A/N: Oh my gosh, it has been waaaaaay too long since I last uploaded a chapter! It feels so nice to be doing this again...and on another Tuesday! Anyway, I 'd like to welcome you guys back to chapter 26 of Perfectionism! Thanks goes out to Chibi for betaing, as always, as well as Armyx for giving me his two-cents worth and chatting with me during my massive writing slump, as well as Waiting for Wings (Wings) who took it upon themselves to ask me to keep writing when I was about two days into writing this chapter. XD You guys are awesome!

Disclaimer: I don't own KH, as much as I wish I could...it'd be pretty cool to see this as an actual series of cutscenes, wouldn't it? I just own my ideas, most of which make up this chapter. :)

Chapter 26-Plotting Insubordination

"Are you insane?! Do you even understand how much danger Sora is in right now because your little friend has been paying you visits? Do you, Namine?" Namine cringed as Riku's voice rose to a shout.

"Shhh! If you would give me a moment to explain-" Riku cut her off before she could finish.

"You've already done enough explaining," he growled, turning and taking a step towards the door. Entirely too adamant on making her plan work, the Nobody did something neither expected-she hopped off the table and darted forward to grab one of the sleeves of Riku's coat and held on tightly.

"No, I haven't, seeing as you're still bent on running to DiZ and telling him. I'm smarter than you're giving me credit for being right now , and if you would hold on for five minutes, you'd understand that not only am I not insane, but that Sora's not in any danger," she countered fiercely. Riku's hood-covered head turned to look down at her in response and he regarded her in silence for a moment before his shoulders slumped and he sighed.

"Fine, explain." Namine let go of his sleeve and gestured back to the table.

"Why don't you sit down and take your hood off?" she suggested, however Riku just shook his head.

"Explain, Namine." The Nobody girl sighed before she moved back to the table herself and sat down again.

"First of all, he's the one back at Castle Oblivion who convinced me to act on my wishes to right my wrongs and want to save Sora. Second of all, he's been coming here for months. Before we knew about Roxas, before we knew we needed him to make Sora whole again. When he first came here, I thought he was going to take me back to the Organization or kill me, but he didn't. He didn't do much more than tease me when I slipped up and admitted what I was doing here, though he seemed genuinely angry when I told him I was locked in at that point. When we took Roxas, he could have done something then, but he did nothing more than yell and throw papers. He deserves the chance to say goodbye, Riku, and the chance to put on one last show for his higher-ups, even though he understands Sora waking up is important. Besides, it'll grate DiZ's nerves if he finds out after the fact, and you seem to be about as fond of DiZ as I am, and if anything goes wrong, I'll take all the blame, though I don't think anything will be a problem, so long as you can teach me how to get him into the fake Twilight Town and distract DiZ for him."

"Knock on wood," Riku grumbled in reply. Namine laughed as Kairi's memories supplied the meaning to the phrase and flashed Riku a big smile.

"You're going to help, then?" she asked, and Riku nodded slowly.

"How can I not when you make such a good argument? It will annoy DiZ, and if he's just as much a victim as the rest of us here... I'll admit it; if he is, he deserves the chance to say goodbye...and maybe stir up some trouble in the process. I mean, what kind of supposed villain just lets a stolen mem-"

"Friend. Roxas was his best friend. He's not just another member of some exclusive club to him. To Axel, Roxas is his best friend." Namine was sure that Riku looked surprised under the hood obscuring his face.

"Well then, what kind of villain lets the enemy get away with stealing his best friend without a fight?" She could almost hear the smile in his voice.

"He loves being theatrical, I expect Axel will be ecstatic the moment I tell him what you just said," she informed him, and she almost imagined seeing a single silver eyebrow rise at her in question before Riku spoke again.

"Loves? Ecstatic? Isn't he a Nobody? I know you are, but you're...different. Kairi is still living. Whoever he was probably isn't." Namine could only smile back.

"We all have our special cases, I think. He acts so often like he has a heart that it makes me wonder, to be honest. And if it's just acting, he'll still act like he loves being theatrical and he'll still act ecstatic over the prospect of getting to cause a little chaos because he's Axel-it's what he does." Riku laughed softly, and finally walked toward her to pull up a seat at the table. "What?" she asked, "What's so funny?"

"You really did make a friend out of him, didn't you?" Riku asked, Namine laughed too.

"I think I did. Now, how about starting to explain the computers to me?" she asked, thinking of a picture that lay amidst the pile on the table; one that she'd made sure to grab before Axel saw it when he had scattered them everywhere earlier. She'd thoughtlessly drawn herself standing between Riku and Axel, trying something new with her powers for once and attempting to see if her drawings needed to be related to the memories she was working on. Amazingly, they didn't, and while Namine knew she'd have to hide the picture, she also realized she had formed her own trio of close friends. A trio she had never actually expected to work together, until Axel had shown up earlier.

When Axel came in, she was drawing again, piecing together Sora's memories as she was supposed to be doing. "So? How'd it go?" he asked her, sitting down on the table as she had not so long before. Namine looked up and smiled before putting her crayon down.

"Riku is in. He's in the process of explaining how the computers work to me right now, so then I can explain it to you or just run everything for you, and he's going to try to keep DiZ distracted." She left out the part about how they would be conducting their own test run that might have the plan exploding in their faces, which was something Namine had decided was probably best, until they could see whether or not it would work. Axel's face lit up with surprise and happiness.

"Seriously, Nami?!" he gasped, she nodded, still wearing that smile.

"Yes, Axel. Seriously. Hopefully you'll be able to see him soon," she told him. As he handed her a familiar blue bar of sea salt ice cream, Namine thought back to the picture hidden under the paper pile on her table. Friends, she thought. I have real friends, ones who are working together, even if they haven't met yet.

A/N: And that's it for this time. Hopefully you guys won't have to wait that long for a chapter again...I'm kind of hoping to go back to regular Tuesday uploads if all goes well. It would make my day if you took the time to write down your thoughts on the fic and leave them in a review or PM...or even if you have a few suggestions on things you want to see. I'm coming up on a big block of time to kill with headcanon while KH2 is going on, and if you want to see something that doesn't have to do with pairings, let me know-I might like the ideas. Also, for you people with dA who remember and liked Aura from chapter 17... FermonsNosYeux did a lovely commish for me with Namine and Aura, and they do amazing KH fanart-you should totally check them out! Anyway, thanks for reading, see you next upload. :)