A/N My sad attempt with Anti-Sora. I haven't written a Kingdom Hearts fanfic/story. Ever. Thought I'd give it a shot. Like always, I try to keep the character personalities right – although Anti-Sora's personality is something I created.

There are some slight differences, like how Sora, Riku, and Kairi all have parents here. I can't make a fanfic without changing something… D: This was a rushed story. :(

Pretty much this was just an experiment to test out how I could create a personality for Anti-Sora. xD

"The closer you get to the light, the greater your shadow becomes." – Mysterious Voice/Unknown, Kingdom Hearts

Kairi would never fear Sora. Never.

She wasn't afraid of him when he became a Shadow. After all, a part of her had noted that no matter what form he took – he would always be Sora… The boy who would accept everyone, protect everyone, befriend everyone, and commit nothing out of selfishness.

The Princess of Heart sighed as she trudged up the stairs from the living room. From whatever strange force there was, her parents, along with Sora and Riku's, were never aware of the time periods in which they left to fight Heartless. In fact, they probably weren't even aware of Heartless!

Of course, in some ways she was relieved they were oblivious. It meant she was spared from lying like the heroines in her stories did when they couldn't explain something crucial to a loved one.

But, it also made Kairi feel lonely. She had no one to talk to about her past journeys. There was only Sora and Riku, and they were almost always away – fighting Heartless, saving worlds, all that good stuff.

Sure, she was a Princess of Heart, but she was a Princess of Heart with a keyblade. Why couldn't she go out to help and fight alongside with them? Oh right, Yen Sid has said she was to stay put until her training started.

Kairi was starting to think that was code for "Become a hermit and avoid contact with anyone and anything – you never know what might be a Heartless."

Still, she missed her friends, and most of all she missed Sora. It was only now that she realized she had taken Sora's smile and constant positive attitude for granted. Destiny Islands didn't seem as fascinating as before.

Sighing for the thousandth time ever since she was banished to the "safety" of her home and a part of Destiny Islands, Kairi pushed open the door to her room. Now that dinner was over, she could move onto the next event in her schedule: Lie on the bed and brood like any teenager filled with angst.

Hey, it's actually very soothing though, Kairi thought to herself. A great moment to think about myself, the world, why everything in my room is pink, and–

Kairi's mental reasoning was paused as she caught the familiar figure of a boy standing near the open window and facing it. There wasn't mistaking that spiky hair, nor the clothing and big shoes. His hair looked almost black in color, but Kairi brushed it off – thinking it was just a trick of the light in her room.

"Sora!You're back!" With a big smile on her face, she took a step forward. Why was he in her room, though?

"I'm sorry." He chuckled; his voice was lower, darker than usual. "You seem to have mistaken me for someone." And he turned around.

Kairi inhaled sharply.

It was Sora, but then it wasn't. His irises blazed a cold, golden yellow, rather than the cheerful, sea blue. The boy standing ahead of her grinned, revealing sharp fangs. Looking closely, Kairi grasped the fact that his hair was black as ash, and that there seemed to be wisps of darkness coming from him, like his very being was made of darkness.

Everything about him screamed Heartless, but Kairi didn't run. She didn't summon her keyblade. First, she needed to know if this was Sora.

Maybe this was just a prank, maybe she was only dreaming, maybe she was finally beginning to lose it after such a long time (okay, it was only weeks, but still) of speaking to no one but her parents.

Maybe, maybe, maybe.

"Sora? Are you okay?" she asked, settling on the one simple question she wanted to know. Sure, his current state was… unsettling, but at least he didn't seem to be hurt. Though Kairi had a thousand questions in store for him, it was his well-being that mattered the most.

In return, the shadow-like boy cocked his head in confusion.

"You're not… scared of me?" His eyes narrowed into two golden slits. "I'm not your Sora, you know." Another (sharp) toothy grin spread across his face.

"Then what are you?" Kairi should have pulled out her keyblade the moment the entity declared he wasn't Sora – but she didn't. The why to this remained unknown.

Was it up to the dangerous point that Kairi didn't fear anything that looked like Sora? The boy standing in front of her, barely ten feet away, definitely posed a threat. So why wasn't she afraid of him?

However, when she didn't attack, his grin faded. He looked more perplexed.

"You're not attacking," he said after a moment, staring at her. "Is this why…" Almost instantly, he shook his head, as if it would dispel some thought. "No. I still don't see why you're so important to him." He made the word him sound like a curse, a disease.

Kairi wondered whom he was referring to.

"I," he began, "don't have a name." And he smiled a devious smile that would have made anyone in Kairi's place break into a run to get away. He took a breath, and looked to the ceiling like he was thinking deeply. "As much as I hate to admit it… I am a part of Sora, I guess you could say."

Then he chuckled again, darkly, as every action of his had been. Dark and mysterious. "Oh, how panicked he would be to find out I was here," he drawled.

Kairi found herself unafraid of the being that resembled Sora, but that didn't mean she was comfortable. Heartless (depending on the type) were often predictable. However, the boy in front of her was dicey.

His personality was nothing like Sora's.

"What do you mean?" she asked, this time warily.

"We're playing 20 questions now!" he cheered with a false jovial and childish tone. His hands clapped together as he leapt into the air – and to Kairi's shock, floated in the air for a few seconds before gently landing again, closer to her. "But I must admit, your questioning is a nice change from our silver-haired friend's attacking."

I'll never get used to that gliding ability, she thought. His words registered in her mind, then.

"Wait, you saw Riku? Is he okay? Why isn't he with you?"

"And she answers me with more questions." The Heartless-like Sora scoffed. "What's so important about Riku? I'll never understand why Sora forgave him so easily… Then again, Sora's an idiot. He forgives everyone for anything." He rolled his eyes, muttering, "I don't see how he's still alive, with all the chances he's given his enemies."

"It's because he gives those who've become lost a chance to find the light again that saves him. Sora helped many people realize what they were doing was wrong, and in return, they aided us," Kairi defended. "His friends are the power he has to bring back the light."

He raised an eyebrow, skeptical.

"Sounds like a perfect power to get you killed." It was hard to think this was a part of Sora. Kairi had always known Sora to be positive, yet this humanoid Heartless – who claimed to be a part of said boy – was anything but positive.

"If you're a part of Sora, how come you don't have a name?" she asked again. Questions were all she knew now, mainly because she knew nothing about the… stranger in front of her. Nothing about him connected to Sora, other than physical looks.

"Ah, a change of topic in the questions." He laughed, although it wasn't the cheerful laugh Sora had. "What? You think I have to have a name like the brooding hooded blond kid or that other keyblade-wielder who he looks like? Well, I don't. I don't need a name. It's not Sora acknowledges any of our presences anyway, so what's the point? You and that Venta boy or whatever were the only ones who had real identities in here."

"Don't you want a name, though?" Kairi frowned. Some part of her felt bad for him, and it didn't matter that he was a Heartless (or resembled one, anyway). "You still exist, and anyone who exists should have an identity."

"I represent everything that good, little Sora has that he keeps hidden. I'm all the hatred, annoyance, jealousy, and every other imperfection he doesn't seem to have. I'm the realistic, rational part of him. I'm the part that frowns upon forgiving an enemy. As far as I'm concerned, erasing them in a permanent way will make sure they don't come crawling back to fight us again."

"I got it!" Kairi snapped her fingers. "You should be called Aros."

"Aros?" he growled. "Did I not make it clear I don't want anything to do with Sora? Even if I wanted a name, it would be stupid to just reverse the name Sora for it."

"Yes, but it shows you're a part of Sora," Kairi added, "and that you're different."

"And how does it show that?" Aros grumbled, before mumbling to himself, "Aros," like he was testing out the name. He didn't sound like he was against the name, although he tried to show he was. "This is probably the most civil conversation I've ever had with a person who hasn't pulled a keyblade out on me."

Looking lost, he hesitantly added, "It feels… nice."

There was a silence between them as the wind blew through. Kairi noticed that Aros' eyes didn't seem as fiercely golden as before – it looked like a soft amber now.

"You're very accepting, just like him," Aros attempted a smile, and it came out crookedly, "but unlike him, it doesn't annoy me. Don't get yourself killed because of it, though."

Kairi smiled back.

Aros jumped onto the windowsill, crouched and prepared to leap down. Now, they were on the second floor of a house on a cliff – so with any normal person, jumping down would be suicide. But Kairi had been through a lot, and seeing someone being able to land like a cat wasn't any much stranger than seeing a living person breathe.

And the strangest thing happened after that. It was as if the words flew out by themselves, naturally.

"Visit now and then, will you, Aros?" she called to him.

Aros twisted around, staring at her in shock, before letting out a yelp as he fell back without balance. Shadows formed like claws on his nails as his hands reached out to grab onto her windowsill. He hung for a few seconds, and let out a laugh.

"I'll try, Princess." The dark hero grinned, releasing his hold and falling back into the darkness before Kairi could retaliate toward being nicknamed Princess of all things.

In that one moment, it dawned upon Kairi that she had befriended someone who was supposedly a Heartless.

And in the next moment, she realized she didn't really care.

Please review! :D