For the Eternity…and More – Hearts Intertwined

“I do stand by your side. I am the shadow cast by your light… How much closer could I be? I am Darkness.”

Those words echoed in Ventus’s mind, hours after he saw Vanitas vanish in front of his very eyes. He should find rest; calm, now that all of this was finally over but those words lasted. They suffered while fearing for the ‘destruction of the order of the Worlds’, they lost themselves in their way, but they were all together again, now.

It was as if nothing had happened…

Although a few other things.

Aqua would never forget the years lost in the Darkness, and she couldn’t erase the dread, the looming feeling making her jolt at each unexpected sound. She was always expecting to be attacked, a noise, a shout, could force her into a defensive stance.

Eraqus wasn’t anymore. He wouldn’t guide them, hug them again.

Terra would have to leave with the sensation of his body not belonging to him, of the trepidation to see his eyes turn gold; would he be even able to handle the time when his hair will turn grey? And the pain, the endless pain…

None of them would forget.

They were marked. For life.

And though Ventus felt like his damage was less profuse than theirs… But he couldn’t explain the feeling within him.

Before, he felt whole, then he met Vanitas, and perhaps Xehanort succeed in his work, for he felt suddenly so… empty. He realized there was no way for him to be whole again, and Vanitas was the reason. He was supposed to run away from their union, as the χ-Blade was too terrifying… but it was what he sought. When he fell in slumber, although it was worrisome, a looming bad omen, he finally felt whole. It felt real. Not the lie he told himself when studying with Aqua and Terra under Eraqus–not that he blamed Aqua and Terra, in contrary. But he now knew this was a mirage told to himself. What he started to feel when his and Vanitas’s heart merge, however was real and pure wholeness…

He understood what it meant to be Light and Darkness, to be fulfilled to an unnameable extant.

And even after the resolution of the events that brought them against the thirteen Darkness… the void didn’t leave. Meeting Vanitas in this Labyrinth, this Graveyard, not only for Keys but, for an instant, dreams and hope, and, in the end, his opponent, Ventus had realized this never had changed.

The sentiment of being One.

Not when he met Vanitas. Not when he died.

“How much closer could I be?”

How much closer could Vanitas be? He was the Darkness of his Light. And he chose to be Darkness for a Reason.

Perhaps the reason was…

Every being needed a part of Darkness.

His pure Light needed Darkness…

Darkness…

Ventus closed his eyes, sought peace.

He took his time, slowly, surely… peace takes a lot of time to find. Even if he was Light, even if he was a Keyblade wielder, even if he had trained for so long, by the side of so many Masters of great power. Everyone needed true peace. And him, who had lived a turmoil, he needed it even more…

When he opened his eyes, he wasn’t in his home anymore. He was at this place he used to fight for the Fate of the Worlds, the last place before he met the end of suffering, the start of feeling complete.

And he was there, sitting on the stained glass representing them, intertwined, belonging to each other, there was his dark shape.

“You needed quite a time,” the deep voice said.

“Sorry…” Ventus replied. He walked towards the form. “Was it you?”

“Not since the beginning. The last words, yes. I hoped you could understand.”

“Why?”

He got up, vague form that was without shape; vague form that turned into a Human shape. He could be nothing, he could be sentiment and nothing else. Would Ventus need to see him?

As he shaped himself into this entity they both knew so well, something formed itself from his shoulder. A tiny Flood. It jumped on Ventus.

Could Keyblade exist in this World? Perhaps, but Ventus didn’t use it in any case, holding out his arms instead as the vague shadow was finalizing its form, gleaming gold eyes remaining the last trait of visible Darkness. The undefined form became defined in the embrace, and Ventus couldn’t help but laugh. Last thing he knew, Vanitas announced that Unversed were his emotions, and that was the reason why they were formed of Horror, looming and terrifying creatures… Then, why this minuscule Unversed, this Flood, was always so gentle with him.

Tiny, perhaps a sign of how much Vanitas was lacking of love, of how much he didn’t believe in that part of light within him, this Flood had been the first one who showed love and affection to Ventus. Aqua and Terra did, but sometimes, Ventus wondered if it mattered.

This little sentiment jumping on Ventus, proving what Vanitas truly believed, was what Vanitas needed to blurt out the words he didn’t even know he wanted to pronounce.

“I wanted to see you again. I waited for you long enough…”

“You waited all this time?” Ventus asked.

Ventus allowed himself a smile and stared at Vanitas between closing his arms tenderly around the Unversed who snuggled in his embrace. If Unversed were Vanitas’s emotions, they could also convey their emotions to him. Vanitas couldn’t accept a hug, but he could accept one offered to him through his palpable emotions. That was why Ventus transmitted his joy, his tenderness, and the warmth of his embrace around this so tiny creature who nuzzled against him. Ventus dared even a kiss between the ‘ears’–antennas?–of the Flood.

For Vanitas, this warmth was delightful; it told him he was right to have sown the seeds leading Ventus to be… with him.

“I waited all this time. But the waiting time didn’t feel… this long. It’s not the first time I have had to wait. And now…” Vanitas stepped away. “Now, you understand. I always have been here. You can…” He closed his lips.

“I can see you, at any instance. You were in my Dreams… You cast yourself at this mere puppet,” he said, “to protect me. I know those words must hurt you.”

Vanitas folded his arms with a smirk.

“You are the one saying those words yourself. I won’t deny them, but I won’t confirm them neither.”

Ventus smiled in return.

He knew how much it truly meant to him.

“You always meant to me too,” Ventus replied. “I searched for you… I helplessly searched for you for so long… I needed you.” The words came out of his lips unexpected. They felt right. He closed his arms around the little Unversed as he wanted to be sure Vanitas understood he meant them. Or perhaps because he wanted to be sure his words were real. The next words came out with confidence, yet shyness. “I cannot find happiness without you.”

“Is it what you believe?”

Ventus smiled, peaceful. Finally peaceful? “I had waited for so long to be… here. Not shredded by the fights but at peace… with you. We have been the tools of others’ desire… And what about us? About what we want… I want this instant to be more than a few seconds. I want it to happen again.”

“What if it was damning yourself to the Darkness?”

Ventus smiled.

Vanitas wanted to remind him what it was. What Darkness was.

What he should fear.

“You are Darkness,” Ventus replied. Vanitas opened his lips to protest but he was silenced by the smile of pure light. “I am fine being damned, as long as it is being damned to stay by your side.”

Vanitas was tempted to throw him the kind of monologue Xehanort would lose himself in, talking about how the Darkness would always corrupt Light, how Light would never win, how he would always be here after all, a dark spot in the purity of Ventus. He realized it would be in vain.

He stained Ventus as much as Ventus cleaned him.

“I’ve been taught since so long that Darkness and Light have to fight until the end of the time… But, with you, I understood something totally different…”

Vanitas watched at him with a supercilious smirk. He moved closer to grab his Unversed by the neck. Ventus wanted to protest; but wasn’t this a clear metaphor of Vanitas? Trying to silence his own emotions when they became too loud for him…

“Then what?”

Ventus moved closer, bit by bit, in such a way Vanitas could push him away or step away. Once sure Vanitas seemed to accept his presence, any gesture to come, Ventus pressed his head on Vanitas’s shoulder. Vanitas let him do, hiding how much he loved the idea to have him in his arms.

“It doesn’t have to be a fight. There are plenty of ways to make things balance in harmony. If things can’t be simply constant, it’s fine! Some days, we are tempted by the Darkness, some days we are tempted by the Light… It’s normal. But we are different. Because you are Darkness, and I’m Light… We can only be tempted by each other. And I’m too tired to fight you, when all I want is to embrace you. Us.”

Vanitas held back the growl threatening to expose the depth of what he felt. He loved too much the usage of this word…Us.

Us was a good word.

Short.

But full.

Full of love.

Full of… them.

Vanitas hated the sound of this.

He hated how much he loved the sound of this… But he loved Ventus’s expression.

“Isn’t it some kind of dance?”

Vanitas pondered the double-edge of those words. Ventus who had come across Worlds and Worlds, wanting to dance with the Princesses he met, but only being a tool to help them reach each of their dreams without anyone ever holding out a hand to help him reach his own Dream.

At some point… he wasn’t even sure what was his Dream.

Did he have a Dream… he who slept for so long…Was Vanitas his Dream?

“Do you want to Dance with me?” Ventus asked in a laugh.

“For all Eternity… and even more. So long as you belong to me… as long as I will be your shadow, your Darkness… Always there.”