AN/ Hey folks welcome to chapter 1 of the entirety of FtPverse! It's a long ride, and, I hope you enjoy every second of it. Thanks for checking it out.

Chapter 1: Arrival

He made his way to the shore slowly; he hurt too much to move quickly. Once he was on dry land, water only lapping at his feet, he paused and took a moment to cough up the water that had filled his lungs.

How did I get here? he thought, truly confused. He didn't remember a thing.

He started to push himself to his feet, only to be overcome by another fit of coughing.

"Are you alright?" someone called, and he looked up. Running towards him was a girl, probably about his age, with red hair and blue eyes. She knelt in front of him and looked at him expectantly.

"Yeah, I'm alright," he said.

She took a look at his beaten body and frowned. "Are you sure about that?" She ran a hand along one of the cuts on his side. He winced. "What happened to you?" she asked.

He took a second to think about that, but his efforts were pointless. He couldn't remember anything, and was starting to wonder what had happened himself. "I don't know…" he said slowly.

The girl's frown deepened and worry filled her eyes. She turned back towards the island. "Sora!" she called. "Can you come here? I need your help with something!"

"Sure!" came the response. A boy, who he could only assume was Sora, came running over. Sora paused once he noticed what it was the girl had called him over for. "Who's this?" he asked.

"Don't ask him questions! He's hurt, we need to get him inside."

"Okay, okay, geez!" Sora laughed, and held out his hand. He took it after a second and Sora helped him to his feet. Sora supported him as they made their way towards town.

After a few minutes of walking in silence, the girl spoke up. "My name's Kairi, by the way, do you mind me asking who you are?"

"I'm Riku," he said automatically.

Well, at least I remember my name, he thought.

"So, Riku, where'd you come from?" Sora asked.

"I can't remember."

"Can you remember anything?" Kairi asked.

Riku shook his head. "Not a thing," he replied with a sigh. It would be great if he could remember, maybe then he'd at least know why he hurt so much. Slowly, he closed his eyes as he limped along, doing his best to recall anything.

"Hold it."

He was in a clearing. Someone else was there, but he couldn't remember their face.

"You've changed… darkness… scare you…"

"I'm me!"

"Must be nice… couldn't get away with saying that…"

Anger, hate, rage, they flooded his mind. Whoever this person was, he needed to go. There was something about this person that just made him so mad! He pulled out his weapon and charged—

"Riku!"

He opened his eyes, Kairi was looking at him, and she seemed a bit worried. He noticed that he was also lying down on a couch. They were in a house. "Wha- what happened?"

"Sorry," Kairi said, "you just didn't answer the first time. I was a bit worried. Sorry if I woke you up, you probably need the rest. Whatever happened, it certainly wasn't good." She continued what she had previously been doing, which was bandaging one of Riku's wrists. While he had been trying to remember, it seemed she had bandaged up most of his major injuries.

He thought of the memory he had managed to pull up. The fragmented conversation hadn't made much sense to him, but the basic idea of what was going on was clear. He and whoever else was there were fighting.

"I think it was a fight…" he said quietly.

"It must have been a preeeeetty serious fight." Kairi sat down on a nearby chair.

"Yeah…"

Try as he could, though, he couldn't recall the memory again.

"Look what I found!"

Riku and Kairi both turned as the front door slammed open. Standing in the doorway was Sora, and he was holding something. He tossed what he was holding to Riku. Riku caught it and stared at it in slight disbelief. It was a bundle of clothes. Clothes that were identical to what he was wearing.

"Where'd you find this?" Kairi asked.

"They were just in a pile with the rest of my clothes? Which is weird, but lucky I guess," Sora answered, grinning.

"Thanks," Riku said.

"No prob."

"C'mon Sora," Kairi said, standing up and grabbing Sora's hand. "Let's get outta the way so he can get changed." She dragged him up the staircase to the right of the couch, since there really wasn't anywhere else to go except outside.

Riku laughed at the surprised look on Sora's face and sat up. It seemed like the two of them were going through an awful lot of trouble to help him out. Kairi had bandaged his wounds, and Sora went looking for new clothes that he could wear. Riku couldn't help but wonder why they were doing this.

Maybe it's destiny, he thought as he changed out of his old clothes and into the new ones. It took him a while, due to his injuries.

Or maybe I'm just lucky and I happened to run into the two nicest people on this island.

Whatever the reason, he certainly wasn't going to complain about it.

xxx

Sora and Kairi returned later, and the three of them spent quite a while talking. Their conversation consisted of mainly Sora and Kairi asking questions regarding Riku's past and Riku constantly reminding them that he could not remember a thing. Kairi informed him that his injuries should heal in less than a week, except possibly the most serious ones, which lead Riku to ask this question:

"So why are you guys helping me so much?"

"Would you rather we just left you to die on the beach?" was Sora's reply. Kairi let out a small laugh at this.

"We just felt like we should," she said. "This may sound crazy, but I think our hearts are connected. Like the three of us are meant to be friends."

Riku laughed. "So it is just destiny" he mused.

"I guess it is," Sora agreed.