Alright, y'all, I'm starting to write this in mid April, however by the time you'll read this, it'll probably be about August. I am going to be moving, and if all goes according to plan, I'll be moving in the day after I post all of these remaining chapters. I know that once I get settled in that I'll be lucky to get enough free time to be able to write anything for recreation, let alone finish a story. So, throughout April, May, June, and July, I'll be writing out the rest of this story. The rest of what you're reading is the work of four months, and this will likely be the last thing that I write on this website. I'll talk to you all more at the end of the last chapter, so until then, please enjoy!

'To live would be an awfully big adventure'

~J.M. Barrie, Peter Pan

Naminé

The following day, Naminé awoke to see Axel and Roxas standing over her, a devious grin on their faces, their hands mirroring one another behind their backs. The petite girl knew at once that she was about to find herself in an interest predicament to put it lightly, and braced herself for whatever the boys had in store for her.

"What on earth are you about to do?" Naminé demanded with a smile, huddling under the comforter in a small attempt to feel safer from her friends. The red head and the blonde men exchanged a grin, before throwing half a dozen pancakes on Naminé, shouting,

"Surprise!" Naminé felt her eyebrows pull together in confusion as she picked up one pancake between her thumb and forefinger. She cocked her head to one side and felt laughter bubble up in her chest,

"Of all the stupid, pointless things you two could have done, you decided to give me a pancake shower!" she exclaimed, chuckling along with Axel and Roxas, "Thank god you didn't include syrup in this shower!" the three giggled among themselves for a few more minutes before Naminé neatly picked up all of the pancakes and stacked them in her hand and climbing out of bed.

"Come on, you bunch of weirdoes, let's go eat these instead of throw them at each other." She cheered, leading the two goons out into Roxas' tiny kitchen. Something in Naminé chest soared, like she was at the top of a rollercoaster. Here she was, sleeping in Roxas' home, having breakfast made for her, and two guys who genuinely seemed to enjoy her company. Friends. It'd been so long since she'd had real friends in her life. Not coworkers, not neighbors, but actual friends. The blonde woman felt her eyes prick with tears as she sat down at Roxas' tiny table, and tried to blink furiously to keeps her eyes from flowing over. Unfortunately, the blinking only managed to coax a tear from each eye to slide down her cheeks, and before she could hastily swipe them away, Roxas noticed.

"Is there something wrong?" He asked, his brow furrowing in worry, which only made her want to cry harder. Axel swallowed about half of a pancake and said,

"Way to go, Roxas, your cooking is so terrible you made her cry!" This made Naminé snicker and wipe away the few tears that had followed the first two. She saw Roxas give Axel an agitated gaze before he turned back to her,

"Did I do something?" He wondered, his eyes searched her face for something-what, she didn't know. She vigorously shook her head and offered a small smile,

"No, no…it's not like that at all, I'm just happy, I guess." Roxas and Axel exchanged a glance, clearly baffled as to why she was crying tears of joy just because of pancakes. She giggled softly before saying, "It's just been so long since I've had a friend around, let alone people to wake me up with pancakes! I've just missed having friends, is all. I missed you."

Axel looked back down at his pancakes, prodding at them with his fork, visibly trying to shrink out of the conversation, knowing this was between Roxas and Naminé. Roxas, on the other hand, softened his light blue eyes and smiled at her so warmly she thought she'd start weeping again.

"I missed you, too." Was all he said, but Naminé knew that this was enough for right now, and turned to her pancakes and started to eat.

After their breakfast Axel muttered something about needing to feed his cat and promised to be back soon. This left Naminé alone with Roxas, to her delight. She eyed him nervously from where she was throwing away the paper plates they'd been eating on. What would they do all day? Sit around and wait for the other to talk? Catch up? Or something more…intimate? Naminé felt herself blush at that thought and quickly banished it the back of her mind, scolding herself for even thinking of something like that. Who was to say Roxas was even interested in her in such a physical way? She wasn't even certain that he was interested in her in a remotely romantic way. Granted, she had her hopes and her intuition screaming at her that he wanted her, but being as timid as she was, she needed absolute proof that he had some semblance of an interest in her. And then there was the whole issue with his alcohol…

Naminé found herself wandering over to the couch, where she wrapped herself in a blanket and continued to sketch the outlines of Roxas' living room. Not long after she'd started shading the easy chair to her right did Roxas plop down next to her and nuzzle his nose against her collarbone and fling one arm around her middle. 'Don't freak out, don't start sweating, you're fine' Naminé has to continually think to herself as she tried her very hardest to continue writing as if she weren't internally freaking out. A few minutes later Roxas murmured,

"Remember when we stole all of Riku's lightbulbs from his house for April Fools junior year?" Naminé snickered at the thought. She'd thought that they were so clever for thinking that one up. She nodded and turned to him, his eyes not six inches from hers'. He grinned up at her and continued, "And he called Sora, convinced that it was him, and he egged his truck?" Naminé began to laugh out loud, ignoring the shock that he even remembered that at all.

"And Kairi got nailed in the ass with an egg while she was walking out to her car?" Naminé choked out, chuckling harder. She felt Roxas shake next to her, and found that he was laughing just as hard as she was.

"God, we're terrible people." He sighed, shaking his head.

"Only because you insisted that we didn't tell him that it was us!" Naminé exclaimed, shutting her notepad and setting it aside. Roxas shrugged,

"Sacrifices needed to be made; did you really want your car to get egged, too?" Naminé rolled her eyes but didn't protest. She'd kept her mouth shut along with him, making her just as guilty as the blonde boy next to her.

After their laughter had died down, and several stories later, Roxas asked,

"So, what do you do for like, a living?" She glanced at him is surprise, that's right, she'd never told him.

"I was an assistant teacher at an elementary school for two years, and now I suppose I'm working with Sora." She explained, turning so that she could face him, in turn causing his hand sliding off of her waist and onto her thigh. She found no reason to protest. He nodded, thinking for a moment.

"Do you think this job will be worth the move? I mean, he's basically asking for us to drop everything and just go." Roxas said, and Naminé thought about this.

"I guess I think it's alright. I mean, I liked my job teaching kids, but I also need to be back with the old gang and find my friends again. I know that Sora wouldn't offer me a bad job, so I think it'll be exciting." She said with a shrug. Roxas thought about this for a minute before asking,

"Do you think seeing everybody again will be weird?"

"Maybe at first, but at the same time, we were like family. We can't just forget about that."

"No we can't…" Roxas murmured. Naminé felt awful as she felt the question bubble up inside of her, knowing that she was about to shatter the peace that had blanketed the two of them so nicely. She took a deep breath before asking bluntly,

"Are you an alcoholic?" The question took an immediate effect on the man next to her. He glanced at her with wide, skeptical eyes, taken aback. He started to pull away, sliding his hand off her thigh. She caught his hand and gazed into those big blue eyes of his, pushing against the way his expression was hardening as each second passed. After a few moments of silence, Naminé sighed, and let go of his hand, convinced she'd just ruined whatever bond they'd managed to make that morning. But then he whispered,

"No." And for a moment, she felt grateful. But that was not the end. His eyes flickered around the room, over her legs, and finally settled on her face, meeting her stare with guarded eyes, "But I was afraid that I'd turn into one if I didn't stop."

Riku

When Riku arrived at the address Aqua had given him he realized that his hands were quivering. He took a moment once he'd parked to run his hands through his long hair and take small sips from the bottle of water in his lap. How amazing it was that such a small gesture of kindness from someone he barely knew had filled him with so much hope. Once he'd managed to calm himself enough, he stepped out of the rental car, and stepped up the front porch, and knocked on the door. There was a rustle inside, the sound of chairs scraping against the floor, and then the door swung inward to reveal a trouble Aqua.

"Hey! Um, is something wrong? Because if you want me to leave I will." He exclaimed, taking in the worry lines etched around her mouth. The blue-haired girl shook her head hard, and stepped aside to gesture him into the house,

"No, no, that's not it at all…I'm sorry. I'm happy to be helping you, it's just that this girl who was staying with Ven…she disappeared. I was on the phone in my room talking to you, and when I came out into the living room, she was gone and so were all of her things. I'm worried about her." Aqua told Riku all of this as he stepped into the home and looked around. The couch was littered with blankets-this, he assumed, was where Aqua's mystery girl had been.

"I'm sorry to hear that. Maybe we could look for both girls while we're out?" Riku suggested, unhappy that there was someone else he'd have to look for, but he also know how nerve wracking it was to not know where a friend was. Aqua nodded eagerly,

"Thank you so much, Riku! Um, should we sit down and describe what each girl looks like?" she suggested, bouncing on her heals.

"That sounds great." Riku assured, and sat across from her at the tiny kitchen table. Aqua managed to locate a sheet of paper and a pen, and scribbled down the name 'Ivy' at the top left of the paper, before asking Riku,

"What was your friend's name, again?"

"Xion." He muttered, crossing his arms and blocking out the flash of memories that came to attack his conscious just at the mention of her name. Aqua penned 'Xion' across the top right of the paper, and then glanced up at Riku with expectant eyes,

"Alright, what does she look like?" He thought about this for a while, unsure if she would look the same or not. After a minute of silence he sighed and started,

"She had this jet black hair. It was just above her chin when we graduated, but I don't know if it's grown out or if she still keeps it short…a tiny nose, extremely pale, she never tanned, only burned. She's short, about five-one, five-two, maybe? Really skinny, you could snap her in half like a toothpick. Not much there in the chest department, but I never minded…" He paused and glanced at Aqua, heat rushing to his face once it registered he'd said that out loud, "Uh, sorry, that just kind of slipped out…Her eyes, wow. The brightest blue I've ever seen. Big eyes, like saucers on her face. But she never looked like a little kid…she was always a grown woman who could take care of herself…She was sassy to say the least. Didn't always talk, but when she did, man was it good…I guess if you didn't know her well you'd think she was all sullen and angry, but she wasn't…she wasn't."

Riku watched Aqua scribble down as much as she could in an almost intelligible fashion. He swallowed hard and waited for Aqua to look up, and when she did, there was an alarming glint in her eye.

"Riku…do you think she could be giving out a false name?" Aqua inquired. Riku's eyes flickered down to the paper, between the names 'Ivy' and 'Xion', and for the first time in a long time, he felt his stomach churn and bile rise in his throat. He heard Vexen's words in his mind again, 'My cousin, you know, the strange one who lives in Twilight Town with the eye patch, Xigbar? He was telling me about some drug deal he got into'. Riku felt his eyes widen and his pulse sky rocket. She'd been here. She'd been here and he'd let her slip between his fingers like sand. His hands were shaking again but this time he did nothing to stop them.

"D-did you happen to see her arms? Her forearm? Were there any…marks? Scars?" He knew his voice was shaking, and as guilty as he felt about exposing Xion's habit, if it brought her back to him, he wouldn't care. He watched Aqua think for a moment, recalling if she'd seen such a thing.

"I don't know, she usually wore a sweatshirt, but…wait." She paused, and Riku practically felt his heart stop, "There was one time, right after she got out of the shower, I think I saw a few scars on her arms…very faint, but I think there were, yes." Riku shot up out of his seat, the chair toppling uselessly to the ground.

"We have to go. Someone from my work heard from his cousin that she'd dealt him drugs. Oh my God, she could die." He exclaimed, wanting to rip the hair from his head.

"Riku, calm down. She'll be okay. Let me get my jacket and we'll head out." Aqua said, her voice low and soothing. Ice against Riku's burning fervor to find Xion. He nodded, and waited for Aqua to retrieve her jacket. When she reappeared, her eyes flashed and she announced with the most confident poise he'd ever seen, "Don't worry, we'll get her back, and when we do, you're going to tell her what she means to you, because I've never met a man as crazy for a girl as you."

Xion

When Xion arrived at the house she had to force herself to keep from sprinting in the opposite direction. It wasn't that once she stepped foot inside they'd hurt her-quite the opposite, actually, but rather that the memories she worked so hard to repress would come flooding back into her thoughts and shredding apart and semblance of sanity that she had clung to. The thought of Riku and Aqua flashed behind her eyes, and she suddenly pictured what had horrified her. Of course he'd wanted someone like Aqua. Someone curvy and capable and kind. Not a washed up woman addicted to cocaine. Why had she even dared to expect differently before? After she flinched at the thought and swallowed back tears, she brought herself to knock on the door, and waited for the scuffling sound of feet across the floor to greet her.

When the door opened, she was met with the familiar, unsettling dark eyes of Tifa. Xion saw the woman's eyebrows shoot up in suspicion, but after a moment of looking her over, Tifa stepped aside, nodding,

"Welcome back, kid, welcome back."

Xion nodded and stepped over the threshold, and waited for the crowd of people to greet her, and sure enough, eventually new and old faces alike appeared from the living room to see who'd intruded on poker night.

"Good god, you've come back!" Saïx exclaimed, uncrossing his arms. Cloud and Leon both nodded at her, small smiles of approval on their faces. Yuffie grinned from ear to ear, gripping a stunned but also smiling Yuna's arm. Vanitas just looked shocked, blinking a million miles a minute and Xemnas nodded in approval,

"It is good to see you back with us, Xion." He said. Behind Xemnas stood a peculiar man whom Xion seemed to remember dealing with a few weeks ago. She'd never forget a man with an eyepatch.

This was her family. At least for now. Until she decided she'd leave again, and disappoint all of her comrades again. But until that time, she settled for simply laying low and taking things a day at a time. That was all she could do. So she nodded, and offered up a small smile back at everyone, and replied in a low voice, "Yes, it's good to see none of you are dead."