This time he ran around the back, trying to get himself behind the giant ram things, but was too slow to outrun a tackle from a prickly purple whatever they were.
"You have to try flow motion!"
"I'm not good at it!" He emphasized, craning his neck to see if he was in the clear before scrambling to get up. "I'll just get hit and waste more time!"
"Try!"
It was annoyance, not agreement, that finally made him give in. He groaned loudly. "Fine!" He snapped, running for the wall, and then jumping on it to demonstrate that he was either just going to slide down awkwardly and not do anything, or end up "jumping" in the wrong direction because he couldn't get these fricken controls to-!
But when soles hit brick, his entire body glowed brilliant pink, energy surging through him. He snapped his head to the dream eaters, and leaped forward, blazing into them. He flipped in midair, arcing above them, and then shot his feet down to stomp on them. It took out both a ram, and snake, and for a second he could only gape in astonishment. Not just because it worked, but because it felt so fricken cool!
"Behind you!"
He turned before she even finished, and the charging ram made him ground himself as he reflexively tried to catch the horns. He managed, miraculously, though it came with a cost. His head started throbbing and he could swear he saw red flashing behind his eyelids. Screaming out in pain, he used his legs to shove with all his weight to get space between them, then kicked with his back leg as hard as he could into the creature's belly. It actually went airborne. Sadly, "Beat" was so surprised at this display he didn't take advantage of it, but as soon as it landed, he went for another kick, this time straight in front, and killing it instantly. The good news was, now that he knew flow motion would work, he had no problem diving for a glowing snake and seeing what would happen. When it made the same "slingshot" effect as the barrels, he targeted, pulled back, and released it with relief, taking out the last of the dream eaters.
The bad news was that now both arms hurt, albiet one not nearly as bad as the other. Beat released a heavy sigh as he landed safely in an open, empty clearing. His arm was throbbing and the scrapes on his other arm and legs were stinging. Not to mention his back hurt from being thrown on the ground. D-, this dream sucked. He straightened and winced at the sudden feeling of his head throbbing. Man, the blood was pumping so hard he was literally seeing red behind his eyeli-
He gasped. "Oh s- I'm low on health! Uh, uuuuuh," he looked around, spotting the moogle manning the window close to him. It was probably just the entry point for flick rush, but-
And then came a third round of dream eaters. And just like that, the growing sense of victory and accomplishment came tumbling down.
Beat's arms and chest sunk as he realized he was going to lose this. Was this the "dream"? That he was thrown into Kingdom Hearts as Beat and had to fight off dream eaters to protect Rhyme? Darn. He did get to kind of feel cool for a minute. Too bad he never actually won in these dreams.
He tried to raise his arms, then grunted from pain as his right one finally gave out, going close to his body reflexively as his wrist went limp. The left one rose, but he couldn't close his fist. And then with shock, he realized that he, quite literally, could not use his arms. The komory bat took advantage of his hesitation, tackling him from behind and sending him skidding to the ground. He heard Rhyme's terrified shout. She was trying to call him to use flow motion, or reality shift, or anything to help, but she didn't realize that even those things wouldn't work for him anymore. He craned his neck up to watch her through the approaching dream eaters, feeling a sense of sadness. It was true that he himself would just wake up in the real world, but now he'd have to imagine her "dying" to the dream eaters after him. Talk about depressing.
Oh. Wait. Of course he was having a dream like this. He was always agonizing about protecting his little sister.
A barrage of black flames shot from the rooftops onto the dream eaters below. One by one they were each eaten up by the negative fire, drowning out in their shouts of pain, and leaving both "Beat" and Rhyme alone.
'Darkness? But that's-!' He looked around expectantly. 'Riku?'
But Riku was nowhere to be found. There was only the nighttime shadows of Traverse Town.
"You did it!" Rhyme cheered as she came up to him. "How'd you do that?"
"That wasn't me." He grunted as he struggled to get up. He tried to drag his knees under him, but any pressure on his arms hurt a lot, so he couldn't get any leverage. Rhyme watched him worriedly, but didn't touch him. "Someone else did. But I guess he left."
"You're hurt," she said worriedly.
"I'll be fine," he assured, but his voice was tight. "I just need a minute to figure this out. Wait," he looked up suddenly. "What about you? You hit the ground, right? Did it hurt? Did they get you?"
It had hurt a little from the suddenness, but she shook her head. "No, I'm okay, thanks to you."
He tried to hold his breath to brace himself, and tried to get one last push on his arms, but the shoot of pain made him cry out briefly before falling again. It wasn't just that they hurt, they literally would not function. There was a moment of fear, nay, panic at the thought that he might be well and truly stuck. Wait, were his arms broken? Er, "supposed" to be broken? Was that why they were hurting so bad? He remembered reading somewhere that "broken" limbs couldn't be used properly…
"Is there anything I can do?"
He looked up at her. She was such a tiny thing. And Beat actually had muscle, so he wasn't super light. He'd be afraid of hurting her just falling on her. "No, I'm too heavy. I'll figure it out."
Ok, think, there was always a way to fix something, it was just a matter of figuring out what. He slowly rolled onto his side, noting that while it still hurt, at least the rest of his body was cooperating. Ok, good, progress! He tried doing an awkward crunch, finding out the hard way that, unfortunately, by habit he still used his arms to brace himself, and the pain made him freeze. Ok, maybe from his back he could-
Rhyme squatted down, and lifted his head to try to push him up. "Rhyme, wait, I don't think you're strong enough," he warned. "You could get hurt."
But Rhyme didn't listen, and pulled as much as her skinny little arms would allow. She awkwardly adjusted to get her hands under his shoulder, then pulled from there as well, pushing him in the last bit. And though "Beat" hadn't wanted her to do it, and it actually hurt, he finally managed to get himself to sit up with a brief shout of pain. He groaned in relief, panic abating and breathing easier. She came around him and he turned to her, and smiled encouragingly.
"Thank you, ho- erm, Rhyme! That's very helpful of you!" He said. Not "Beat"-like at all, but he was too tired and hurting to remember.
"I don't even know your name." Rhyme said, and all her cheer from before was gone. "But you tried so hard to save me. Why?"
"Well, uuuuuh…" he hesitated, debating with himself, before finally speaking. "Actually, I'm Beat. I'm your big brother."
"What?" She looked at him shocked. "I have a big brother?"
"That's right!" He said cheerfully, with a smile that was far too friendly for the real Beat. "And he- erm, I really care about you. So I wanted to look out for you."
The girl smiled. "Thanks Beat," she said sincerely. "But, what happened to you? Why did you look like that? Did you lose your body, like I lost my memories?"
He gaped at her, taken aback, because as soon as she said it, he realized it made sense. He was dreaming he was a heart, just stuck floating around, and she came and then he… got a body?
"Actually, yeah," he confessed. "That is what happened." He looked down at his hands and legs. "And then you came along, and I just… became this."
But why?