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In the darkness of the dungeons, Kairi shone. Her heart was a hot tightness searing up her throat and churning her stomach, but her steps were steady down the stairs, then through the corridors, down and down into the bowels of Hollow Bastion. She kept her gaze fixated far away; it was only close by, on the edges of her light, that the shadows writhed.
“You came.”
Ten feet away was an open mouth, a doorway darker than the rest, waiting for her to illuminate the shadows, shining like a beacon. The voice had come from within. Kairi stopped walking, breath coming shallowly. The resulting silence made her shiver. She’d been counting the clack clack of her heels to keep from thinking.
This was always the hardest part -- convincing herself to begin at all.
Into the dark, she said: “Of course I did.”
If she listened carefully, she could hear Riku’s footsteps coming closer. If she tried, she could almost block the overwhelming stench of darkness that came with his approach, mired in misery. The shadows on the edges of her stilled; he appeared before her, close enough to touch.
“Don’t act like it’s a given. You hate it here,” he frowned, a sullen twist to his pretty mouth. “But you came down here anyway, because I asked.”
Even if he didn’t say it aloud, Kairi knew what he was trying to say: thank you.
“For you,” she admitted. “I can handle any amount of darkness.”
“Brave Kairi,” Riku breathed, stepping closer, motions tentative but with a restrained desperation that made Kairi’s eyes sting, that gave truth to her words: for him, she could handle anything. His need held her steadfast and brave when nothing else could have, not even memories of a once pure love, an easy friendship.
Lonely Riku, she thought. I’m all you have left.
Where was Sora when you needed him? she wondered. His was a light that cast its own shadow; all Kairi did was throw Riku’s into higher contrast. But the answer was: nowhere. Sora was nowhere to be found, and so Kairi was all Riku had left.
He was all she had left.
“I’m hardly brave,” she protested.
Riku smiled, slanted and soft. His hands were cold even while gloved, frigid against her cheeks as he brushed fingertips against her skin, gentle, gentle. She let out a stuttering sigh. Her part came next, where she lifted her hands and slid them up his chest, to link around his neck beneath the soft slide of his white hair and the dangling ends of his blindfold. She would never get used to the slick feel of his body trapped in tight leather. She missed his ridiculous rubber, the yellow and blue, the ocean-shade of his eyes--
He kissed her.
--she missed so much, the sun on her skin and the freedom of the wind, Sora and Riku and Kairi on a beach, dreaming. She poured her own regret and longing into the kiss, meeting Riku’s slick mouth with her own demanding one.
He melted beneath her hands, her touch, gone liquid with relief.
“I have you now,” Kairi murmured against him, licking at his upper lip.
He groaned, grateful.
Kairi cast her own radiance in the dark, or perhaps it was the dark that cast her in radiance. She didn’t know. How much longer she could survive this way was another thing she couldn’t imagine. How long until her heart lost whatever supposed purity it had, to make her one of the Seven? How far into the dark could she fall until she was tainted in turn?
What did it matter?
Riku needed her, and Riku was the only thing that kept her sane anymore. They fit together like this, darkness and light giving shape to each other. Without Riku, Kairi might have been lost, a light that fizzled and failed, burned out.
“Kairi,” he breathed against her mouth, chasing her tongue. His leather clad fingers were tangled in her hair now, gripping too tight. “When does Maleficent need you back?”
She stood there against him, a pillar of light unbowed for the darkness to wreathe, hungry and sad. Riku leaned in further; Kairi took his weight, gripped the back of his neck in one hand. Swept the other down and down, slow and sure. He made a needy sound, pressing his cheek to hers.
“We have an hour. And then the guests will notice that I’m missing.”
Not a lie. An hour, and the guests would notice that one of Maleficent’s pet Princesses were gone. Maleficent would notice in half of that, however.
“Then we’ll be quick.” His mouth was sharp and sweet as it nipped down her neck. “I know Maleficent can be… temperamental.”
Kairi huffed, pressing tighter against Riku, feeling the slow slide of the purple silk of her dress against his coat. It felt good, but then, so did many things that shouldn’t. Whatever happiness or comfort she gained here, like this, would hurt later. She could already feel an echo of it starting; from her own inability to fix what was most precious to her, from anticipation of Maleficent’s cruelty. Kairi’s heart ached, broken and battered by all the wrong things that made up their world.
But for now, for this moment, Riku so close that she could feel his heart beating in time with her own, the choice was entirely worth it. The painful ache was sweet, tangled but true. She wouldn’t let Riku go; she’d hold on to him as long as she could, keep him from falling forever into darkness. Whether it was wrong or right didn’t matter.
She grumbled, fiercely as her tight throat would allow, “Maleficent’s a hag,” and when Riku laughed, startled and real, Kairi finally found her smile.