[154] "Mapped"
Jul. 17th, 2008 01:32 am![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
tabitha-dornoc.livejournal.com posting in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png){kind=small}
kh_drabbleChallenge: [154] Still Believe
Title: Mapped
Word Count: 462
Notes: PG. Mid KHI, Riku is with Maleficent for his own ends. (*shuffle* Hello. Bear with me. I'm a little rusty. <3)
In what Riku privately thinks of as her study, Maleficent has a map. When she catches him gazing at it, she tells him that it’s all well and good to burn each world they happen upon to cinders, replacing them with kingdoms of bone and shadow… But empires only last as long as their emperor can keep them, and Maleficent has grown rather fond of her throne.
Her territories are marked in sharp pen strokes and blotted red. When corrections and expansions are made to the map (almost daily, the heartless can scatter so quickly) sometimes the ink drips. On this wall, the universe looks like it may be melting.
At night, when Maleficent’s goblins are at their loudest and most reckless, she likes to sit and watch them, drinking in their chaos. Riku comes here, to the map. Some days this stretch of ink and parchment is all he has.
Riku knows he doesn’t see the map the way Maleficent does. The names scrawled across each dot spiderweb connected to others are not how he knows each world.
Here is Home (Maleficent’s, of course), but Riku just knows it as the world where girls are woken from enchanted sleeps by true love’s kiss. Kissing didn’t work for him.
This is Neverland, where fallen pixies may come back with enough faith and clapping. Riku wore his palms nearly raw from striking them together. But still she sleeps.
Wonderland, where only spoken word can end the dream. “You’re nothing but a pack of heartless”, perhaps. But Riku hasn’t heard her voice in months.
The Dwarves’ Wood where maidens can fall deadly asleep from poisoned combs, corset ribbons and bits of apples lodged in their throats. Physical hurts can be undone. But heartless leave no visible scars, so her skin is smooth and still warm and wholly unhindered in waking. Yet she doesn’t.
Over here is Olympus, where even the dead can be woken if you are willing to travel deep below the ground. Riku has sludged through the river meant only for souls, but hers is not there at all.
Dot connected to dot by dripping ink trail. He’s been to every single world that’s connected to Maleficent’s web, and none of their methods are able to wake Kairi. Hope burns away quicker than candle wick.
But across the tangle of ink splatter is empty parchment of world after world they have not yet been to. Worlds they have not swarmed with heartless and claimed for their own.
So Riku watches Maleficent conquer her sky and spread her ink across the map. Each day, Riku tells himself that this day he will find a world that will be able to wake Kairi. And each day it gets more and more difficult to believe.
Title: Mapped
Word Count: 462
Notes: PG. Mid KHI, Riku is with Maleficent for his own ends. (*shuffle* Hello. Bear with me. I'm a little rusty. <3)
In what Riku privately thinks of as her study, Maleficent has a map. When she catches him gazing at it, she tells him that it’s all well and good to burn each world they happen upon to cinders, replacing them with kingdoms of bone and shadow… But empires only last as long as their emperor can keep them, and Maleficent has grown rather fond of her throne.
Her territories are marked in sharp pen strokes and blotted red. When corrections and expansions are made to the map (almost daily, the heartless can scatter so quickly) sometimes the ink drips. On this wall, the universe looks like it may be melting.
At night, when Maleficent’s goblins are at their loudest and most reckless, she likes to sit and watch them, drinking in their chaos. Riku comes here, to the map. Some days this stretch of ink and parchment is all he has.
Riku knows he doesn’t see the map the way Maleficent does. The names scrawled across each dot spiderweb connected to others are not how he knows each world.
Here is Home (Maleficent’s, of course), but Riku just knows it as the world where girls are woken from enchanted sleeps by true love’s kiss. Kissing didn’t work for him.
This is Neverland, where fallen pixies may come back with enough faith and clapping. Riku wore his palms nearly raw from striking them together. But still she sleeps.
Wonderland, where only spoken word can end the dream. “You’re nothing but a pack of heartless”, perhaps. But Riku hasn’t heard her voice in months.
The Dwarves’ Wood where maidens can fall deadly asleep from poisoned combs, corset ribbons and bits of apples lodged in their throats. Physical hurts can be undone. But heartless leave no visible scars, so her skin is smooth and still warm and wholly unhindered in waking. Yet she doesn’t.
Over here is Olympus, where even the dead can be woken if you are willing to travel deep below the ground. Riku has sludged through the river meant only for souls, but hers is not there at all.
Dot connected to dot by dripping ink trail. He’s been to every single world that’s connected to Maleficent’s web, and none of their methods are able to wake Kairi. Hope burns away quicker than candle wick.
But across the tangle of ink splatter is empty parchment of world after world they have not yet been to. Worlds they have not swarmed with heartless and claimed for their own.
So Riku watches Maleficent conquer her sky and spread her ink across the map. Each day, Riku tells himself that this day he will find a world that will be able to wake Kairi. And each day it gets more and more difficult to believe.
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2008-07-17 05:51 am (UTC)tabby~~ :clings: this makes me happy and heartsick at the same time. i've missed your drabbles so much, and this is just... ♥
"you're nothing but a pack of heartless," eieee. if only it was so easy! and the images are just amazing ♥
love~! ♥
no subject
Date: 2008-07-17 06:08 am (UTC)*glomps*
This is so gorgeous; where have you been. I've missed you and your drabbles so much! *hugs* I love it. Oh my God, it's so sad, and the way you show each world and each attempt is so delicately, heartbreakingly beautiful. I adore your Riku fic. Thank you so much for writing this. :)
no subject
Date: 2008-07-17 10:28 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-07-17 11:48 am (UTC)YOU'RE BACK. XD *hughug*
It was lovely, and I hurt to see his desperation- the childish, yet not, persistance to try every cure available on other worlds but he can't do anything and you always make me think. *hug!* You give me bunnies and you write the most visually stunning drabbles that make me want to hug the kiddies~.
Much love. ^^
no subject
Date: 2008-07-19 12:57 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-07-19 12:59 pm (UTC)I've been... awol, I suppose. XD It's nice to be missed, thanks hun! And thanks for your comments; I think I have a fondness for writing Riku fic. Heartbreak and sadness and strength and redemption... there is so much to work with. <3
no subject
Date: 2008-07-19 12:59 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-07-19 01:02 pm (UTC)Bunnies?! That is awesome! So I can look forward to syvvie fic, you are saying? Maybe?
(Your Hades/Persephone fic was in a dream I had the other night. How weird is that?)
no subject
Date: 2008-08-18 04:31 am (UTC)