A/N: Wahoo! Finally! Chapter three is here! Anyway, I absolutely love this chapter to bits, as I love can picture Nami's little "field trip" in my head almost perfectly and I find it adorable. :) Anyway, thanks to Chibi for betaing again, and those who commented/favorited this fic (yes, I know you're the same two people, and you're awesome in my book, lol). Anyway, this chapter not only marks the start of some real action pretty canon to the storyline, but on top of that, I ended up referencing a game script for lines, so thank you, dragonblade3325 from GameFAQs, for being amazing enough to have put up the entire original CoM script up online.

Disclaimer: I do not own Kingdom Hearts aside from the copies of the games and manga I bought, nor do I own dragonblade3325's game script-just my ideas and a good few OCs (which don't appear here and probably never will).

Now, on with the fic!

Chapter 3-Decided

They lost most interest in bugging her once they had him practically in their black-gloved palms, they were so preoccupied with what he was doing now that they didn't seem to care much about what she did, so long as it drew Sora closer to her in the end. They didn't realize how she'd been changing, trying to work a hole in their plan that would allow her to escape unharmed with him so she could fix her mistake. That was what it had become to her: A huge mistake that she needed to fix before it tore her to pieces and destroyed him. Axel was helping it along with his visits, talking to her about nothing, really, giving her updates on how things were going without gloating too much, and sneaking her out for "fresh-air breaks" in a world that was new to her—

"Come on, you can't want to stay cooped up in here! Live a little, five minutes of freedom, that's all. You'll like it, trust me!" He pleaded; of course, that was what she was afraid of. It was a petty excuse for him to get out and stretch his legs, but there was always that danger there. If she did like it, who would keep her from trying to abandon all reason and Sora with it?

"Tha—" She started as she looked back down to her sketchbook, brown crayon in hand to draw his spiky hair, but she stopped as another cut her off.

"No, absolutely not!" The replica thundered, attempting to get in Axel's face, a venture that was unsuccessful before it began, as Axel towered above both of them. "I'm supposed to protect Namine, and this idea is ridiculous and dangerous!" Axel didn't look like he really cared or was bothered by the replica's outburst.

"Come on, Nami, don't you want to go out and see something other than white walls?" The problem was that she did, and she wasn't sure she could keep telling him no with the way Axel kept dangling the offer before her. "They'll never know, just five minutes of freedom and fresh air in someplace new that even your wanna-be hero has been, Nami. You know you want to…" Her resistance suddenly shattered, the crayon hit the sketchbook and she shoved her chair back as she stood abruptly. She tilted her head back to look her tormentor boldly in the eyes, feeling brave for the briefest moment.

"My name is Namine. Is it really that hard to say?" She asked him sharply, patience at it's end. Axel could do nothing but grin at her.

"Good choice."

"But—" The replica protested, Axel rolled his eyes.

"You can come too, if you shut up." He told it as the dark corridor exploded into existence beside them. "Ladies first."

She was first aware of a sound similar to drumming above her as she passed through the corridor to whatever location Axel had had in mind. The house smelled musty, unused, and the air was warm and stagnant. To her disappointment, the room was as white-filled as her room in the Castle, but unlike her room, it had—

"A window!" She gasped, running around the table to get across the room to get to the clear glass that allowed one to see the world outside the walls and pressed herself against the glass. It was cold as ice, her breath fogged up the glass and made it nearly impossible to see through, as the little rivers formed by the raindrops sliding down the glass already made clearly seeing the world outside difficult. She didn't mind, though, because just seeing the smear of color against the glass and knowing that at least somewhere there was such thing as "outside" existed was enough for her.

"Aw, it's raining, I was hoping to go out, but I guess not. You want me to open that for you?" She turned her head to see Axel and the replica on the other side of the table and nodded timidly.

"Please?" The single word came out ever so softly, as though she was afraid that taking up the offer would be asking too much. With a laugh, the redhead stepped around the table and up to the window, which it only took him a moment to get open. Her hands were out the window the instant her moved away. Icy little pinpricks stung her skin but the feeling was more nice than uncomfortable—she'd never felt rain before. With the window open she could see the still-blurry shapes of the trees standing huddled together on the grass, the ghostly shape of what appeared to be a wall around the house, as well as the cloud-covered sky and what appeared to be a few building tops, particularly what might have been the top of a clock tower in the in distance. The air was cool and fresh with the rain giving it a slight dampness that Namine had to admit she liked.

She wouldn't have minded staying there forever.

But then Axel spoke up. "Five minutes is up. Time to go." She backed away, let him close the window and dry off her arms with the bottom of his coat, wiping away all evidence of her field trip outside of the Castle as though it had never happened—like it had been a dream. She allowed herself to be led back to her windowless room in the Castle and went back to drawing, just like always.

Since then, Axel had brought her back once more and let her run through the woods that time. He told her the world was called Twilight Town, and that the mansion that the white room was in and that they had to come out of to get to the woods was abandoned. It was kind of sad, she thought, that such a big, pretty house had been abandoned and left in such a disarray. She would have liked to live there and fix it up. With those two trips, she had made her decision; she was going to break free as soon as she could. If she couldn't be perfect like the replica had told her, she would at least right her wrongs and fix him, repair the damage that she had done.

"You're all he's got left. If you don't stop this, no one will." He told her when they were alone. She frowned, was that really true? The whole thing had gone too far, was it really still possible to fix the damage she'd done?

"But...it's too late now." She countered weakly, the speed at which the questions were swirling around her head were going to make her sick if they kept up.

"Oh, I don't think you should give up just yet. By the way, Namine, I don't see Marluxia around. Do you?" Was he really telling her to…?

"What are you trying to say?" She asked, glancing up to meet those mischievous green eyes that almost always seemed to look sad. Axel was smirking like he knew the universe's biggest secret and was going to tease everyone he knew about it to the point of infuriation, yet never tell them what the secret actually was.

"There's no one here to stop you. Do it right." Her eyes went impossibly wide—so he was giving her the go-ahead? She would have never thought that she would hear the words. She stood so quickly that the chair hit the ground with a bang that almost sounded muted by the white walls, then turned and ran. This was it—her chance to fix what she had so willingly damaged before. She couldn't allow herself to mess up.

Ending A/N: Whoot! And done! Hope everyone enjoyed it, and please comment if you did! Anyway, until next week!