His shout drags Riku's gaze back to the couch and the boy on it. He's already pale from half a year in the dark, if not for the ruddy glow of his cracked lantern, the way the color flies from his face would be more conspicuous. The bottom of his stomach drops out.

It's the same feeling every time he would dream of the boathouse or walk by the shore where it used to be only to see a shape lying supine on the beach, knowing before his lantern's light even falls on it that it would have Kairi's face, that she would be gazing sightlessly out at him or the sky, that her mouth would be full of lake water and she wouldn't really be there.

The same shocky sweep of nausea and then it gets lost somewhere on its way to his throat, he stands there, but he doesn't feel like he's standing there. All of this is happening to someone else, somewhere else. This can be useful in the moment, when he needs to focus and observe and take action without hesitation, but the experience always makes him feel depleted, like he's tipped the balance too far to the dark.

"Did this start when your lantern changed? Is it always green?" sounds like a strangely calm line of questioning when there's a bloodied boy hyperventilating on his couch; Riku can see he's trying to hold it together, crowding the boy wouldn't help him regain control.