Chapter Text
Sora is doing so, so good these days.
Y’know, first of all, Xehanort is defeated. That alone is a big one, right? Approximately fifty-two countable worlds have been saved in addition to countless across the universe, and the plague of Heartless, in whatever form, seems vanquished. Sora just keeps winning, right? And he’s so basically a Keyblade Master now.
He’s got friends to the moon and back, and two very wonderful friends (it’s like rainbow heart emojis are bursting in his sixteen-year-old brain when he thinks about them) that he gets to go on dates with. If he keeps his schedule well enough, he never, ever has to spend a moment alone.
He can just enjoy time with his friends, and enjoy being home on the Destiny Islands. Even work on getting his driver’s license like a normal teenager.
His mom only breaks into quiet sobs sometimes when she comes home and finds him sitting in the kitchen, still there and eating cereal. His other mom knits him a lot of sweaters and sweater vests when she looks sad. They build up in his closet, spilling from hangers to the floor and getting little use in the nigh-unending warm weather.
Being home is wonderful. He’s even fine with doing extra courses over the summer to catch up on all the school he missed. Really, getting used to online schooling after everything else he’s been through is a no-brainer.
He doesn’t even cry when he goes to the pharmacy to get his testosterone potions, a month’s supply at a time, instead of haranguing Donald to make them last minute each and every week.
He hasn’t cried in forever, honestly. It’s fine that Donald is busy all the time now. It’s fine, because Sora is too.
Yeah. Things are good.
The biggest yet smallest change of all things (aside from not waking up every morning to hack and slash at unfeeling creatures trying to consume your heart) is definitely… dating.
Dating his two bestest friends, even.
Sora likes to consider himself an emotionally in touch young man. That said, everything about dating has him totally out of his depth. It’s good that Kairi and Riku are so patient with him. He wishes that they didn’t have to be so patient with him, though. Sometimes he says things and they frown and they look at him with sad eyes, and it makes him feel like he’s going to throw up. He tries to say less of those things, but it doesn’t make it less scary.
Still, Sora is also brave, otherwise he wouldn’t still be here. Literally. So, undoubtedly, dating will get easier, and he will again get as good as he used to be at making people smile instead of frown. Maybe at least everybody except his moms. Amelia will keep to her sweaters and Vette will work more hours to try and cry less. Sora can’t fix everything.
“I know I went off and did scary things, but you don’t need to feel upset about it. I’m not,” Sora said, one time, and Vette looked horrified.
“You’ve been off fighting nightmare monsters,” she said. “Horrible monsters. But even worse, you were fighting adults. Who hurt you. And I was here putting up missing posters while my son and his friends got beat to a pulp by an immortal fuckhead and his variety of grade-school-to-college-aged henchman. What kind of monster would I be to not be upset by that?”
“Oh,” Sora said, and they didn’t talk about it any more.
He didn’t think she wanted to hear things like, I had such a good time with my friends a lot of the time and I learned so much from all the moments I almost died slash actually died.
Because it’s not like Sora doesn’t get it. He’s sixteen, you know. Not ten.
He would probably be sad and scared and angry and worried and a lot of things if his kid went through all the things Sora’s done in the past couple years, and then showed up again with a circus troupe of legendary heroes (not to mention a few ex-villains.) It would be a lot to process. But it’s done and he’s here now and he’s tired.
He’s more used to the Keyblade War stuff. Being home is confusing.
Amelia wants to meet everyone. And, probably, knit them each something. So Sora really does try to bring them all around, one or a few at a time. Most everyone works it into their schedules. Roxas dodges it well, though. There’s always a reason.
School trip. Prior plans. Part-time job.
There’s always a reason at first, and then the responses peter off entirely, and Sora is just speaking toward the void.
Sora feels like he’s fucked up, or maybe he’s started to overblow it in his mind at this point. Roxas probably just isn’t really ready to hang out with Sora yet.
He doesn’t (still) hate Sora. Probably.
Xion is chill with him, though. She likes him unabashedly, shows up nearly the day after Sora invites her, bubbling with excitement. She makes Sora feel better while she’s there. He doesn’t know her very well, but he does. Maybe it’s awful, but he thinks she’s the most like him of either of them.
Amelia loves her. She coos over them both and makes charcuterie board snacks and takes Polaroid photos. It’s all good except when Sora smiles at the camera lens and wonders if he looks like he’s faking.
“Will you come to Twilight Town?” Xion asks, and he promises he will.
Lea comes to pick her up in gummi ship that Amelia refers to as “the most battered fuckshit thing I’ve ever seen” when she thinks the kids can’t hear. Lea’s spiky red hair bounces when he laughs and agrees with her. He and Xion are almost coerced into staying for dinner by Amelia, but Xion’s got homework, and Lea’s got a shy look on his face when Sora asks about Isa. Sora and his moms eat on the couch that night and they put on a movie they’ve watched once a year every year for as long as Sora can remember, except for these last ones.
Sora feels warm and cold at the same time. The lasagna tastes like nothing, really. Vette pushes hers around on her plate counterclockwise. Sora just sets his fork down and excuses himself.
Xion texts him. It just says, had fun! Talk to me if you need me, and Sora wonders at the definition of need.
He climbs out his bedroom window and goes to see Kairi.
“Hi, little boy in my window,” she says, peering down at him. Eyes glittering like when they were little kids. “What happens if you fall out of the tree?”
“I won’t fall,” he says, “and if I do, I’ll fly.”
She just laughs at him and pulls him up and in. “Okay. Talk to me.”
“Talk to you?” he says. “I’m talking to you, Kairi,” big smile, “I came to see you.”
“Okay,” she says doubtfully, but moves on. “Movie, Sora?”
He agrees, but finds it was a tactic all along. She gets him all cozy, lends him back his own big hoodie to take a break from his binder, and pulls him halfway onto her lap where she can stroke her fingers through his thick hair. They start watching a rom-com that leaves them both giggling, and then makes them cry at just one point, and then she asks, “So what’s up, Sora?”
“My grades,” he assures her, grinning in expectation of her laugh.
“Sor-aaaaa,” she complains instead.
“I’m doing okay. I promise.”
Kairi pulls away from him a little bit. “I don’t like it when you keep me out. I thought we weren’t doing that anymore.”
“I’m… sorry,” Sora says helplessly. He misses her hands in his hair. It got real fast. “I’ll work on it.”
She sighs, then smiles. She looks like she feels a little off-balance, which puts him back at ease, too. “Thank you. I appreciate it. I love you.”
“I love you too,” he declares easily. It’s never been hard to say things like that, at least.
Riku gets back from Keyblade Master business. He sends out a bunch of invitations to a potluck party at his house and—well, Sora would like to say he doesn’t know when Riku got so cool, but the truth is he’s always thought Riku was the coolest guy ever.
Because, somehow, Riku gets Roxas to show up.
(Sora tries not to feel straight up hurt about that. That’s just diabolically unfair, right? Like, Sora doesn’t think he’s really done anything to Roxas, but he knows Riku and Roxas had some serious beef.)
Riku greets everybody individually at the door. For Sora, he has a kiss on each cheek and on the forehead. Sora stands there blushing for a good second before Kairi pulls him along with a giggle.
He only wonders for a moment where Riku’s parents are. Probably off camping. Or going to spiritual retreats. Or whatever it is they do when they’re not here, which is most of the time.
Riku seems happy enough with their absence. He certainly hadn’t minded their lack of comment on his dropping out of high school.
It’s a good-sized party, but not all of Sora’s friends are here. He sits on a couch and hides behind Kairi, which is so unlike him that it makes him feel even more weird. She lets him hide behind her, but she has a look in her eye. He wrings his hands. He bets if Donald and Goofy were here, they would make him feel much less awkward. The duck and the dog have other things to do, though. Royal duties call them.
Aqua and Terra’s steady presences aren’t here, either; nor Lea.
Someone Sora doesn’t expect to see is Ienzo. It’s not unwelcome to see him. Sora feels bad for the guy if anything, not that much older than anyone else here but looking extremely out of place among his peers. After all, it sounds like he practically grew up in a lab, which sounds awful and boring to Sora, but then, he thinks Ienzo had initially been a curious and willing participant in the experiment, as well. Like, who likes science that much? When Sora thinks about equations for too long they float in front of his eyeballs like Heartless.
He loses sight of Ienzo when Naminé appears in front of him and Kairi. She extends a hand to both of them, and Sora takes it automatically. “You’re here!” she says, glowing. Kairi glows similarly when she looks up at the blonde girl.
She described her relationship to her Nobody as “like a perfect sister,” once. Sora isn’t jealous at all. He thinks he’s launched right past jealousy into despair, actually, if he thinks about it at all.
He looks extra hard at Naminé when he feels Roxas’s heavy stare on him from the door.
“Come get food with me, you two,” Naminé says pleadingly. “I’ve never eaten at a party. I’m a little scared.”
Well, Sora can’t say no to that obviously, and neither would Kairi ever. They string their hands together and meander to the table where all the food is laid out, buffering Naminé from other bodies and helping her find where plates, silverware and such are. Sora brought blackberry cobbler Amelia helped him make, and he pumps his fist when Naminé and Kairi both go for some. Success. He’s certainly brought worse to a Destiny Islands potluck before. He asks Naminé what she’s brought, and she points shyly at some cupcakes adorned with messy icing swirls and m&m flowers. Kairi shrieks with pride, and Sora, wincing at the piercing noise to his eardrums, assures Naminé that they’re adorable.
“Try one?” she suggests, hopeful. Sora reaches for one. They look so cute, after all.
The first bite is like death and the deserts of Agrabah. He chews slowly, eyes wide. Naminé and Kairi are both giving him puppy eyes, in different ways. “It’s, flavorful,” he says, trying not to retch. Once he gets it swallowed, he pulls a big smile and a double thumbs up. “Great job, Naminé! I can’t wait for you to practice baking more.”
Kairi grabs his hand and squeezes it. Naminé claps her hands, delighted, and takes her tray of cupcakes to move onto another victim, clearly forgetting food in favor of seeking more ratings immediately.
“Thank you,” Kairi says when Naminé won’t hear it. “How bad was it, really?”
“Not that bad, really,” he says generously. Nothing tastes that good lately, anyway, and it doesn’t feel good in the pit of his stomach, either. “Let’s grab a plate for her.”
The crux of it, honestly, is that things are working for Sora.
Everything is pretty good, and there is not supposed to be anything wrong anymore, and Sora has been running around the universe for one thing after another for so damn long. He can’t fuck things up now, now, when everything is easy. Everyone else is handling things just fine, by the looks of it. Nobody else, probably, is staying up all night looking at the shadows in his room and screaming into his pillow. They’re just. Going on with their lives.
Sora does his online homework at 3 a.m., usually. He’ll be awake anyway. One day Vette asks, stiltedly, if he’s still doing okay with the courses, if he wants a break, needs time off. He tells her he likes it all except the math, and that he wants to do more art courses next semester. She says okay and makes him dinner. Amelia is at her brother’s, so Vette and Sora eat in silence again.
He thinks he hears her crying, down in the living room after he goes to bed that night.
His heart hurts really bad, he finds, lying there with cloudy moonlight streaming in his window, and for a second he thinks wildly that he’s losing his heart again. Again. He wishes it would just happen faster, but the feeling doesn’t go away and Sora’s ribs are shaking and his fingers and maybe it’s just his whole body then, shaking and trembling and still not crying.
Kairi goes away with her parents to visit extended family. Riku was already away again doing Keyblade Master things with real Keyblade Masters, and promises to be home soon, telling Sora about the beach date they’ll have when he gets back. The weather gets overcast, cruel and gray, and Sora dreads opening his eyes in the morning to look out the window. Vette leaves vitamin D tablets on the counter for him to take, which he does dutifully.
He wants to make good on that promise to visit Twilight Town right now, but Xion is sick for the first time since having an immune system again, and Lea is reluctant to have Sora over when Lea’s been the one around Xion and taking care of her. No need to get everybody sick, he insists.
He must sense something in Sora’s messages, because he also insists on a phone call.
“How’re you doing, Sora?” he asks. Jovial, but serious at the same time. It’s a unique quality Lea seems to have in abundance. “How’s that world over there on your shoulders?”
Sora laughs at him. That doesn’t make any sense. Silly. “I don’t know. How’re you with yours?”
“My world’s littler these days,” Lea tells him. “I think I like it that way, though. Easier to carry.”
“How’s Xion and—and Roxas?” Sora asks, and Lea is quiet for a moment.
“Xion’s alright, just a little feverish,” he says eventually. “Roxas—it’s not my business but, he’ll come around, Sora.”
Sora chokes a little bit. It’s like his throat is closing up, his muscles wanting to cry, but his eyes still awful and dry.
“Yeah,” he forces out. “Ah, sure. I should go, Axel. I mean—Lea.”
“Don’t be a stranger,” Lea says, before he hangs up. “Got it memorized?”
Sora strikes gold finally when he reaches out to Ventus; not only is Ventus free today, but he wants to know if Sora will come over and spar with him. A workout sounds good to Sora. He’s never felt better than with aching muscles and a Keyblade in his hands. He tells Amelia where he’s going, and she sends him off to the gummi ship laden with sandwiches and Gatorade. Sora knows overdoing it is how his mom shows love, but he wishes she didn’t look like she was sending him off to war every time they parted.
He was so excited to be off, but now his gut twists. He counts the seconds to the Land of Departure staring vaguely at the stars. He is used to them. Is that bad? He feels almost inhuman for failing to wonder at the beauty of the universe. He looks away, towards the approaching world.
As he descends, Ventus smiling up at him from the ground is a welcome face. Ven may have Roxas’s literal face, but he has none of his bite. When Sora’s feet touch the grass he’s pulled into a hug.
It’s a very nice hug. It’s also a very careful hug.
Sora wonders when people started treating him like he’s fragile.
What is he showing them? What does his face look like, to the world?
Ventus treats him like any other sparring partner in the ring, though. “Get your blade out before I whoop ya,” he threatens, brandishing his own Keyblade with a grin. Energy is surging high in Sora, but a different kind of energy, murky and icky, bubbles in his belly. It nauseates him. He braces himself with a slightly uncomfortable grimace and opens his hand for his Keyblade.
Nothing happens.
Sora looks at his hand. He waits. He looks up at Ventus’s fading grin. He looks back down at his hand. He opens it wider, flexes the fingers. Feels the leather of his glove creak.
His hand is empty still, and he is hollow. Cored by the loss of something he didn’t know was loseable. He stands there, a shrill noise ringing in his ears, and then he turns around and walks away. Words from Ventus wash over him like a wave as Sora’s thoughts are blanketed in fog.