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Riku didn’t know much about technology but that hardly stopped him from camping outside Ansem’s laboratories, twenty-four hours per day, seven days per week.
It has been several months since Sora and Kairi’s disappearance, long days blurring together, spent in a heightened state of constant anxiety and fear. The latter Riku tries to avoid like the darkness and Xehanort, but the persistent gnawing thoughts still manage to creep into the corners of his mind, whispering words of failure and loss – the two things that Riku could never cope with, not without hating and/or losing himself in the process. His past endeavours are enough of a proof. Ashamed, Riku has tried over and over again to distance himself from his misguided past and learn from it all the while, redeem himself somehow, and sure, it did work at first. But now, after more than eight weeks of useless searching, Riku’s beginning to feel the gradually encroaching darkness of his soul inching closer to his heart, ready to ensnare the dwindling light of hope – hope of ever seeing his friend alive and well again – at a moment’s notice.
Ansem and his apprentices didn’t mind Riku’s lurking presence in the slightest—the aforementioned boy trying to make himself as scarce as possible—even going as far as bringing out an extra chair for him to sit on for whenever he got too tired of gazing at the beeping radar. Whenever Riku actually managed to fall asleep—as of late, it’s become a bothersome and borderline impossible task—the sound of that radar would permeate his dreams and play tricks on his mind, driving him insane. Hopeful, he’d lurch awake, eyes wildly scanning the screen for signals of wandering lights only to find the red grid lines empty as ever.
When their radar—which Riku, in his frustration, has labelled as busted—finally picks up a signal on week nine, Riku is dosing off, refusing to acknowledge the persistent beeps and chalking them up to nth false alarm but then Ienzo is shoving him aside to get to the platform while somehow managing to shake Riku awake simultaneously, fingers flying over the controls.
“There’s two!” Ienzo informs Riku in a single excited breath as though Riku cannot see the two dots on that accursed piece of junk. “The signal is strong – I think we’ve found them!”
Dazed, Riku only nods and moves away to make space, as more and more of Ansem’s old and new pupils pour into the small, cluttered lab, murmuring excitedly in scientific-sounding codes that Riku cannot be bothered to understand, the only thought occupying his buzzing mind being—
He’s home.
The restoration is a success.
Kairi kneels on top of the elevated white platform, raising her hands to fend off the blinding rays of light burning her eyes. She looks dazed, confused, as though she’s never expected to come back to the real world again, surprised by her own tangible body.
Riku pushes through the clutter of scientists respectfully keeping their distance and letting the girl take her time to get about her bearings, but Riku cannot be bothered with that right now.
All he knows is that there’s a glaringly empty spot right next to his childhood friend, one that’s supposed to be occupied by a certain spiky-haired loudmouth, Riku’s reason for existing, the keystone of his redemption and sense of self. His heart races, pulsing noisily in his ears, throat. Riku’s dry eyes sting, heated gaze wildly scanning the platform once more, as though trying to convince himself that he has somehow managed to miss Sora in his haste to get closer to check on his friends. Riku knows it to be impossible. He’d notice Sora even if there was a blindfold tied around his eyes and all sound ceased to exist in this world, even if Riku was robbed of all senses. Sora’s light, his presence, is something that Riku could never not point out at a moment’s notice – not in a dead world nor a crowded one. Not in any reality.
Kairi ignores the ruckus around her and Riku’s presence altogether as her shoulders slump forward, shivering uncontrollably. Distraught, she shifts away from the countless prying eyes, the room growing quiet with the exception of Ansem giving out commands to a few scientists. Riku watches Kairi curl into herself, bob falling onto her face.
A pang of fear strikes his heart which falls down to his heels as though trying to escape into the ground – she’s crying. Sora’s gone, gone gone gone—the word loops in his mind, scaring Riku senseless—and Kairi is crying, sobs rocking her lean frame; something must’ve gone terribly wrong.
Slowly, as though approaching a wild animal, Riku steps onto the white platform, counting his breaths to steady them. “Kairi,” he calls out and the girl stops to inhale a panicked breath, only to resume sobbing – it’s worse this time around, borderline mournful. Riku’s far too afraid to breathe when he comes to a halt before her and steadies himself, readily asking the most glaring question hanging in the air between them, tact and delicacy be damned. He cannot force himself to be careful when his heart is breaking in half and his nerve endings feel like fireworks under his skin, ready to burst open, numbing his legs and fingers. “Kairi, where’s Sora?”
She claws at her naked arms, white bones peeking through the thin skin covering her knuckles and it feels as though a lifetime passes before Kairi raises her head to look Riku in the eye, a mixture of tears and snot caking her face, eyes bloodshot and cheeks darker than her hair – Riku has seen Kairi cry before but never like this.
“Oh Riku,” she starts, her lower lip trembling. Kairi closes her eyes to take in a deep breath through her mouth, tears freely sliding down her blotchy cheeks. When she looks up at him again, her violet eyes are filled with pity and sorrow. “He- Sora’s dead,” she spits out as though its poison in her mouth that she refuses to swallow no matter what.
Riku can almost feel his heart shatter into tiny pieces as his body goes completely numb.
Everything fades out into the white light of the platform, Kairi’s features blurring in and out of existence as Riku stares into the nothingness, unable to function. He tries to grind his teeth, clench his useless hands, cry, frown, breathe, anything to make his body react to the sheer pain shocking his body – only to fail it all. Kairi holds his gaze for a few seconds before returning to her earlier pose, making herself as small as possible.
He’s dead, Riku tentatively repeats inside his mind as though wanting to hurt himself with that concept even more. It works, almost too well. He’s dead and now it’s over.
No more Sora. No more reason, no more light, no more—
Riku bites his lip hard enough to make it bleed, body finally catching up to his muddled emotional state.
He’s expected to cry, to deny it. Sadness or denial, perhaps a combination of both – but what comes out, is pure anger. Rage so seething that Riku forgets all reason, the image of a smiling Sora, his best friend, light, world, universe, sitting at the forefront of his mind as Kairi wallows in her own grief, small and pathetic. She got to bathe in the last of Sora’s light, one she’d stolen for herself - all because of her weakness, inexperience.
Shuddering with suppressed anger, Riku lashes out, aquamarine eyes filled with storm clouds, words lightning – ready to strike, to hurt. “Dead? What do you mean dead, Kairi? Where is he!?” he roars, vision blurring. Tears escape the corners of his eyes while the redhead flinches, sliding away from him. She seems afraid, rightfully so.
“Riku, please, I didn’t mean for this to—” she quivers, eyes widening when Riku takes a step forward. Behind him, the scientists buzz angrily like a bunch of wasps, appalled by the teen’s rightful fit. To Riku, it seems natural. He’s already been through the stages of sadness and denial, had nine whole weeks for that, long days to sort out his emotions and come to terms with the worst case scenario.
“And you call yourself a Keyblade warrior?” Riku hisses out, nose crinkling with disgust. “That thing isn’t some toy or a pretty decoration to be summoned for your entertainment! Didn’t you spend months training for this? You promised to protect him, Kairi, why didn’t you!? What did you do to him? Why’d you leave Sora!? Why’d he go after you without waiting for help, without letting us join him? Why did I think that letting him go alone was… the right choice?”
He takes a staggering step backwards, legs threatening to buckle underneath him. Riku feels his vision swim around the edges. Kairi reaches out to him as though to console despite being afraid, despite Riku saying nonsense just to sting her, share his pain. With a shaky hand, he runs his fingers through his messy fringe – he forgets the last time he’s held a comb in his hands. “I hate you,” he grinds out and watches in satisfaction as Kairi recoils hard as though he’s just struck her cheek, mouth agape, “you did this, you killed him. Give him back, Kairi! Give Sora back…” Riku sobs and before he can move forward to do anything undeniably stupid, there’s a firm hand on his shoulder, forcefully pulling him backwards.
“Hey man, not cool.” Riku doesn’t have to look back to pin the voice to a face – the obnoxious one with the sitar. Demyx or whatever. “She’s already been through a lot of shit, don’t be a dick and make it worse by taking it out on her,” its said in a faux scolding manner, a tone one would use to reprimand their kids for stealing cookies before bedtime, but there’s undeniable threat in those words. Demyx’s free hand tightens around the neck of his weapon, ready to give Riku’s brain a little wash to douse the flames of his blind rage.
Redirecting his explosive grief to the annoyance clawing at him, Riku forcefully rips himself away, nearly hissing like an enraged feline. The fingers leave distinctive marks on his pale skin. “Let go,” he says coolly but instead of going back to emotionally abusing his childhood friend, one he’d promised he would protect, Riku turns and runs, ignoring the girl’s stricken calls of his name.
He runs until he aches in a different kind of way, until he’s short on breath not due to the heart pains but rather complete exertion. Radiant Garden blurs together in a mass of concrete and blooming flowers and Riku collapses on a bench by some out-of-order fountain depicting a beautiful woman holding her wounded lover. Riku heaves as he looks at the woman’s once-bronze face, her formless, rusted mouth gaping wide in a silent scream, face twisted in grief. He looks at the man, peaceful despite the powerful moment, thinks of Sora, of his confident smile as he bid them farewell, as he turned away, raising his arms, keyblade held in his hands. Sora, his beautiful Sora, thinner than a rail but somehow powerful and confident all the same, bony shoulders broad and piled with burdens that did not belong to him yet he’d willingly taken up. His back was the last thing Riku saw before—before he—
He’d promised to protect that back, shield it with his own. Keep Sora out of harm’s way. Be there for him always.
He didn’t even get to see him… go. Didn’t get to say goodbye. Foolishly let him leave when they should’ve gone together, stronger than before. They should’ve saved Kairi together in the same way that the Wayfinder trio and those people from the old Organization XIII did. And that knowledge, more than Sora’s disappearance, hurts Riku the most.
It wasn’t Kairi’s fault. It was Riku’s – all his. He’d grown overconfident. Careless, proud of Sora and his training, his strength of heart. And that had caused him the life of his best friend. His light.
His everything. Something that Kairi could never replace – no one ever would.
And with that thought in mind, Riku breaks down crying, face twisted like that of the statue in the fountain mourning her dead lover.
Kairi finds him when the sun has completely set. She has a lab coat in her arms, mindful of the night’s chill and Riku’s short sleeves. He doesn’t feel the cold, puffy eyes looking up to his childhood friend, clearly reluctant and awkward, unsure if she should approach.
Riku sighs, shoulders dropping low. Drops his face into his palms. Kairi takes it as a sign for her to take a seat, still keeping a respectable distance from her friend, just in case.
It doesn’t fly. Riku cringes at the memory of his mental breakdown – he can hardly believe that he said all that when he should’ve been glad to have her back, should’ve held her close and let her cry on his shoulder instead of accusing her of such horrid things. Another prolonged sigh. “I’m sorry. I was an idiot and you shouldn’t be jumpy around me. I wasn’t… in the right state of mind.”
Kairi’s silent, looking at her boots. For a while they say nothing. He does not expect her to forgive him, not after accusations as heavy as these. “I understand,” she carefully phrases, “the fault was mine as well. I should’ve delivered the news a bit more… mindfully.”
“Look, it doesn’t change the fact that he—” Riku begins, tone teetering the edge of harshness but controls himself immediately. Kairi tenses up. “There’s no good way of saying this, okay? Don’t blame yourself.”
“I guess there isn’t,” she agrees and then presents the lab coat. “Ienzo gave me this. He expects you back at the lab in an hour – there’s some report briefing that you need to attend to.”
Riku raises an eyebrow but does not question it further, taking the coat and putting it on just for the sake of pleasing Kairi. It’s too thin to provide any real warmth anyway.
The awkwardness slowly dwindles though never disappears completely. After the start of their adventurous and tragic journey, ever since Riku’s fall into the darkness and his obsessive need to protect the heartless princess of light, that mutual awkwardness has been growing stronger and stronger. Then again, Riku would be lying if he said that he and Kairi were always… close. In a group of friends made of three very different people, Sora was the glue that had kept him and Kairi together – Riku had been around since the beginning whereas Kairi was someone Sora befriended when the girl had moved to Destiny Islands. Riku didn’t even like Kairi all that much, not at first, too jealous of Sora’s undivided attention becoming, well, divided among his two best friends. Even more so after Sora had blatantly developed a crush on the girl.
Perhaps Riku too had liked Kairi once, but only because she was the link that he and Sora could bond over – that way, Riku would feel less left out. It was fun to tease Sora as well, especially whenever Riku threatened the kid with the paopu fruit – he would be the first one to share it with Kairi.
Now that he carefully thinks about it, Riku regrets not sharing one with Sora. The two pieces of fruit dangling from the Keyblades that they forged into one seemingly didn’t hold the same effect as the real deal. Perhaps then he and Sora would still be together, with both of them either dead or alive, bound together.
As though reading his mind, Kairi begins. “You know… he cared a lot about you. When he released his heart, I—”she puts a hand on her chest, fingers digging into the fabric of her dress, “I felt it. The sadness and the regret. Even if it was barely noticeable – it seems that in death, the human heart regrets. Things that could’ve been and some things that were.” Gently, she covers Riku’s stone-cold fingers with her own dainty hand. “He truly loved you, I think,” she shakes her head while Riku sharply inhales, staring ahead, too scared to see Kairi’s expression. “Has loved you since the start.”
The concept seems ridiculous, especially coming from Sora’s childhood heartthrob. Nevertheless, Riku’s heart pumps a little faster, his insides giving a funny flip at the mere concept of Sora considering him in… that light.
“Sora, he—” Riku huffs, smiling despite himself. It’s small and it hurts his facial muscles, but it’s there. It’s something. “Sora loved everyone and everything. All things alive. And you were the one he wanted the most.” He tells her with a shake of his head. She must know. Riku is willing to bet that she already does.
When he risks a glance at Kairi, she seems lost in thought, but her smile mirrors Riku’s. “That may be so, but I don’t think he ever realized what he truly needed. Even if he did, well... He was stubborn until the end,” Kairi trails off in a whisper, violet eyes misty. “You were right, Riku. If it had been you, both of you would’ve made it back safely. I couldn’t protect him in the way you could’ve. The way you did, for years and years. There’s nothing to apologize for. I’m still lacking in skill, if not resolve. I wish things would’ve been different. I wish he’d noticed sooner, let you come with. After all, when we shared the paopu fruit before the final battle, instead of looking at me, he spent most of the time looking at you on the beach. Wondering about you.” Kairi laughs at Riku’s baffled expression. “He’s a little dense, is he not?”
A pang of pain courses through Riku’s body when he realizes that they’ve been talking about Sora as though he’s still there, as though there still is a chance for his return, no matter how slim. The reality is a nasty concept forcefully pulling him out of his wonderland, regrets stabbing his chest. He loves Sora, no matter what. Has loved him for the longest time, even though he didn’t really know it or fully understand it – not until he lost him to the sleep. He’d give anything for a shard of hope, anything to get him back and tell him. Hold Sora close, protect him from all things evil. Light-heartedly laugh at the years-long mutual courtship and awkward teen flirting.
He didn’t even get to say goodbye.
If Kairi is right, then perhaps Sora had loved Riku back, just as fiercely. Just as dedicated. Just as much as he’d loved Kairi.
“Yeah,” Riku answers, looking nowhere in particular. His heart squeezes inside his chest in a painful way. “I guess he is.”
It’s a little too late now. There are memories, sure, fond ones too, yet Sora… he’s no longer here. But he will treasure them; those lost unspoken feelings and those countless what-if scenarios.
Overhead, the stars gleam in cool silver, just like the ones back home, back when everything was alright and no one had to die or sacrifice. Back when it was just Sora, Riku, Kairi and Destiny Islands, and the darkness was an unfamiliar concept, the world seemed mysterious yet exciting rather than outright cruel.
Together, they watch the stars for a little while longer and pretend that Sora is there to see the stars with them.