangle Larxene.
"Oh, the twerp is right." Larxene exclaimed. "We were planning to go to this new club, are you interested?"
Kairi's face lightened up, as that was the occasion she was waiting for: she just had to make sure that Sora would be there and then there was no way he could resist her charm. "Sure... will Sora come too?"
Seifer clearly didn't like that.
"Sora, Sora, SORA!" he finally snapped. "Always Sora, what's so interesting about him?"
"He has a certain something that you totally miss, Seifer." Larxene grinned. "I think it's called 'charisma'."
Nobody talked for a few seconds, as an uncomfortable silence fell upon them. Then, the only person that hadn't said a single word until that moment opened his mouth. "So, what time this evening?" Saïx asked calmly.
"Ten 'o clock works for all of you?" Kairi offered quietly, glad to have the occasion to drop Sora's subject.
"Works for me." Larxene proclaimed. "I'll go tell it to Axel and the others."
And before anyone could stop her, Larxene had already stood up and had started to walk towards the small table in the darkest corner of the cafeteria.
Sora was satisfied.
He had managed to make Riku enjoy that moment despite -or maybe just because of- the fact that he had gotten more people closer to him. Of course, he would have never got a 'thank you' out of him, he was sure of that. But he didn't care.
For some reasons, just the fact of seeing the silver-haired boy smile made his heart throbbing with excitement: it was like he himself couldn't be happy if the other boy wasn't.
If only with Noel...
Suddenly, he noticed that Larxene was approaching them. 'Unusual, to say the least.' he thought. Still, he put up his good boy face and welcomed her.
"Hey Larx, what brings you here?" Axel asked when he spotted the blond girl.
"My legs." she answered drily. "For this evening, we'll meet at the 'No Name' at ten. Be on time."
"As you command, your highness." Axel retorted. "Riku will come with us." he then quickly added.
Sora observed carefully Larxene looking at the silver-haired boy: surprisingly, he didn't perceive any hostility. "Great. This way I'll have the certitude that at least one of you won't sexually harass me."
As much as it was fun to see Riku turn into a living tomato, Sora thought it better to take his friend out of embarrassment.
"Aww, come on Larxene, you think so little of us?"
Well, that was surprising: someone had anticipated him. Roxas had been faster and had replied to Larxene before Sora himself could say something similar. And despite having known him for just a few weeks, he was sure that it wasn't coincidental: Roxas was a lot more observant than people gave him credit for and had surely noticed Riku's reaction. After all, Sora knew how much he did care about Riku...
"I wasn't worried about you kids." she answered, pointing at Roxas and Sora. She then turned her attention to Axel. "I was referring to pyro here who tends to lose control when he's a little high."
"Pfft. You're not my type, Larx."
She looked at him, grinning. "I know: I'm not inflatable"
And just like that, Larxene went back to her table, leaving behind her Axel pouting and everyone else laughing. Riku included.
The rest of the breakfast went on smoothly, up until the moment when Roxas looked at Sora, as if he had suddenly remembered something important. "Uhm... My ID card, you have it, right?"
Sora grinned, immediately earning Riku's attention. He took out of his pocket two small piece of plastics, apparently identical.
"Here's yours." he started, offering the first of the two cards. "And here's the one for this evening."
Roxas looked at the second and last small object that Sora had given him. He was shocked, that much was clear from the expression plastered on his face: the little piece of plastic that he was holding in his hands was identical to his actual ID, if not for the fact that the date of birth engraved on it was anticipating his real one by a few years.
"Wait." he said incredulous. "You seriously made me 21? Nobody will ever believe it!"
"Take it on my friend Leon, that's his doing. That said, nobody would have believed it if we had written that you were 18. On the other side, 21... who would think that you'd lie so blatantly about your age?"
And with that, Roxas had no choice but to come that evening, Sora had made sure of that. He observed amused how Riku had taken the card from Roxas' hands and was laughing at it. "That's amazing, Sora. It looks absolutely perfect. Are you sure it's legal to keep something like that?"
'Uh, don't go there, Riku.' "Of course, it's just a piece of plastic to make Roxas look older, what problems do you think it may cause?"
He didn't miss Roxas' skeptical look, though.
When the bell announcing the beginning of another long school day -luckily the last one of the week- Sora waved goodbye to the other boys and started walking away.
And on the way towards his class, he couldn't help but think to all of the interesting possibilities that were looming on the horizon for the evening.
End Notes: You know, re-reading this story I'm realizing that it started really fast and then... it somehow got a lot slower. It should pick up speed again fast enough, but still... I didn't really realize it when I started writing it. Well, let me know what you think about the pacing. Constructive criticism, mind you. I may thank you with a small preview... ;)
Preview: Roxas is worried sick about getting out. Riku is worried sick about what he should wear. Sora is Sora.
Next Chapter: The Calm Before the Storm