An End To the Beginning
| An End To the Beginning | |
|---|---|
| Date of Cutscene: | 16 September 2012 |
| Location: | Destiny Islands |
| Synopsis: | The Night of Fate |
| Cast of Characters: | Riku, Malificent, Ansem, Sora |
Recommended Music: Leaving Earth and An End Once and For All(Mass Effect 3)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x5JvbD2Zc9I
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uorR5Cn4a-Q
A warm afternoon breeze trickles through the ceiling. It transformed into a hollow roar as Riku laid his fingers against the back wall of the cave. This quiet and secretive place was crammed wall to wall with a tangle of drawings. They laid stark white against the dark walls. His gaze fell on a five pointed star, the rough sketch of a paopu fruit. He could almost reach out and touch the history behind the drawings. The stories wound through the years, written out by the hand of everyone who visited this lonely alcove.
None of that mattered now. A mental sneer ran underneath his dismissal. It was all so childish. This place, this island, this world was a cartoonish cardboard cutout. A suffocating prison with all the sharp edges removed so the inmates won’t hurt themselves. It doesn’t have to be that way.
Riku jerked his fingers away, breaking contact with the wall as he stepped backwards. He swallowed back the fear, breath ragged in his chest as he tried to keep a lid on his emotions. Turning away from the wall, he looked towards the entrance and the smell of warm, dusty air and nearby ocean. The raft. In his mind, Sora was probably lazing on the beach again and the only way things would get done was if he and Kairi did it themselves.
Thinking of the raft got him to thinking about the plans they had made. They didn’t know what was at the other end of the ocean, but they were going to find out. They would go farther than anybody else had. The list wasn’t long. Not many people ventured far into the sea that he could remember. It was just there, a constant backdrop that rolled out to the horizon. They didn’t even know if there was an end to the ocean.
Riku shakes the thought away, beginning to pace back and forth in the small space. It crowded down around him, confining and constricting him. The breeze ebbed, dying away to a suffocating silence.
Other children had gone out to sea before. They said the same thing that nobody believed and yet few bothered to challenge. They had gone out to sea and given up.
Or they had been stopped.
They had never tried again, as if the ocean had stopped holding any interest to them.
Three little children, trapped in an ocean that would never permit them to get lost.
No one had been concerned because there was nowhere to go. Riku turned away from the entrance, putting his hand flat against the wall. His fingers dug into the stone surface but he didn’t have to push hard. He knew what he was looking for. It had appeared in his dreams many times. The rock wavered, drawing back away from the outline of a door that appeared across the wall of the cave. Riku stared at the door, suddenly stymied; taking in every detail though he had seen it a thousand times before. They had never known how to open it before.
He stood there and the sudden roll of thunder shattering the silence caused him to jump, stomach twisting with a sickening lurch as something brushed against his outstretched arm. Riku pulled away, staring at the glittering outline of the keyhole. Something wasn’t right about this. Just like the dreams. Something had never been right with the dreams. This wasn’t the way.
/This is the ONLY way. /
Anger flared as Riku recognized the voice from his dreams. This must be another of them. He could never tell that he was asleep when he argued with that voice. Not until he woke up the next morning and was told it was only a nightmare.
“This isn’t right. There’s something out there.”
What does it matter?
“Because-” And he couldn’t think of the answer. The storm rattled his thoughts with another boom of thunder and he felt confused and unsteady. He felt the first flush of embarrassment as his mind remained blank, consumed with fragments of memories that seemed the life of someone else. He clawed at words that wouldn’t come, the cynical chuckle of amusement shattering the last vestiges of his concentration.
What does it matter? You and your friends will be far away and onto the road of your destinies.
Riku begins to nod, then violently shakes his head. A thought floats to the surface of his mind and he clings to it. The warrior Terra. Kairi. They had not come this way. He could feel something moving beyond the door. It wanted in.
He lied to you, Riku.
Riku closed his fingers, resting his knuckles on the door as he leaned forwards to rest his forehead on the cold stone. He closed his eyes, teeth grit as another brutal snap of thunder was joined by a howling wind. It beat against the stones while Riku growled out the denial. His heart wasn’t into it though and it fell away, swallowed by mocking silence.
None of this was right. He had been faithful to his promise. He had kept the secret, he had pushed himself to prepare. He had driven himself to exhaustion so that one day, he would be ready. The sea of stars would be his, for as long as he championed the ones he loved. What had he done wrong?
No one gives anything of value without a reason. Do you really think he would give anything to you, a random boy he had barely met? He lied to you Riku. There is no destiny that you do not take for yourself.
Riku slams a fist into the stone wall, the shock running up his arm and through his entire body. The door shuddered, tendrils of darkness leaking around the edges. It brushed his face and shoulders, the sensation frightening but strangely not unpleasant. The warrior had told him to keep it a secret. The spell would break if he told anybody. It couldn’t be shown as a lie if he never told anyone.
The words had merely been what he wanted to hear. It couldn’t be true and yet how could he fight it? They had never appeared again. There had been no sign. One way or another, there was no way to know if it was true. The door shuddered again as Riku slammed both fists into the door. His head was a constant buzz of hate banishing all other thoughts. His bruised hands bled unnoticed as he screamed another denial. His voice was lost in the storm.
Do you truly mean to stay behind, nursing your fantasies in this stagnant world until you are like the others, too used to your chains to notice them? They want this place. They want it with a hunger you do not yet know. Let them in. Only then will you escape.
If there was a small glimmer of doubt remaining, Riku did not act on it. He opened the door, the way abruptly clear. He heard the sliding crack of the lock, a sound very much like the storm outside. The door shimmered, a dark translucence giving him a split second glimpse of what lay waiting beyond.
He ran.
Now there was no choice but escape. Riku tore from the hidden alcove, feet pounding on the stone and sand as he rushed towards the beach. The darkness followed him from the cave. He could feel it in every step, in every breath as the storm worsened and he searched for Kairi and Sora. Whatever happened now, they were free of this place with a guarantee the raft could never bring them.
A cursory glance brought up nothing. No Sora or Kairi. He did not even see any of the other children. How long had he been down there? The beach and the little island were deserted. Riku ran up a tight stairway, feet pounding against the wooden planks. The darkness chased him, just below the surface, pulsing just under the surface as he came to a halt near the tree sticking sideways from the earth. He leaned against it for a moment to gather his swirling thoughts.
Moments later, or perhaps minutes for he had little sense of time anymore, Sora caught up with him. Riku turned, hearing the bridge planks squeak and squeal under the younger teens gigantic shoes. He composed himself to be as calm as possible. He wanted to only have to explain this once and explain it quickly. There was no time for doubt. There was no time at all.
The ground sagged beneath him. The darkness became all too visible now, tendrils reaching up to claim him and Sora before he was able to get more than a sentence or two. It would have to be enough. They had not found Kairi. There was nothing that could be done about that. He felt guilty but was resigned to this. This is what he had chosen. Riku extended a hand to Sora. It was like the raft. It was like all of the plans they had all made together. Whatever happened, it would be together.
Sora strained to reach him and Riku began to frown as the younger boy wasn’t strong enough to struggle against the darkness. He had thought his friend was better than this. Maybe he hadn’t pushed him hard enough. He kept the hand extended, waiting with the long patience of experience for Sora to eventually catch up. That moment never came, and as Sora disappeared there was a much more terrible moment of dread. A flashing edge of doubt and remorse before the ground dropped away entirely.
There was no time even for fear.
Later on, in the dreams that would haunt him, it would always be of this. The moment of dread and falling. Always falling, lost somewhere between the sky and the ground. In a place where he was drowning, but it wasn't exactly water. He was lost in the darkness for a time. When it spit him out, the world he left behind seemed like a distant memory. A dream he had once about a place of warm winds and endless ocean.
Water surrounded him on all sides. Riku noticed finally that he had a body again, which was a novelty, and that he was lying on his back. Raising up on one elbow enough to watch the water, his brow furrowed as he watched it rise from the bottom of his sight, past a stone platform that served as the ground up to the top of the waterfall. Or was that, water rise? The thought made his head ache, so he laid it back down, closing his eyes briefly.
When he opened them again he was surrounded. A large raven sat on his chest, amusement in the eye it turned towards him, the beak almost smiling at him unpleasantly. He was surrounded by monsters. They were the darkness he had seen on the other side of the door and for a moment he wondered if they followed him here. If they would follow him forever.
A tall woman in a black cloak towered amongst them by presence if not by height. In a voice those overlapping echo eerily sounded like his mothers, she said two words while looking down at him surrounded by darkness.
"Hello, boy."
