[06.] Introspection
Title: Introspection
Fandom: Kingdom Hearts
Claim: Riku/Cloud
Theme: [06.] Water
Rating: T/PG-13
Word Count: 1,739
Summary: There are places we all have that bring us comfort.
Musical Inspiration: Tony Lucca: various songs
Disclaimer: Sorry, but I still have no affiliation with Kingdom Hearts, and if only I were making money off this trifle of a story. Alas, I am not, and I am dreadfully broke.
Author’s Note: Water’s an interesting theme. Water flows, ebbs, erodes. Water shows us our reflection, houses life, replenishes thirst. Water takes form in our tears. Water is the element of creativity.
Author's Note 2: This is a serialized story following the prompts in numerical order so feel free to refer to the prompt table for previous installments.
Two days passed and Riku hadn’t returned from Maleficent’s castle. Cloud wondered where he was. The last time he’d seen Riku, he stopped by the morning after seeing Sora, and they talked briefly before Riku had to run back. Maleficent had plans for him, or so Riku said. Cloud didn’t like the idea of Maleficent having plans for anyone, much less Riku, someone he cared about.
When Riku was here last, he had mentioned something about going to Agrabah to obtain a fifth princess. Assuming that to be the reason for Riku’s absence, Cloud looked across Hollow Bastion to the castle. He leaned against the little house he stayed in, slung his bag over his shoulder, and tied the crimson cape on. He wasn’t sure how long Riku would be gone, and he couldn’t march into Maleficent’s castle and demand to know Riku’s whereabouts. Cloud glanced back into the house through the hole in the wall at the note sitting on the table. He hoped Riku wouldn’t be angry.
Cloud sent one last look to the castle and set off toward his Gummi. He needed to go to Traverse Town to check in with people. They’d start to get worried if he didn’t, he knew. Besides, he had a few supplies he wanted to pick up there before he set off to look for Sephiroth again.
~*~
“Cloud, you seem distracted,” said Aerith. She peered at him. “Cloud, is something wrong?”
“No,” he said, shaking his head. “I’ve just-“
“You seem worried. Different.”
“Cloud, worried?” said Yuffie, laughing. “Yeah, sure. Cloud has two emotions: bored, and annoyed.”
Cloud glared at her. Yuffie giggled.
“Okay, so you have more emotions than that. There’s also uninterested, indifferent, and depressed.”
“And angry,” added Leon.
“Oh, yeah. I forgot that one. That’s like, six emotions.”
Cloud huffed.
“What’s bothering you, Cloud,” said Aerith. “This isn’t about Sephiroth.”
“It’s nothing, okay. I can’t stay long. I’m heading back to Hollow Bastion in the morning.”
“I don’t know why you stay there,” said Leon. “That world is destroyed. It should be gone. If it weren’t for Maleficent-“
“I know, okay? But that’s where Sephiroth ends up a majority of the time, and if I want to track him down, I ought to go to where the odds say he’ll be, right?”
“I’ve got that warp gummi installed for ya,” said Cid, entering the little house. “And you wanted these, too, right?”
Cid passed two cell phones to Cloud. He nodded.
“Yeah. Thanks a lot, Cid. I appreciate it.”
“Cloud’s worried about something,” Yuffie said. She grinned from where she sat on the table, swinging her legs.
“Worried?” said Cid. “About Sephiroth?”
“No,” said Cloud, “now could you all please leave me alone?”
“Hey,” said Leon, “whatever’s bothering you can’t be that bad. Why don’t you go on down to the river when you get back to Hollow Bastion? That ought to clear it up.”
Aerith smiled at Leon, still patting Cloud’s knee as if to reassure him of whatever was bothering him.
“That’s a great idea, Leon,” said Aerith. “Don’t you think so, Cloud?”
The river. It’d been ages since Cloud thought of the little river that ran through Hollow Bastion. Cloud nodded.
“Yeah. I’ll give it a try.”
“Well, then, that’s all settled. So why don’t you tell me what’s on your mind?”
Cloud groaned.
“And that emotion,” said Yuffie, “would be annoyed.”
~*~
That warp gummi Cid installed for him worked wonders. It took a tenth of the time to get back to Hollow Bastion for which he was thankful. He hoped Riku hadn’t stopped by since he’d be gone. He’d promised to tell him if he was going to leave, but that hadn’t been an option.
Cloud rounded the corner of the little house to find Riku inside, sitting on the pile of blankets. He arched an eyebrow at Cloud’s approach.
“Where have you been?” said Riku.
“Traverse Town. It’s in the note.”
“I saw.”
“I would have told you in person, but you didn’t stop by, and I didn’t know if you-“
“It’s okay. I went to Agrabah to get Jasmine.”
“How did that go?”
“Good. Well, Sora wiped out Jafar, so now we’ve got an emergency meeting tomorrow, but I pulled the kidnapping off without a hitch.”
“That’s . . . good.”
If kidnapping was good, which Cloud thought it wasn’t, but it wasn’t much better than what he’d done, promising to kill someone for Hades, and he was searching for Sephiroth to kill him, so he didn’t think he was in any place to judge.
“So what happened in Traverse Town? Did you see Sora?”
“Nope.”
“Did you say anything to your friends about us?”
“Nope. Thought you wouldn’t want it getting back to Sora.”
Riku smiled.
“Thanks.”
“Not a problem. I was worried about you.”
Riku’s eyebrows rose.
“What were you worried about me for?”
“I don’t know. I didn’t hear anything from you for a few days, so . . . I don’t know. I hoped Maleficent hadn’t cut out your heart or anything.”
“She’s a nasty piece of work, but I don’t know if she’s that bad,” said Riku, laughing. “So what’re you going to do now that you’re back?”
”Actually, I was thinking of taking off tomorrow to look for Sephiroth again.”
“Oh . . . well, um, good luck with that.”
”I’ll miss you.”
“I’ll miss you, too.”
“I have something for you.”
Riku laughed. “It’s nothing infused with the power of darkness, is it?”
“No, why?” said Cloud, now laughing, too.
“I don’t know. Every time I hear someone has something for me it turns out to have to do with the darkness.”
“I see. Maleficent.”
“Yeah.”
Cloud put his bag on the table and fished through it.
“You know, there’s this river just outside of town. I was thinking of taking a walk over there to clear my head. You want to come?”
“Is that your special place or something?”
“Yeah. It’s where I go to think.”
“I used to have one of those places,” said Riku. “A paopu tree on that island I told you about where we used to go play. The other guys on the island used to call it my tree; I wouldn’t let anyone else sit there except Kairi and Sora.”
Cloud smiled, digging one of the cell phones out of his bag. He walked over to Riku and sat beside him on the blankets.
“This is for you.”
“A cell phone?”
“Yeah, I’ve got the other one, and my number’s programmed in there.”
“Is this so I can call you when you get into Hollow Bastion to set up secret dates?”
“No, this is so if I’m leaving, or you’re leaving, we can contact each other. I had Cid put a special chip in them, too, so we can call across worlds.”
“Really?”
“Yeah. So when I’m looking for Sephiroth, you can give me a call any time.”
Riku’s smiled brightened and he pressed a kiss to Cloud’s lips before pressing his forehead against Clouds.
“This is great. Thank you.”
”No problem. Want to go down with me to that river now?”
Riku nodded.
~*~
“The orphanage I grew up in used to be right up that hill,” said Cloud, motioning behind them. He and Riku sat by the river, and Cloud watched Riku’s hands as he picked at the grass. “Leon and I used to come down here a lot and play.”
“You know Leon from the orphanage?”
“I know all of my friends from there. Cid lived nearby, and with all us kids being so young-and since he could never have kids of his own-he used to watch out for us. When we got older, everyone stopped coming down here so much, but I still like to.”
“It’s your special place.”
“Yeah. I come here when I want to know the world is still a good place despite all the crap going on. I like listening to the water.”
“I used to like listening to the waves on my tree.”
“Yeah?”
“Yeah.”
“I love the sound of moving water. Aerith used to say that water was like hope: when it comes upon an obstacle, it isn’t deterred, and if it continues to flow for a long time, it can erode away even the toughest rock, but if you close it off, things dry up and die.”
“That’s intense.”
“Yeah. I don’t know. Aerith has a way of saying things sometimes that tend to both inspire and depress you at the same time.”
“Aerith is full of little pearls of wisdom, isn’t she?”
“She’s that kind of girl.”
“What do you think about water?”
“I don’t know.”
Cloud looked down into the river at his blurry reflection. Riku smiled at him and gazed into the river as well.
“I can hardly stand to look at myself anymore,” said Riku, so quietly Cloud had almost not heard it. “I like the way the water keeps moving; means I can hardly see myself.”
“What’s eating at you?”
“The darkness, I suppose. I just didn’t know . . . I don’t have any options, you know? Sora is off thinking he’s king and I have to find Kairi. If Maleficent can help me-I don’t know. I feel like I’m drowning in something I can’t quite see. Sometimes I wish I were still at home. Sometimes I just want to cry.”
“Cry.”
“I can’t. Do you know that feeling? When things are so bad you can’t even cry anymore?”
Cloud thought back to a long time ago when Sephiroth had been created. The Heartless had slowly started to appear in Hollow Bastion. He’d accepted darkness fearlessly then. It had seemed glamorous in a way to have that much power. When Cloud was young, he’d been rather thin and a tad on the frail side. He was good at fighting; he and Leon trained together most of their lives, and he had no problem against the Heartless, but the darkness . . . it seemed like a blessing almost. He could acquire powers through it that, without darkness, he couldn’t dare to dream of having.
“Yeah. I’ve been there.”
Riku leaned over, resting his head against Cloud’s shoulder.
“I’m happy here with you. There’s still something good left in this world. You know?”
Cloud smiled down at Riku.
“I know exactly what you’re saying.”
Fandom: Kingdom Hearts
Claim: Riku/Cloud
Theme: [06.] Water
Rating: T/PG-13
Word Count: 1,739
Summary: There are places we all have that bring us comfort.
Musical Inspiration: Tony Lucca: various songs
Disclaimer: Sorry, but I still have no affiliation with Kingdom Hearts, and if only I were making money off this trifle of a story. Alas, I am not, and I am dreadfully broke.
Author’s Note: Water’s an interesting theme. Water flows, ebbs, erodes. Water shows us our reflection, houses life, replenishes thirst. Water takes form in our tears. Water is the element of creativity.
Author's Note 2: This is a serialized story following the prompts in numerical order so feel free to refer to the prompt table for previous installments.
Two days passed and Riku hadn’t returned from Maleficent’s castle. Cloud wondered where he was. The last time he’d seen Riku, he stopped by the morning after seeing Sora, and they talked briefly before Riku had to run back. Maleficent had plans for him, or so Riku said. Cloud didn’t like the idea of Maleficent having plans for anyone, much less Riku, someone he cared about.
When Riku was here last, he had mentioned something about going to Agrabah to obtain a fifth princess. Assuming that to be the reason for Riku’s absence, Cloud looked across Hollow Bastion to the castle. He leaned against the little house he stayed in, slung his bag over his shoulder, and tied the crimson cape on. He wasn’t sure how long Riku would be gone, and he couldn’t march into Maleficent’s castle and demand to know Riku’s whereabouts. Cloud glanced back into the house through the hole in the wall at the note sitting on the table. He hoped Riku wouldn’t be angry.
Cloud sent one last look to the castle and set off toward his Gummi. He needed to go to Traverse Town to check in with people. They’d start to get worried if he didn’t, he knew. Besides, he had a few supplies he wanted to pick up there before he set off to look for Sephiroth again.
~*~
“Cloud, you seem distracted,” said Aerith. She peered at him. “Cloud, is something wrong?”
“No,” he said, shaking his head. “I’ve just-“
“You seem worried. Different.”
“Cloud, worried?” said Yuffie, laughing. “Yeah, sure. Cloud has two emotions: bored, and annoyed.”
Cloud glared at her. Yuffie giggled.
“Okay, so you have more emotions than that. There’s also uninterested, indifferent, and depressed.”
“And angry,” added Leon.
“Oh, yeah. I forgot that one. That’s like, six emotions.”
Cloud huffed.
“What’s bothering you, Cloud,” said Aerith. “This isn’t about Sephiroth.”
“It’s nothing, okay. I can’t stay long. I’m heading back to Hollow Bastion in the morning.”
“I don’t know why you stay there,” said Leon. “That world is destroyed. It should be gone. If it weren’t for Maleficent-“
“I know, okay? But that’s where Sephiroth ends up a majority of the time, and if I want to track him down, I ought to go to where the odds say he’ll be, right?”
“I’ve got that warp gummi installed for ya,” said Cid, entering the little house. “And you wanted these, too, right?”
Cid passed two cell phones to Cloud. He nodded.
“Yeah. Thanks a lot, Cid. I appreciate it.”
“Cloud’s worried about something,” Yuffie said. She grinned from where she sat on the table, swinging her legs.
“Worried?” said Cid. “About Sephiroth?”
“No,” said Cloud, “now could you all please leave me alone?”
“Hey,” said Leon, “whatever’s bothering you can’t be that bad. Why don’t you go on down to the river when you get back to Hollow Bastion? That ought to clear it up.”
Aerith smiled at Leon, still patting Cloud’s knee as if to reassure him of whatever was bothering him.
“That’s a great idea, Leon,” said Aerith. “Don’t you think so, Cloud?”
The river. It’d been ages since Cloud thought of the little river that ran through Hollow Bastion. Cloud nodded.
“Yeah. I’ll give it a try.”
“Well, then, that’s all settled. So why don’t you tell me what’s on your mind?”
Cloud groaned.
“And that emotion,” said Yuffie, “would be annoyed.”
~*~
That warp gummi Cid installed for him worked wonders. It took a tenth of the time to get back to Hollow Bastion for which he was thankful. He hoped Riku hadn’t stopped by since he’d be gone. He’d promised to tell him if he was going to leave, but that hadn’t been an option.
Cloud rounded the corner of the little house to find Riku inside, sitting on the pile of blankets. He arched an eyebrow at Cloud’s approach.
“Where have you been?” said Riku.
“Traverse Town. It’s in the note.”
“I saw.”
“I would have told you in person, but you didn’t stop by, and I didn’t know if you-“
“It’s okay. I went to Agrabah to get Jasmine.”
“How did that go?”
“Good. Well, Sora wiped out Jafar, so now we’ve got an emergency meeting tomorrow, but I pulled the kidnapping off without a hitch.”
“That’s . . . good.”
If kidnapping was good, which Cloud thought it wasn’t, but it wasn’t much better than what he’d done, promising to kill someone for Hades, and he was searching for Sephiroth to kill him, so he didn’t think he was in any place to judge.
“So what happened in Traverse Town? Did you see Sora?”
“Nope.”
“Did you say anything to your friends about us?”
“Nope. Thought you wouldn’t want it getting back to Sora.”
Riku smiled.
“Thanks.”
“Not a problem. I was worried about you.”
Riku’s eyebrows rose.
“What were you worried about me for?”
“I don’t know. I didn’t hear anything from you for a few days, so . . . I don’t know. I hoped Maleficent hadn’t cut out your heart or anything.”
“She’s a nasty piece of work, but I don’t know if she’s that bad,” said Riku, laughing. “So what’re you going to do now that you’re back?”
”Actually, I was thinking of taking off tomorrow to look for Sephiroth again.”
“Oh . . . well, um, good luck with that.”
”I’ll miss you.”
“I’ll miss you, too.”
“I have something for you.”
Riku laughed. “It’s nothing infused with the power of darkness, is it?”
“No, why?” said Cloud, now laughing, too.
“I don’t know. Every time I hear someone has something for me it turns out to have to do with the darkness.”
“I see. Maleficent.”
“Yeah.”
Cloud put his bag on the table and fished through it.
“You know, there’s this river just outside of town. I was thinking of taking a walk over there to clear my head. You want to come?”
“Is that your special place or something?”
“Yeah. It’s where I go to think.”
“I used to have one of those places,” said Riku. “A paopu tree on that island I told you about where we used to go play. The other guys on the island used to call it my tree; I wouldn’t let anyone else sit there except Kairi and Sora.”
Cloud smiled, digging one of the cell phones out of his bag. He walked over to Riku and sat beside him on the blankets.
“This is for you.”
“A cell phone?”
“Yeah, I’ve got the other one, and my number’s programmed in there.”
“Is this so I can call you when you get into Hollow Bastion to set up secret dates?”
“No, this is so if I’m leaving, or you’re leaving, we can contact each other. I had Cid put a special chip in them, too, so we can call across worlds.”
“Really?”
“Yeah. So when I’m looking for Sephiroth, you can give me a call any time.”
Riku’s smiled brightened and he pressed a kiss to Cloud’s lips before pressing his forehead against Clouds.
“This is great. Thank you.”
”No problem. Want to go down with me to that river now?”
Riku nodded.
~*~
“The orphanage I grew up in used to be right up that hill,” said Cloud, motioning behind them. He and Riku sat by the river, and Cloud watched Riku’s hands as he picked at the grass. “Leon and I used to come down here a lot and play.”
“You know Leon from the orphanage?”
“I know all of my friends from there. Cid lived nearby, and with all us kids being so young-and since he could never have kids of his own-he used to watch out for us. When we got older, everyone stopped coming down here so much, but I still like to.”
“It’s your special place.”
“Yeah. I come here when I want to know the world is still a good place despite all the crap going on. I like listening to the water.”
“I used to like listening to the waves on my tree.”
“Yeah?”
“Yeah.”
“I love the sound of moving water. Aerith used to say that water was like hope: when it comes upon an obstacle, it isn’t deterred, and if it continues to flow for a long time, it can erode away even the toughest rock, but if you close it off, things dry up and die.”
“That’s intense.”
“Yeah. I don’t know. Aerith has a way of saying things sometimes that tend to both inspire and depress you at the same time.”
“Aerith is full of little pearls of wisdom, isn’t she?”
“She’s that kind of girl.”
“What do you think about water?”
“I don’t know.”
Cloud looked down into the river at his blurry reflection. Riku smiled at him and gazed into the river as well.
“I can hardly stand to look at myself anymore,” said Riku, so quietly Cloud had almost not heard it. “I like the way the water keeps moving; means I can hardly see myself.”
“What’s eating at you?”
“The darkness, I suppose. I just didn’t know . . . I don’t have any options, you know? Sora is off thinking he’s king and I have to find Kairi. If Maleficent can help me-I don’t know. I feel like I’m drowning in something I can’t quite see. Sometimes I wish I were still at home. Sometimes I just want to cry.”
“Cry.”
“I can’t. Do you know that feeling? When things are so bad you can’t even cry anymore?”
Cloud thought back to a long time ago when Sephiroth had been created. The Heartless had slowly started to appear in Hollow Bastion. He’d accepted darkness fearlessly then. It had seemed glamorous in a way to have that much power. When Cloud was young, he’d been rather thin and a tad on the frail side. He was good at fighting; he and Leon trained together most of their lives, and he had no problem against the Heartless, but the darkness . . . it seemed like a blessing almost. He could acquire powers through it that, without darkness, he couldn’t dare to dream of having.
“Yeah. I’ve been there.”
Riku leaned over, resting his head against Cloud’s shoulder.
“I’m happy here with you. There’s still something good left in this world. You know?”
Cloud smiled down at Riku.
“I know exactly what you’re saying.”