Chapter Text
Sora's chest burned.
He swore up and down he's not a crybaby. He's not a pansy, he's not weak. He can take it. The teasing, the jokes, the subtle jabs Master Yen Sid threw his way after losing his power again. The sureness in everyone's eyes that he'll get through this unscathed. That he'll just pick himself back up, be plucky and perfect and his usual upbeat self.
But he just… he couldn't help it, okay? That itchy feeling in his eyes, the tightness in his throat, even the blood rushing to his face. He ran.
He had made some bumbling excuse, an "I'm tired" or something like that, and slipped quickly from the room, shutting the door on Axel, no, Lea's call of "Didn't you just wake up from a magic sleep?"
He wasn't tired physically, he was tired mentally. The kind of tired that made him want to wrap himself in a blanket and ask Kairi to read silly romance novels to him, like she did when they were kids. The kind where people blushed too much and wore weird clothes and the kissing scenes were read with so much disgust it made them giggle til their sides hurt.
But that was a lifetime ago, and she was worlds away.
So now, here he was, wedged between the Mysterious Tower and a bush, trying to stifle his shakey breathing by clasping a hand over his mouth and forcing his inhales through his nose. It wasn't working. All it did was make him crave the oxygen he needed. The force of his exhales wasn't being matched by his inhales and it was starting to make him lightheaded.
Eventually, he just couldn't handle it anymore. Sora pulled his hand from his mouth and gripped his hair. Something had to ground him. He tugged at his hair with one hand and wrapped his other arm around himself and squeezed as hard as he could. Pain, pressure, something, anything had to keep him from falling to the claws of this overwhelm.
His breath came in shorter and shorter gasps. A strange feeling, an awful feeling, gripped his heart. He couldn't tell what the fucking was going on. What was he feeling? Anger, at his power being taken? Fear, from nearly being possessed? Sadness, that he was so weak, even after all his effort? Was that what these things felt like? Was this all just a massive over reaction? It felt like a tangled rope had gathered behind his sternum. He had no clue where to even begin to start picking at it.
"Riku is good at unraveling knots."
The memory rose to the surface in a flash.
Himself and Kairi accidentally tangling the rope they needed for the raft, and in trying to untangle it, only making it less resemble a line and moreso look like a ball of incredible coarse yarn. They had gone to Riku, yarn-rope in hand and pleaded him for help. He had dropped the log he had been carrying into the sand with a sigh and pulled the mess from their hands, plopped down into the sand, and began to pick at the knot. He and Kairi sat beside him and watched as his brow furrowed in concentration - so severely Sora thought he was angry with them - as he traced section after section with his index finger. He would tug a section to release tension, then push it in to shove the slack further and further into the knot, slowly loosening it. He picked and pushed and wiggled until it was loose enough that all he had to do was lead an end of it through the loops that had once seemed so indecipherable to Sora and Kairi. Just like that, the knot was released, and the raft plans were back on track.
Desperately, secretly, he wished Riku could unravel the feelings tying up his heart.