Sora had been having nightmares for the past few nights, but he couldn't put his finger on what it could possibly be that was causing them, so when he woke up in a cold sweat another countless time he wouldn't have deemed it out of the ordinary except for the fact that this time he awoke to find himself lying on the soft sand of the Destiny Islands. It was the middle of the day in the middle of summer and nothing could be more out of the ordinary than the feeling of a cold shiver running down your spine while you lie in the warmth of the tropical sun that shone overhead.

It was so bright that Sora lay there only for a second before a reaching a hand out up above him to shield his eyes from the harsh sun, trying to breathe slowly and come to his senses. He was becoming weaker and more exhausted by day and found himself yawning after every word of conversation. Lately, he'd been losing tournaments and races with his friend Riku, which he usually never won anyway, but even Sora himself had noticed how he was tripping up more often.

Thinking maybe he needed to find a way to get some sleep somehow, he assumed maybe he'd fallen asleep on the beach to try to regain some shuteye, but as Sora wiped a slew of cold sweat from his forehead with the back of his gloved hand he sighed and realized that he probably wouldn't have gotten any better a sleep on the burning sand than in his cool, comfy bed.

"Sora! What are you doing down on the beach?" a familiar voice called from behind. Sora, who was too tired to even sit up and turn to meet the voice, opted for stretching his head back to greet his friend Riku upside down. Sora lie on his back, watching Riku make his way toward him through upside down eyes. He tried to smile, but he was so taken by his grogginess he somehow wound up making some off-faced grimace before he found Riku standing over him. "Sleeping, of course! Kairi's right, you are a lazy bum." He threw his head back in a throaty laugh that exposed his perfect teeth that caught the sun in a shimmer. Sora instantly found himself wincing at the brightness of the light that shone off from him.

Kairi had caught Sora resting on the beach earlier that day and she'd called him just that—a lazy bum, but not before giggling and hitting Sora over the head as he tried to blab on about one of the nightmares he'd just had. After which he'd trudged around the island for a while before falling back asleep in the same place he'd awoken just now, this time caught by Riku.

With a well-placed hand, Sora blocked the light from Riku's smile that had just blinded him a moment before. He could see that Riku, still laughing, held a tarp in one hand a rope in the other. Riku's laugh was followed by a quick bubbly giggle from Kairi, who Sora had just noticed standing behind his taller friend. A coconut and a couple of mushrooms were cradled in her arms.

"I told you he'd be down here, Riku." Kairi said as she smiled up at him and then down back to Sora. "What is this, the second time today? The sun hasn't even gone down yet!"

It had been Sora's job to collect the supplies for the raft, but since he had dozed off on the beach his friends had taken the liberty to move on with the gathering in his stead.

"Well, I… You guys gathered the supplies without me?" Sora asked, a bit downhearted.

"We couldn't wait all day for you to wake up from your nap!" Kairi pouted playfully in a way that made Sora's grimace turn into the smile he was trying for. It was no secret that Sora had liked Kairi since she first came to the island. It was wishful thinking, but he hoped that maybe she liked him too, at least a little bit. He was kind of upset they hadn't woken him up so he could go gather the supplies with them, because it was also no secret that Riku had liked Kairi since she first came to the island as well, as he seemed to take every chance Sora had with Kairi away.

"Don't worry, you can still help us! There's one more thing we still need." Kairi said through a smile that broke Sora's train of thought. He'd listen to Kairi talk any chance he got, but as he was smiling and ready to hear how he could still help from her, Riku had come in to finish the thought.

"You mean three more things—we still need to gather the fish. One for each of us," Sora and Riku had a playful rivalry when it came to Kairi's attention, but Sora swore, sometimes he just really set off his nerves. "We figured since you were down here by the water anyway you wouldn't mind getting them for us. Since we did all the heavy lifting, you know."

If it weren't for Kairi's very, very convincing "please," Sora would not have found himself murking around the shallow waters of the ocean looking for some fish to catch. More than once, Sora had to splash his own face with the cool water to keep awake and alert. He hoped this forced-alertness would help him catch something, since it had been over half an hour and he'd caught nothing. It felt as though most of the problem came from the fact that fish were all just too fastfor him, and not just because he was tired. Unlike most people, whose most brilliant plans come to them in the deepest hour of the night in that state of being not-quite-asleep, Sora did not do his best thinking when he was half asleep—so why he had decided to go in the water with his shoes still on was beyond him.

He slumped out of the ocean some odd hours later, his shoes pooling with water, pockets filled with flopping fish, skin itchy from the salt water that had dried under his clothes, and so exhausted he felt he was about to collapse. Sora's very next step was followed by wobbly knees and a sudden surge of gravity and because he was exhausted out of his mind, it took the boy much more than a second to realize he'd not hit the ground and fallen into the sand at all.

Riku's strong arms alone managed to hold Sora up from becoming a mess of mud below. His eyes were filled with a gentle annoyance, but creased with a more sincere smile as he looked down upon his sleepy friend.

"You did good today, you lazy bum." Riku murmured as he steadied Sora on his feet and ruffled the front of his hair, whether affectionately or teasingly Sora couldn't tell.

"Riku…you jerk." Sora's voice was small and weak and it took all his strength lift his arms, but when he only stumbled back into Riku's arms, needing the support. Something strange a fully away Sora would never admit to needing, much less from Riku. Sora's eyes fluttered closed while Riku's widened. "I'm so tired…I've been having all these weird thoughts lately, and I can't seem to get any sleep."

"Sora, what are you talking about?" Riku tried to steady his friend once again, but Sora was becoming dead weight. Somewhere in his mumblings, Sora reached to grab Riku's hand, his desperation for comfort beyond his shame—but not beyond Riku's who embarrassingly tried to shake Sora's grasp loose.

"No!" Sora sleepily protested, "I have to reach your hand. If I don't—if I don't reach you and take your hand then—then I'll lose you! If I don't take your hand when I get the chance I'll be drowning. I'll drown…I'll drown…I'll…I'll…" Sora's voice trailed off as he slipped into a much-needed slumber.

"That sounds like some nightmare." Riku mused, shaking his head with little understanding.

The two of them waited together in that moment for a while. The sun had just begun to set, making the ocean look like liquid gold and all around them seagulls could be heard saying an early "goodnight" to each other. The sound of the waves crashing into the nearby dock was soothing, unlike the obnoxious sound of flopping fish coming from Sora's pockets. Riku sighed to himself and relieved his sleeping friend of his tokens of a job well done, wishing him sweet dreams and hoping he wouldn't stumble onto any unpleasant nightmares tonight.

The sun had just set, leaving Sora's room coated in the cool leftovers of the sun's warm red glow. He'd always loved this time of day—the time just before it got dark. When you get the feeling that everything's about to disappear…you have to make the most of the light you have left.

Sora took a deep breath in, almost as if to inhale the light of the sun. He'd been drifting in and out of sleep since Riku found him and he made it home. But now that he was trying to sleep he couldn't seem to catch a break. His mind wandered and he began to lose himself in his thoughts.

It upset him that he couldn't carry through with his raft duties earlier, but as Sora looked around the room, any worries that the day had brought to him began to fade away. He lay on his back and looked up to the ceiling where a wooden carving of a boat hung. Sora had made it himself when he was younger, when he thought that he, Riku, and Kairi, would sail the seas together onto new worlds. It was always what Riku had wanted to do, and as he talked more and more about it, it eventually became what Sora wanted to do as well. Later on, when Kairi came to their island, the idea of other worlds out there solidified, and that's when they really started to imagine their dreams into reality. Sora had even carved little versions of himself, Riku and Kairi and stuck them on the top of the wooden boat. They were quite atrocious figurines, but Sora had made them when he was still young, and Kairi thought they were cute.

As he stared up at the toy in nostalgic admiration he could hear in his mind the words that Kairi had once spoken to him, "I just can't wait. Once we set sail, it'll be great."

While wood-carving had always been a passion of Sora's, he found himself working twice as hard after Kairi had mentioned how much she loved the things he made. Soon, his desk became littered with wood shavings, and various sizes of wooden blocks lay scattered about his room. He'd even made himself his own dueling sword—two, in fact, when Riku had stolen his to get the 'one-up' on him in tournaments, he had to make another to get himself back on the playing field, even though he still found himself losing as much as he had before.

Caught up in memories of the past, sleep was given another chance to sneak up on Sora. After he'd confided in Riku earlier about his nightmares he'd found himself more at ease and knew the nightmares would cease. Though, he wasn't sure if he'd really call it confiding, considering he was being dragged back to sleep and only managed to get out a few words of what was plaguing him when he closed his eyes. He tried not to think about it for his own sake, otherwise flashes of it all would seize him again. Flashes of losing his friends, losing Riku…losing Kairi. Flashes of darkness. There was nothing Sora hated or feared more than the darkness.

Heart beating hard and fast from a sudden jolt, Sora felt something was deeply off. It was the middle of the night, but this time it wasn't a nightmare that had startled him awake so suddenly. A bright sting of lightning lit up the room and immediately after, a bone-grinding roll of thunder shook the walls. Outside his window, a nasty storm was forming over the Destiny Islands. A pit of black clouds swirled over the modest form of land, and what trees the island did have looked like they'd be ripped from their roots by the strong winds at any moment as easily as a child picking daisies.

"A storm?" Sora muttered, then realization dawned on him. "Oh no, the raft!"

The thought of something that Riku, Kairi, and Sora had worked so hard on for weeks together being destroyed in a single night was enough for Sora to leave his bed and home and race down to the island to make sure everything was secure. Thankfully, there was no rain yet, but the winds alone were enough to send Sora's worries into a whirlwind themselves.

The closer he inspected the sky it became clear that this was no ordinary storm. Swirling in the center of the dark clouds were menacing black flames, emanating a dark power and creating an uneasy feeling deep within Sora. It was frightening. Nothing like this had ever crossed the Destiny Islands before, and even though it was night, the clouds swallowed the moon creating a distinct darkness that made the palms of Sora's hands sweat beneath his gloves, his fingernails digging into the folds of his clenched fists.

The boy stared up at it watching, waiting, until bringing his head down to notice two wooden boats, each small enough to fit only a single person. Sora recognized each of these, as he was the one who'd made them for him and his friends to travel the short distance to the island from the town and back.

"Riku's boat. And Kairi's!"

The fact that their boats were here on the island meant that the two of them had come to this place during the storm as well, presumably to also secure the raft, but with no sign of either of them, Sora was not so sure.

He squinted through the darkness, trying to locate his friends. He figured he could check the shack or maybe the secret place as those were areas that would provide some amount of shelter for his friends to take refuge. And he felt he should hurry too, not because the storm was getting more intense by the minute, but because the thought of Riku and Kairi huddled together to comfort each other from the effects of the storm was enough to make him dizzy…but certainly not enough to make him hallucinate?

Sora was wide awake this time—he was sure of that, but it seemed as though he'd stepped right into one of his nightmares. The shadows on the island seemed all too real, almost as if they were alive, and as each one became more distinct in their shape, they rose from the ground, eyes opening into two bright yellow craters on each figure.

If it were any other day, the hero in Sora would have whipped out his wooden sword and begun fighting with all his might, but exhaustion was winning over him and he couldn't spare the heroics when his friends could be in danger or worse. So, he dodged his way through the nightmarish creatures, avoiding them instead of fighting them, trying to find his way to the shack without tripping on sand or darkness.

Just as he was about to push the wooden door open, he saw a figure standing at the end of the island's extension, connected with a wooden bridge. It was easy to judge who it was even through the darkness. Riku.

Sora's heart began to race with a mix of relief and worry, his throat running cold and dry. His knees felt weak and his thoughts began to race.

It was Riku, yes—but it was just Riku—no sign of Kairi. He wondered where she could possibly be—the shack, the secret place?… Where, where, where?

Before he'd even finished his thoughts, Sora found his feet at the edge of the bridge, standing only a few feet away from Riku. Without thinking he began to yell out the first thing on his mind.

"Where's Kairi?" Sora demanded to know. "I thought she was with you!"

Sora didn't even give the poor boy a chance to turn around before he began to shout. Though, Riku didn't need time to face Sora—he never did, as he began talking he kept his back to him, his eyes staring intently at the swirling ball of lightning and darkness that swallowed the sky.

"The door has opened…"

"What?"

"The door has opened, Sora! Now we can go to the outside world!"

"What are you talking about? We've gotta find Kai-"

"Kairi's coming with us! Once we step through, we might not be able to come back. We may never see out parents again. There's no turning back. But this may be out only chance. We can't let fear stop us! I'm not afraid of the darkness!"

"Riku…"

It was then that Riku turned around to face Sora. His face would look so calm and collected if it weren't for his eyes—widened ever so slightly to reveal a crazed expression Sora had never seen before. Riku's cool green eyes pierced through the darkness that seemed to become thicker and the moments passed.

More shadows rose from the ground, and though they never opened their eyes, Sora couldn't help but feel that this darkness was alive too somehow. A pool of oil-slick black matter formed at the feet of the two boys, arms of darkness reaching into the air and dancing around its guests. The corners of Riku's mouth curled up in a small smile and he extended his arm toward Sora, offering his hand.

Sora's eyes stretched wider than the vacant moon as the darkness crawled up his body and filled his shoes. The pool beneath him was so much thicker than water and it took no more for Sora to feel as though he was drowning. He felt as if he'd die if he didn't take Riku's hand…just like in his nightmares. With all his strength, he reached for his friend, the weight of the shadows trying to hold him down. He felt heavy, as if he was sinking into the ground, and the forces that pulled down on him made his arm want to give up.

He felt angry and terrified and then numb. There was a brief feeling of static in his arms and legs before he was certain he'd lost feeling in them altogether. With this numbness, there was no way to tell if his hand had reached Riku's. He tried to look down at his hand, to see if he'd taken his, but there was only darkness, so Sora kept his eyes locked on Riku's, which had changed from a haunting stare to a beckoning call. Sora's greatest fear was engulfing him. His nightmares were coming true.

So, he closed his eyes.

And he took a deep breath.

Their fingers entwined in the dark.


AUTHOR'S NOTE:

The year is 2023 and it's exactly 10 years after this story was first published. Somehow I'm back here editing this ol' story and making it what I originally wanted it to be—and what everyone else did too, because Kingdom Hearts never stops being a spark in my eye and I know of too many projects that were abandoned that deserved a little more love. And even though I say that, I'm trying to tone down the SoRiku aspects in this fic as it's NOT a ship fic—it's just a force of habit. I hope you all look forward to where this story is going to go, because I would not be here digging it out of it's grave if it weren't for the small acts of support from Kingdom Hearts fans like myself.