[ It's definitely a remarkable parallel, and maybe a little bit of intuition. Sora may have grown up in a city, but he also grew up on a tiny cluster of tropical islands far away from any major cities. He knows what a star-filled sky, unblocked by light pollution, is supposed to look like. He also knows what it looks like with most of its stars missing - not blocked by anything, just simply... gone.

Sora rolls around the cup in his hands. ] We went to the source of the problem and smashed it. [ He grins. ] I mean, it was that, but it wasn't so simple. There was a person behind the entire thing, and we had to... kill him, I guess. He was a Heartless by then too, but. [ Does Ansem count as a person? He's not sure. He's definitely not certain if Sora had his mind made up about that. ]

Anyway... [ And here, Sora pauses and frowns. ] Sorry, it's just that. I know what happened right when we were trying to fix the problem - there was this door to the darkness, and it was made of the hearts of the worlds, I think? And it had to be locked from both sides, so I locked it from my side and -

[ He stops. Riku. He grips his glass hard. It comes out squeezed, like trying to fit the words through a hole that was a little too small. ]

And my best friend stayed on the other side and helped lock it there.

... After that, the hearts went back to their worlds. I think I... I needed to stay where the door disappeared so I could find another way to get my best friend from the other side, but... [ Kairi. ] There was a girl I liked, and I got to see her before the worlds started going back to normal. When I left her, the stars went back to where they belonged.

[ ... he taps the tips of his fingers on his glass. ] I... Sorry. You should probably ask someone else about that, if you think it'll help. I don't remember a lot of what happened.