This was written for rubyd's beautiful fanart. Then it grew, so more will come.

The dream begins. It's a distorted memory: he and Sora are racing along the sandy beach, just the two of them, laughing and refusing to stop even when they reach the appointed finish line of a skinny palm tree. They keep running, bare feet slapping on wet sand, and then plunging into the warm seawater. It's a weightless wrestling match that, like more and more of Riku's dreams, becomes something entirely different.

Clothes disappear, and the beach shifts and flickers from view, and Sora is whispering things that aren't possible.

"You're so beautiful, Riku."

Then everything shifts again. The warm water becomes a dark mass, pulling him down, down, down. Riku grabs blindly for Sora's hand, but he touches only the cold Darkness. The eyes that meet his are beady and yellow. He looks around and sees he's surrounded. The tall, windowless skyscrapers of the World that Never Was rise up around him, hemming him in.

"Sora!" he shouts. The Keyblade won't come to his hand. What's happened?

Sharp teeth bite into his leg, and he's down on the ground, crushed under the weight of so many dark shadows. The pain in his leg is exactly where Xenmas injured him, leaving a jagged scar.

He shuts his eyes tight and feels his heart leaving him.

"Sora…" A pained whisper.

With a gasp, Riku sits up in bed. His breath is coming in hot, hurried pants. He feels like he's run a mile. The piles of sheets are soaked in sweat. He puts a shaky hand to his forehead; he's burning up. Without even thinking, he repeats his friend's name softly.

"Riku?" Sora's deep blue eyes are blinking at him in the dim light, leaning over the bed with a concerned crease between his brows. "You fell asleep while I was in the shower. You looked so tired all day, I didn't want to wake you up. Are you feeling okay?"

Riku gulps huge breaths of air, trying to slow his heart rate. He's in Sora's home. He's in Sora's bed. He's safe. There is no more Darkness.

Right?

He looks at Sora, his brown locks still dripping wet from the shower. If the Darkness is gone, Riku thinks, then what is making him think about Sora this way? This violent, unyielding way. It's nonnegotiable. It's terrifying. It screams at him to take the boy as his own, to rip him away from this world, this warm house. To tear him from Kairi's arms.

If that's not Darkness, then what is it?

He wipes the drops of sweat from his face and manages a tight smile. For Sora, he can do this.

"I'm fine," he says.

For Sora, he can keep lying.