Riku kept his senses alert as he moved down the dirt streets of the town.
His ears - and the more mystical, extra senses.
He stopped as a strange, terrible smell filled his nose.
He turned, and he heard the sounds before he saw them. Swirling darkness. And then he "saw" them.
Heartless, spawning out of the ground.
Their dark shapes solid and defined, to his mind's eye. Solid darkness.
Shadows and Soldiers, they "looked" like...
Easy.
He flew at them before they knew what hit them, slicing through two Shadows, destroying them. He turned as a Soldier leapt at him with its claws. He backflipped and kicked it in the chest, stopping it. He pulled his leg back to let it drop, then stabbed his Keyblade forth to impale it through the back. The other Soldier came spinning at him like a top, dark energy swirling around it. He leapt up high over it, coming down again. He turned and thrust out a hand, sending a blast of Dark Firaga; it missed, flying past...and instead hitting a building. He winced as he heard the sounds of exploding, splintering wood and wooshing flames. He hoped that wasn't anyone's house...
He ran after the Soldier and came down on it with a cleaving swing, tearing it in half and obliterating it with a huff. He straightened up again-
And stopped, realizing there weren't any more around.
He sighed with relief, letting his weapon vanish.
Then he caught a new scent. The same...? No. Different...
He "saw" strange new shapes pop into existence out of thin air. Darkness, monsters, but...different for sure. Similar to the Heartless...but not? He couldn't have even explained it. It wasn't exactly sight, it was beyond sight, but at the same time, as someone who'd lived his whole life with sight, it just seemed like the right way to... He shook his head quickly, focusing.
He raced forward and threw himself at them, slashing and turning.
Two of them (some strange, fat cat-like creatures?) twisted around in the air to avoid his attack, like runaway balloons. They whipped around him wildly before one came flying back to slam into his back, shrouded in dark energy that burned!
Riku fell forward with a gasp, hitting hard and rolling to come up again. He stumbled, turning back and raising his weapon.
A large, winged horse monster of some kind came at him from the air - galloping on the air. It spread its wings, and a volley of a dozen dark projectiles flew out for Riku, curving and homing in on him.
He cast a dark barrier and adjusted his footing; the projectiles slammed into it, dispersing on impact. But he felt the imperfections spread across the barrier, heard the cracking sounds. It might not have held up against another volley or two. Maybe three.
What were these things, anyways?!
Why were they even here, terrorizing this-
Town...of people...
It was then that it really, fully just hit Riku.
I'm an idiot.
He hadn't heard so much as a peep this whole time. No concerned voices, no screams, nothing that usually would happen when dark monsters appeared out of thin air...
But he could still feel the Hearts around him - the people. They were all over: inside the buildings and streets around him!
So why...? What was going on here?
He'd figure it out later. First things first...
He ran and leapt up into the air, twirling and slashing at the horse monster; dark energy swirled around him, crackling with lightning, and then it spread outward like a ripple in a lake. It hit the creature and blasted it away into a building (he cringed again at the sound of shattered glass and falling, heavy pieces of wood). He flipped back in the air and shrouded himself in a blue aura, focusing his powers...
Then he teleported back to the ground and rushed forward in a blitz of energy and power, tearing through a cat monster. He blew past it and teleported again, reappearing on the left and flying for the other. He slammed into it, bladed in front of him, and took it up with him. The force and power destroyed it. He vanished again, high up in the air, turning as he sensed and heard the horse monster emerging from the broken building. He raised his weapon up, shrouding it in energy, turning it into a great big blade of darkness. He slashed it down in front of him as he dove toward the ground again. Burning dark flames and energy swiped downward, through the monster.
The creature staggered back, twisting and writhing - and then it exploded, and faded.
Riku huffed, breathing and standing up again. He raised his weapon before him, the power fading from it.
Right...now to find out what was going on.
He turned and strode toward the nearest building - stretching out his senses to the Heart within it. He found the door, pushing it open with a creak.
"Hey - it's safe to come out now," he called out. "The monsters are all gone."
He listened - nothing.
Not a sound.
It was...starting to freak him out a little, honestly.
This place was like a ghost town - except it wasn't actually empty. And that was probably more frightening than the alternative.
Riku moved forward blindly, heading straight for the Heart he could sense in front of him. He cursed as he tripped against a shelf. A scattering of little sounds and broken glass. A shop of some kind? And he'd just ruined some of their stock...
He made is way around more carefully, trying to not just focus on the Heart - but on everything else around him now. The ambient magic drifting on the air, running through the physical things and objects around him...creating a hazy sort of sense of where things were and what shape they were. How close they were.
Better now.
He strode forward more quickly, hooked a right...and stopped.
The Heart was there, in front of him. He could sense it - "see it". That swirling mass of pure energy and life. But...it was...shrouded. Shrouded in darkness, and it was dim. The owner of the Heart was alive, but it was like they were...caught by the dark? Trapped by it...?
Riku breathed out, stepping forward and raising a hand, palm out...
The Heart pulsed, and the darkness flew off of it in a sudden explosion, sending him flying back through the air!
He hit the wall hard - after breaking through some more shelves. He fell forward, landing on hand and knee with a gasp.
The darkness swirled in front of him, flowing out from the Heart...and then it took solid shape and form. Just like that.
And just like that...Riku found himself facing more dark monsters.
The ones that weren't Heartless.
The scent hit his nose again, immediately...different. Identifiable.
Riku got to his feet and pulled out his Keyblade.
He hesitated, however.
He wished Terra were here - or Kairi. They'd know what to do. How to fix this. They'd have figured out what was going on from the start, wouldn't they.
Terra would have known. And Kairi- Kairi would have taken one look at these monsters, and these people, and she would have known how to help them. Because that was just what she did. She was a hero, she was a Princess, she was the chosen Keyblade Wielder - the one worthy of it - and she was just...
All the things Riku wasn't. What he wished he could be. What he was playing at here, pretending like he could be...
But he wasn't. Who was he kidding?
Riku was no hero. He didn't save, or help people: he'd only ever hurt them.
His home world, all those other worlds, the other Princesses of Heart...and that kind, innocent old man who'd just-
A dark monster flew forward, ramming into him and sending him back into the wall, tearing him from his own head.
He hit hard, gasping again, his ribs flaring. This one had big, hard horns...
Riku thrust out a hand, blasting out with multiple Dark Firagas at once - a barrage of power. They flew out, striking the monsters and exploding around them, casting them all backwards.
And that Heart in front of him was jarred from its place, as the person was hit by the blast the same as the monsters - and then it dimmed more than ever. It became a small, weak, glinting...
Riku stared, horrified, panicked. "No...I didn't..." He threw himself forward, moving past the monsters in a surge of darkness and a flicker of air, instantly teleporting. He thrust out his fist, casting Curaga with everything he had!
The Heart slowly returned to its original state, pulsing and- brighter than before, as the magical energies swirled around it. Around the person.
Riku laughed in sheer relief-
And a roaring creature slammed into him from behind, taking him to the floor, burning claws pressing down on his backside.
Riku struggled, he panicked all over again, he called on the darkness! It pooled beneath him...and he fell down into it.
He landed in the endless, thick darkness. He groaned and tried to push himself up. He couldn't sense a thing. Just this...squeezing his Heart, trying to burn into his body from all directions...to worm its way through his skin...
He threw out a hand for another dark portal, and he got up and stumbled his way into it. He fell out the other side...into light and air again.
Riku fell to the ground, unsure if he was even still in the same world or in some other one.
But either way...he knew...
He'd messed up again - so bad. He'd failed.
What was he even thinking with this?!
That he could be the big hero? Save people?!
He couldn't even save that one person in front of him, let alone an entire town in need!
He wasn't Kairi, he wasn't Sora, or Terra, he wasn't- he couldn't-
He couldn't do this!
He was too weak for it. Too pathetic. He was just some loser, trying to play hero! Like he'd always been...since his stupid, childhood fantasies with a wooden sword, trying to impress and protect Kairi (like she needed it)...
He hissed in pain, curling his shaking body in on itself, and failed to hold back tears.
Darkness sparked, and churned in the depths of his Heart...
Author's Note: Kind of a short chapter lol, sorry, and also a Riku one, sorry again LOL. But it was kind of important... xD