Chapter One

Destiny Islands

The light shining through the window drew Sora out of his slumber. Opening his eyes by a crack, he looked over at the clock on his bedside table and realized that it was time to get up. He climbed out of bed and, still wearing his pajamas, walked downstairs to the kitchen. He prepared breakfast, pouring himself a bowl of cereal and filling it up with milk.

As he ate his breakfast, he stared out the window, admiring the view of daybreak. He saw the sun and wondered which world its light represented.

Sora had never had the chance to explore the worlds in the same sector as his islands. He had not even been in the space surrounding his world during the year when he was adventuring with…

Sora was bringing a spoonful of cereal to his mouth, but as his mind wandered he stopped midway, holding the spoon unmoving halfway between the bowl and his mouth.

It had been several weeks since he had last seen those two. They had a rough start, with Sora butting heads repeatedly with the loud, short one, while the tall, cheerful one kept order between them. Over time, they had come to work together like a well-oiled machine, acting perfectly in synchronization.

Perhaps too "in synchronization", where all attempts to heal my bruises were concerned, Sora mused wistfully.

They had become two of Sora's closest friends and most trusted companions. But now that the threat was over and the worlds were safe, their adventure had to come to an end. Sora returned to his world and they returned to theirs.

He missed the adventure. He missed them. He was glad to be back on the islands, but he could not help but long for the good old days.

"You better eat that before it gets soggy." The voice startled Sora out of his nostalgia, and he turned to see who had spoken. Sora's mother, Suta, had just come down the stairs to greet him. She was in her early forties, and was two inches shorter than Sora. She had blue eyes and dark brown hair which went down to her shoulders. Like his own, her hair naturally plaited itself into spikes, which despite however much she combed it jutted out every which way. She wore a red nightgown with blue stripes and white sleeves. Size-16 black slippers. She gave him a warm smile.

"Morning, Mom," Sora greeted back.

"Oh, Sora!" She pointed at his leg. Sora looked down and realized that he spilled the cereal and milk from his spoon all over his lap. He quickly put the spoon down on the table and grabbed several napkins to collect the cereal pieces and dab at his drenched pants.

"Sorry. I was just…" Sora began, but he was not sure how to put it to words.

"Reminiscing? Remembering the old days? Recalling nostalgically the two years you were off on your own sailing between the stars without having to worry about parental supervision while your father and I were left worried sick, not sure if you were even still alive?" Suta finished for him as she took the napkins that he had already used and dropped them into the trash bucket.

"Technically, I was asleep for one of those years, and I had been taken out of your memory during that time. And you were also in suspended animation for a few months before that." Sora touched his pants in the wet spot to make sure that he had gotten them as dry as he was able to, and he then started to get back to eating his cereal.

Suta chuckled. "Didn't make us feel any better when we did remember you. Or even during the days after we—how did you put it?—'were brought back from the darkness'." She grabbed another napkin and wiped up the drops of milk that had spilled onto the floor. "Just try to reminisce and eat at the same time next time. Got it?"

"Yes ma'am," Sora answered, raising his hand to his forehead in a salute. He finished eating and brought the bowl and spoon to the sink to rinse out.

He then ascended the staircase to return to his room. Looking into his closet, he scanned for his school uniform among his many red one-piece jumpsuits. He found the white, short-sleeved button-down shirt, the blue slacks, the black belt, and the blue tie next to his black, red and blue jumpsuit and its corresponding small black hoodie with white trim. He put those school clothes on, then crouched down to put on his size-18 dress shoes. After tying the shoes tight, he gathered his notebooks and papers into his backpack, tied the backpack shut, and hoisted it onto his back. As he exited his room and descended the staircase again, Sora saw his father, Kumo, exiting the bathroom.

"Morning, son," Kumo greeted. He was in his early forties and stood at equal height with his son, though his messy light brown hair did not quite stick out quite as much as the spikes in Sora's hair. He wore a light-blue polo shirt and tan slacks. He was carrying a rolled-up newspaper in his hand, though both it and his hand were somewhat damp due to a sloppy job of washing his hands and drying. He beamed a warm smile that very much resembled his son's own standard grin.

"Hey, dad," Sora replied with a goofy wave.

"Have a good day at school. And try not to swing that key of yours around the gymnasium today, not unless you see some real monsters. Or lobbyists." Kumo chuckled. Sora had been made to sit out of the previous day's dodgeball match in gym class when a dodgeball strike to the back caused him to summon his Keyblade reflexively, tripping two of his classmates and causing a lot of confusion.

Sora rolled his eyes at that remark. "Thanks. You have a good day too. And I'll try. Granted, usually it isn't that trigger-happy. I'm not real sure what happened then." He pushed the door open and gave his parents a thumbs-up as he backed out.

Sora walked down the street, and as he approached the corner he saw a silver-haired boy wearing a uniform like his and a red-haired girl in a similar uniform, but with short sleeves that just cover the shoulders as well as a skirt instead of slacks. He put in an extra boost of speed to catch up to his two best friends, Riku and Kairi.

Riku smirked, glancing down at his friend who stood half a foot shorter than him. Sora and Riku had been best friends for almost their entire lives, and that friendship was packed with a friendly rivalry. Riku was the one who devised the plan to travel to other worlds. When they were separated after Destiny Islands was swallowed by darkness two years ago, Riku allied himself with a coalition of villains controlling the Heartless so that he could save Kairi, and he allowed himself to believe that Sora had given up on them so he could run around showing off with his Keyblade. When this went downhill, Riku spent the next year fighting the darkness within him and trying to make up for his past mistakes, but found that Sora and Kairi were able to forgive him easily. Since returning home, he had gotten a haircut, so his hair only reached his neck as opposed to down his shoulders and he no longer had bangs obscuring his face.

"So, how did your parents take it?" he asked.

"Mom said to be more careful. Dad is going to be making fun of me for it for a while." Sora laughed, causing Riku and Kairi to laugh as well.

"The principal almost lost it yesterday. He knew you had a Keyblade, but he had no idea that you could summon it on a whim like that!" Kairi remarked, a mischievous smile plastered on her face. Sora chuckled and placed his hands behind his head as he found himself lost in her violet-blue eyes.

Sora was the first person on the islands to meet Kairi when he found her washed up on the shore years ago, when they were both five years old. She had by some means escaped the world on which she was born, known as Radiant Garden, when it was invaded by dark forces, and when she arrived on Destiny Islands she claimed to have no memory of where she was from before being cast through the sea between worlds. She was adopted by the mayor, Braska, and she became close friends with Sora and Riku. Much to her amusement, Sora and Riku often competed for her attention. When the island was invaded by darkness, Kairi lost her heart, which found refuge inside of Sora. When he found out, he set her heart free, releasing his own heart in the process and nearly causing himself to be lost to the darkness. However, Kairi's love brought him back to the light. When the islands were revived, Kairi was left at home to wait for her friends when Riku was locked in the Realm of Darkness and Sora left to find him. She was kidnapped to manipulate Sora, but she later joined him and Riku in the final battle before finally returning home together. A month after coming back, Sora worked up the courage to ask Kairi out to dinner. They have been a couple for two months now.

"Well, I hope we don't have to let him find out about the magic," Sora quipped. "He'll go ballistic at that one!"

Sora, Riku and Kairi turned and began walking to school. Sora closed his eyes and breathed in the warm spring air. The three friends walked silently, until they approached the next intersection and paused at the stop sign.

"So, what did you think of the calculus homework?" Riku asked. He tried to not look nervous, so as not to expose the fact that he had trouble understanding the topic to them.

"Eh, it wasn't too hard after I applied it to experience," Sora answered with a shrug. "Shooting Blizzard chunks at a Rapid Thruster thirty feet off and twenty feet in the air? Bouncing a Darkball off of a wall starting at thirty meters per second and ending at ten? You learn how this stuff works as you go. Didn't you do anything like that during your time away?"

"I saw a guy run straight up a vertical wall with no change in velocity, so I practically gave up on the laws of physics after that, and aside from our duels, card games with illusions and a giant with a hammer-thing who caused earthquakes, and running through the castle where holographic platforms literally appeared out of nowhere and where I spent half of the fights teleporting all over the place and pulling magic swords and walls out of nowhere, that was the most exciting part of the last two years," Riku replied. "I don't exactly have the kind of experience that you have in applying physics in live action."

Kairi shot him a sly glance and smirked. "Well, I just had a good tutor," she added, tapping the center of her chest with her index finger.

"I'm kind of impressed that Naminé managed to learn all that advanced math and science, considering that she spent the year on the one task of putting Sora's memories back together," Riku said. Naminé was Kairi's Nobody, a shadow of herself made of the body and soul of a strong-willed person whose heart had been lost to the darkness. Naminé came into existence when Sora released her heart from his body, as an effect of her having lost her heart. Unlike Sora's Nobody, Roxas, Naminé had not been formed from Kairi's body elements, because, due to her being a Princess of Heart, she could not be touched by darkness even when her heart had been lost. So, while some flakes of her soul had been forced out when she was separated from her heart, the body elements that fused with the soul and dark matter to give her form was drawn from pieces of Sora's, the rest of which fused with his soul along with dark matter to create Roxas. Naminé had the power to manipulate the chain of memories within Sora and the people connected to Sora's heart. Born without a heart of her own and no sense of will, she had been coerced into messing with Sora's memories to turn him into a puppet, but, inspired by Sora's compassion and capacity to forgive, she offered to restore his memories, but he, as well as his companions whose memories had been torn apart as well, but the process took several months during which Sora and his companions were placed into a deep sleep. At the end of the second adventure, Naminé willingly fused back into Kairi. Lately, it seems that she is maintaining enough of a presence to telepathically help Kairi and her friends catch up with the schoolwork they missed.

"Well, good for you for having someone to give you the answers on a full-time basis," Sora retorted. "So, how is your French class going?"

"Magnificent," Kairi answered with a flourish. Her grin began to falter when she noticed that there was a moment of silence with Sora and Riku simply staring at her blankly.

"Yeah, I just heard that in English, and I even saw your lips move in four syllables instead of three."

"What? Really?" Kairi asked, surprised.

"Yeah. The Keyblade actually has a built-in translator, so any foreign language is heard and even read in the wielder's first language. In mine and Riku's case, it is translated to whichever is nearest, English or Japanese, sometimes even Hawaiian."

"Wow. Is that why you dropped Spanish a week after you got back?"

"Yeah. As it turns out, I can't turn the translator off, and when the teacher tried to tell us what English words translated to in Spanish, I only heard the words in English. I just gave up and figured it didn't really matter if I learned another language if it just translated anyway."

"Huh," was all Kairi could say in response. Not knowing what else to talk about, the three friends remained silent as they continued walking. It was only when they were one block away from school when Kairi posited a question. "Wait. If the Keyblade is what allowed Sora to understand people speaking other languages, then how did you not have any trouble, Riku?"

Riku crossed his arms as he contemplated the subject. "Hmm… I never really thought much about it… Well, I mainly worked with that group of villains; one of them I think already spoke English on his own, judging by his accent; there was a powerful fairy person and a witch with octopus legs; there was the god who ruled the world of the dead; then there was the magic-using vizier with the talking parrot; and I don't even know about the bag of bugs. I figured they were just using magic to help me communicate with them, and by the time the Beast who I presume spoke French showed up, I just ran with it." He finished the last sentence with a shrug. "Maybe the Soul Eater sword was made with the same stuff that lets a Keyblade translate other languages, since it was made by Ansem—er, Xehanort's Heartless. And it did end up becoming a Keyblade, so that would be how it covered for me afterwards."

As soon as they stepped onto school grounds, they simultaneously decided to stop discussing their extranormal escapades. They entered the throng of students, all dressed in their school uniforms, except for a few rebellious youths who dress in plainclothes or all-black attire. Above the row of glass doors, brass letters were arranged to spell out "Nomura High School". They stepped through the doorway and marched through the lobby. As they passed the office, the principal, carrying a folder of papers, gave Sora a stink-eye from the doorway, though Sora pretended not to notice.

Before they were all the way through the lobby, a tanned, muscled arm wrapped itself around Riku's shoulder and pulled him into a playful and shaky embrace. At the same time, Sora felt a slap on his back. "Yo, what's happening, man?" the student who had grabbed onto Riku greeted in a noticeable accent. Sora, Riku and Kairi turned to face Wakka and Tidus. Wakka had an athletic build and a well-earned tan. While he wore the standard school uniform, he also had a dark blue headband wrapped around his forehead, and he had his orange hair styled so that it came up together in a point which curled down to the left as it approached the tip. He stood a couple inches taller than Sora, but was not quite as tall as Riku. Tidus was two inches shorter than Sora but had a lean, toned build. His brown hair was not quite as spiky as Sora's. He beamed his perpetual cheerful grin at his friends.

"What's up, guys?" Tidus asked, then, before giving them a chance to answer, "Take a look here." He guided Sora, Riku and Kairi to the trophy case for the school's sports teams. Between the tennis and soccer trophies, there was a noticeable gap where a prize for another sport, which the school had never won, would be placed. "In just a few weeks, the Destiny Aurochs will head straight for the water polo regional finals. Then, we will stun the audience and our opponents with our strategy, skills, and our sublimely magnificent moves and come home with a solid gold trophy fit for us star players, and the entire island will be cheering our names!" He laughed at the thought.

"Yeah, and to think that just last year we were at the bottom of the barrel," Wakka added. "But Tidus, he's a natural, ya? And his dedication… Without him, we would never have gotten this far." He gave Tidus a playful nudge. "You guys are coming to watch us take the cup, ya?"

Sora, Riku and Kairi nodded enthusiastically. "Wouldn't miss it," Sora answered.

Tidus and Wakka laughed. "Thanks, brudda. I can see it already. The team finally gets a trophy to its name. And just in time for graduation. When I'm gone, Tidus here will be running the show, ya?" He glanced up at the clock on the wall near the trophy shelf. "Whoa, man. We gotta get going. You guys have a good one." He and Tidus waved as they walked off.

Sora, Riku and Kairi looked up at the clock as well. They nodded to each other and turned away to head to their first period classes. "See you at lunch," Riku said, giving his friends a quick wave.

Sora's classes were standard issue. He learned and studied material in calculus, sociology, physics, and literature. He turned in his homework and took a quiz in physics. When he first returned to school after coming home, some of his teachers were eager to remind him that he will not be earning any free passes just because he saved the world, though he managed to turn their opinion around with how quickly he was able to catch up to the rest of the class. He had excellent tutors in the form of Kairi (who had only missed a few weeks), Naminé (also through Kairi), and his classmate Selphie.

At the end of the school day, Sora, Riku and Kairi met up in the lobby to begin their walk home. As they started to walk toward the door, side-by-side, a girl ran up to them and stopped in front of them. She was fifteen years old and had green eyes and brown hair that curled up at the ends. She leaned forward coyly and gave them a cute cat smile.

"Hey, guys!" Selphie greeted. She was a sweet girl with a high-pitched voice. Outgoing and spunky, she was an active member of the Nomura High School student council. She took some flyers out of her handbag and passed one to each of them. They glanced at the sheets. At the bottom of the page was a print of a beach scene, and flowers lined the borders. The flyer read:

25th Annual Destiny Festival

Hosted by Nomura High School

Saturday, June 12

Selphie could barely stand still. Despite her small frame, she was full of energy. "Oh, I can't believe that it's only two months away! I can barely contain myself!"

"Sounds like it will be great," Kairi said. "Are you going to need our help with anything?"

"Thus far, we seem to be on track. But I'll let you guys know if something comes up. As things come along, I may ask for your opinion on things. Say, have you seen Irvine anywhere?"

"He's probably in the gym shooting hoops with his buddies. Why? Are you going to ask him to be your date to the festival?" Riku teased, smirking.

"Oh, please. I asked him the day it was announced!" Selphie replied. Sora, Riku and Kairi snickered. "Well, I'll see you later!" She waved back at them as she ran down the hall to the left, oblivious to the students scrambling to get out of her way. The history teacher, Mr. Leslaie, saw her pass by his classroom, and he stuck his head out of the door to shout "Ms. Tilmitt! Do not run in the crowded hallway! And look where you're going." Selphie broke her stride, turned around, and blurted out a quick "Sorry" before continuing on her way.

Sora, Riku and Kairi left, now unable to control their laughter at Selphie's antics. As they walked home, they talked about their classes that day, joking about conversations among friends and between classmates and teachers, before the topic turned to what was on everybody's mind after the meeting moments before.

"The Festival is almost here," Kairi mused. "It's going to be so much fun."

"Hey, didn't Chappu always pull some kind of prank at the festival every year?" Riku asked. Chappu was Wakka's older brother. In his senior year of high school, he was captain of the water polo team. After graduating, he joined the police academy, and three years ago he graduated and became an officer on the force.

"Yeah," Sora said. "Remember four years ago when he replaced the stage fireworks with paint cannons?" He brought his hands together and threw them up and out to mime the incident.

Riku laughed. "Everything was covered in paint! Everyone loved it. Kairi, what did he do last year?"

"Hmm…" Kairi paused to remember. "He and some of the other guys on the force charged in, in full police uniform, claiming that someone had snuck in contraband. They grabbed the apparent suspect and forced him to the ground, then opened his duffel bag, and while everyone was still shocked and scared they took out a boom box and some stage lights and set them up around them, then they turned on the boom box and did a dance number." She sighed. "It was hilarious."

Sora laughed, then sighed. "It won't be the same without him this year." Only a day after coming home, Sora, Riku and Kairi were informed that Chappu was killed in a shootout a few weeks before. They had their best to comfort and support Wakka through his grief. However, unexpectedly, they were simply in shock at the news. They had just come from a series of epic battles, and in Sora and Riku's case, had almost come to take their own vulnerability and mortality for granted. They had seen two good men sacrifice their lives to help them complete their quest, but hardly had the time to process their deaths due to being forced into even more battles. Then, no sooner than they made it out of the war zone, they learned that a friend of theirs, someone who lived close to their homes, had lost his life doing something that was not too far from what they had been doing: fighting villains and protecting the innocent.

"No, it won't," Riku agreed. But I heard that Wakka is planning something for the festival. I guess he will be taking that job up to honor his brother."

Kairi smiled on hearing that. "That's nice of him. He did help Chappu out the last few years. This will be sure to make him proud."

They turned off of the road and walked toward the shore. As they walked across the beach, the soles of their shoes left footprints in the sand. They felt the ocean breeze blowing through their hair as they approached the water. They ceased their trek just a few steps before reaching the edge of the tide. Sora clasped his hands against the back of his head. They stared silently out along the horizon, their gaze focused on the islet a mile out from the shore of the main island. Since childhood, the three of them, often accompanied by Tidus, Wakka and Selphie, would go to the islet to play together and explore. Until they were twelve, they were not allowed to take the boats and row out to the island themselves, so they were usually chaperoned by either Sora or Riku's dad. It was on that islet where Sora, Riku and Kairi worked on constructing the raft that they intended to use to sail the sea between worlds and find the world that Kairi came from. It was also where Sora was chosen by the Keyblade, had his first fight with the Heartless, and was separated from Riku and Kairi at the start of his first adventure. The three friends still held strong memories of that islet.

"So, we'll head on over after homework?" Sora asked his friends.

Riku gave a quick nod and Kairi responded with an "of course." And with that, they all turned around and walked back to their respective homes.

Suta drove up the street and pulled into the driveway of her house. She shifted the car into park and climbed out, then opened the back-driver-side door to grab the four paper bags of groceries. She lifted all of them by the handles in her hands and pushed the door shut with her foot. She carried the groceries up to the door and set them down on the porch so she could open the door. She looked inside and saw Sora sitting at the kitchen table with his homework. He had changed from his school uniform to his black, red and blue garb along with a pair of black-and-yellow shoes, black fingerless gloves with white straps crossed over each other over his palms and thin metal discs on the backs, and a crown-shaped charm attached to a chain necklace.

"Sweetie, could you come help me with the groceries?" she asked. Sora shot to his feet and made his way to the door.

"Sure thing, mom," he answered as he stepped out of the door. He grabbed two of the bags and carried them inside while Suta grabbed the other two. They carried the bags into the kitchen, and Suta leaned her back against the door to close it along the way, and they put the produce, milk and juice into the refrigerator and the rest into the pantry.

"How was your day?" Suta asked.

"It was good. People are still making jokes about yesterday. And Selphie handed this out," Sora answered, picking up the Festival flyer and handing it to his mother.

Suta glanced over the flyer and chuckled. "That girl really is a go-getter, huh? I can hardly wait to see what she has brought to the table for this year's festival." She took a look at Sora's homework. "Physics, huh? Honey, I have no idea how you managed to learn two years' worth of this stuff in a few weeks and still be able to get this so easily." She shook her head in bemusement, taking in all of the numbers, letters and Greek symbols in the equations.

Sora shrugged. "Well, some hands-on experience is a good way to understand how it is all implemented. For example, going up against something with dense armor is a good way to understand normal force and impulse, as well as figure out how much applied force does what."

Suta raised an eyebrow. "Right. And I suppose you can figure out what sort of forces something like that would use?"

"Well, there is a trick that actually tells me, which I learned how to read after a while." Sora sat down and pulled a napkin off the stack in the middle and put it next to his homework. "While I was in Wonderland, I got a weird vision when one of these"—he drew an oval on the napkin, and then added four smaller ovals around the larger oval, then topped off the figure of the Large Body Heartless with a half-circle—"appeared. At first, I thought it was due to one of the potions or flowers, but after a few fights I noticed certain patterns across all of them, and those patterns had a different frequency and density for each Heartless. I call it 'Scan'. It's like looking at them on a different plane, and I can see their…" he paused, trying to find the right words, "combat stats. For example, defense." He drew a honeycomb pattern over the Large Body figure. "A grid of hexagons shows how resilient these guys are to force. A tighter grid of smaller hexagons means that they can hold up against more damage." He drew smaller hexagons in the center of the picture to demonstrate. He rummaged through his backpack and pulled out a box of crayons. "I can also tell what sort of spells it defends against, if it has hexagons of a different color." He took red, blue and yellow crayons and drew colored hexagons over the grid in the figure.

"Huh. So, what else does it tell you?" Suta asked.

"Well, stamina, active energy, it looks like a river of green lines flowing all around the body, like blood flow." Sora drew another Large Body figure, then grabbed a green crayon and drew lines looping all around the inside of the figure. He then looked around the table until he found a thin piece of string. He took each end between a finger and thumb, held the string to give it some slack, then wiggled his right fingers fast enough to cause the limp part of the string to spin around rapidly. "When they first pop up, the lines move very fast, but as they take damage they start to slow down. The more stamina the Heartless has, the more damage it takes to slow the lines down." He demonstrated this by wiggling his fingers more slowly, causing the string to slow down. He dropped the string and drew another figure, this one made from a trapezoid, a circle and a triangle. I can also tell what kind of magic spells they use and which ones simply heal them by the color of the aura surrounding them." He took a red crayon and traced the outline of the drawing. "Red means Fire, blue means Blizzard, yellow means Thunder, green means Cure, and so on. Purple indicates that they use all of the main three offensive spells, and the ones that use Cure tend to absorb all of those spells. Last, but not least, there's this." He drew a series of lines along the "arms" of the Large Body figure. "The red lines tell me just how much physical strength they have. They show just how much I can afford to get thrown around." He looked back up at his mother, reading her facial expression to gauge if she understood everything she said.

Suta sighed, bemused. "Wow. I cannot imagine making sense of all that. And I'm amazed that you can do it in the heat of the moment like that. Well, I have dinner to make, so you finish your homework and I'll get to work. 'Kay?" Sora gave her a thumbs-up while she turned on the oven.

After dinner, Sora went over to the pier. He talked to the boathouse keeper, Craig, and retrieved his father's rowboat and two oars. He set the boat in the water, deposited his wooden sword in the boat, climbed in, and started rowing out to the islet. Back and forth, bobbing up and down, Sora kept rowing for twenty minutes before he finally reached the wooden landing at the edge of the islet. Dropping the oars and pushing against the water with his hands, he guided the boat to the landing, lining it up next to another rowboat. He tied the boat to a mooring and hopped up onto the landing. He turned and saw Kairi standing on the pier, smiling at him.

"We still waiting on Riku?" she asked. She was wearing a pink strapless mini-dress, with a white halter top underneath with a black hood, as well as a pair of lilac sneakers. She wore a black belt with a notebook-shaped bag attachment, inside of which she kept a drawing tablet.

"Guess so," Sora replied. He smelled the ocean air and found himself admiring Kairi's lovely face. Her beautiful eyes, her perfect smile.

"I guess it's just us for a bit," Kairi added. Sora walked up until he was standing next to her, and she turned around to face in the same direction as him. They stood in silence, staring at the sunset. They watched the light reflect off of the rippling water, the waves lapping against the shore, the seagulls flying overhead. Sora was content, watching the peaceful scenery, standing next to Kairi, enjoying the serenity. Her hand reached out for his, and their fingers locked together.

"Hey, guys!" Sora and Kairi quickly let go of each other's hands and turned around at the sudden greeting. Riku was there, tying his boat up to the post. He wore a black sleeveless zip-up shirt underneath a smaller one that was white on the outside and yellow on the inside, a baggy pair of blue jeans, and a pair of white and gray sneakers. He grinned and waved to them when he noticed them looking at him, but his smile faltered when he saw their shocked expression. "Um, did I interrupt something?"

Sora and Kairi stumbled over themselves to cover up the exchange. "Oh, um, nope. You didn't interrupt anything," Kairi blurted. Sora chuckled and added a "yeah", which only made Riku look sheepish.

Riku scratched the back of his head nervously. "So, erm, were you here long?" he asked. He was still getting used to the fact that the dynamic between the three of them had shifted. They were still the inseparable three caballeros, but Sora and Kairi had moved beyond friendship and were now a romantic couple, while he was left to watch that relationship blossom from the sidelines. Not only that, but a lot of Riku and Sora's activities over the last years were fueled by a rivalry between the two of them over Kairi's attention. And the three of them had grown completely independent of one another for the last two years, so their relationship already had to be redefined as they settled back into their home lives.

Sora shook his head. "Only a few minutes," he answered. "You get everything done all right?"

Riku nodded. "Yeah. The homework wasn't too much trouble. I'm starting to get the functions and equations down." He crouched to pick up his wooden sword, then reached into Sora's boat to grab his sword and tossed it to him. "Here," he said while throwing the toy weapon, which Sora caught, nodding in thanks when the action was done.

Sora turned and gave Kairi a smile, then jumped off of the pier and ran out to the middle of the beach, followed by Riku. They stopped and faced each other, standing ten feet apart. Sora gripped his sword in both hands, held it out to his side, and bent his knees so he was in a squatting position. Riku let out a short laugh and raised his sword arm above and behind his head, pointing the tip of the sword in Sora's direction, and held his left arm out in front of him.

"On my count!" Kairi called out. She saw her friends nod in comprehension. She raised her arm up and whipped it forward, pointing her index finger outward. "One…" She did so again, this time pointing her middle finger out as well. "Two…" One more time, adding her ring finger. "Three…" She whipped her arm forward again and opened her hand in a salute. "Begin!"

Sora and Riku ran toward each other, shifting their arms into a position ready to strike. They swung their swords, which clicked together. The next few hits were parried but then Sora hit Riku in the arm. Riku returned the favor and struck Sora in the shoulder. Sora stumbled, and was seemingly left open to another attack but he blocked Riku's next hit just in time. Before Riku could reel back from the guard, Sora pushed himself back up with his legs and sprung forward, pushing Riku backward. While Riku tried to regain his balance, Sora spun around and struck him in the chest, knocking him on his back. But Riku simply drew his legs up to his chest, then kicked outward, throwing himself at Sora, who did not get out of the way in time and was hit in the abdomen and knocked backward while Riku landed on his feet.

Kairi laughed to herself. Boys will be boys, she thought. Sure, there was no romantic rivalry between them anymore, but it was still nice to watch them tussle. She pulled her drawing tablet out of her side pouch and took a pencil out of her pocket. She opened the book and saw a crayon sketch of Sora, Riku and herself, plus a blonde girl in a white dress. Naminé. Kairi turned the page and saw a sketch of a brown castle with green roofing. Kairi never understood what happened there. She felt Naminé's shame at having messed with Sora's heart there, but she could never get the full details from her emotions regarding the place, and Naminé did not like to talk about it. Meanwhile, Sora had no memory of the castle, and only barely remembers the image of the edifice as he approached it. From what Kairi could piece together, that was the day that Sora had been erased from everyone's memories, including hers.

She flipped through the notebook. A small fountain flanked by a curving staircase. A few shelves in a labyrinthine library. A large Heartless emblem, a black heart-shaped symbol with a red outline and a thorny red X through the middle, in the middle of the page, surrounded by what looked to be a series of metal pipes. Sora, wearing his red one-piece that he had been wearing until a few months ago, alongside the knight and wizard who traveled with him for the past two years.

Kairi had never really gotten to strike up a friendship with them, even though while she was within Sora's heart she had experienced everything he saw and had gotten to know the anthropomorphic animals. She had met them in person briefly twice, but there was too much excitement for them to actually sit down and talk.

Kairi kept flipping through the tablet, but most of the other sketches were unfamiliar to her. She identified a boy in a black coat standing next to Sora as Roxas, and some depicted a man who claimed to be a friend of Sora or Roxas and had then tried to kidnap her, but all of the events depicted were from after Sora's first adventure, and Kairi had no frame of reference to understand any of what it meant.

She was glad to be home with Sora and Riku again, but she wished that she could have really been able to join them on their adventures rather than as a barely-compliant tagalong or sitting on the sidelines the whole way.

She pushed that thought to the back of her mind and flipped to a blank page. She looked up to watch Sora and Riku duel, noticing that they had gotten a few scratches but were still going at it at full energy, studied until she found a good pose to sketch, and started drawing.