Author's Note

And the reason this update took so long was because I was busy revamping the former chapters. Nothing major, mostly just thinned out some of my commentary. And added a little content to the story. At any rate. On with the show.

o-o-o-o

Zexion was not expecting to come back from the mission to find Namine wearing eyeliner, gash red lipstick, and enough blush to be mistaken as a whore with a third degree burn parading across her face. In fact, he is not really certain of what he expected. He has the tendency to forget Namine is not just a porcelain doll that scribbles in destitute and isolation, a quaint picture of a girl who sits in a chair with a pasty complexion and the dewy eyed stare of a spring born fawn. No, he most certainly forgets she is a maturing teenage woman, locked alone with her hormones and sketch pad and the influence of twelve other diabolical villains of mass destruction. How long can a girl like that be satisfied with listening to the lush tales of others? How long before she years for one of her own?

Not that the answer can be found in a makeup pallet, but Namine seems to think so, as is fairly evident by her current visage and newly shrunken, thigh hugging dress.

"...Were you recently tortured in some way I was not aware of?" Zexion questions upon entering the room for the first time in two and a half weeks, somewhat anxious to see Namine again after the prolonged absence, more so than he will ever admit, out loud or otherwise.

He was hurrying down the hallway to release Leaxeus of his shift, of course.

"Hmm?" Namine intones, looking up from her typically ravished paper. Her usually vacant eyes lit up with an internal light once they fluttered to Zexion's countenance. A smile spread across her face, making her teeth look like loose chiclets in her mouth due to the abundant amounts of red lipstick, and she began to rise in salutations.

Zexion cut the greeting off at the legs with a swift nod of his head as opposed to more cordial means.

Namine, realizing with an abrupt start that she had once again crossed the line between captor and friend, stops her procession and returns the nod with one of her own. She then resumes her seat across from him and proceeds to continue scribbling. But she can not repress the smirk still tugging at the corners of her lips. She is happy to have him back and she knows it.

"I trust you behaved yourself in my absence," Zexion implored in his typical domineering manner, pulling up a chair with characteristic torpor and sitting directly in front of Namine.

He notes that Namine's feet are subconsciously swinging back and forth again.

Yes. Namine's white pump wearing feet.

Since when did she advocate the use of pumps?

"Of course Zexy."

"Zexion," comes the heated correction. "-ion."

"Whatever you say, Zexy."

So perhaps the term 'woman' was too strong of a word.

"Is there a reason your dress ceases to...fit?"

Namine looks up again, this time face donning an expression of confusion.

"I don't understand the question."

"You appear as though you are wearing a napkin."

Silence.

"I had Demyx shrink my dress."

"Yes, I can see that," Zexion retorts. "But why?"

"...Um, I'm getting fatter," Namine finishes lamely, avoiding eye contact, though it is an unnecessary precaution for Zexion can already tell she is lying.

"Your legs look like match sticks," he dead pans. "Where, exactly, are you beginning to develop fat?"

"My, uh, stomach and stuff."

"Is that so?"

"Yeah huh."

"If you are beginning to increase in size, then why did you implore Demyx to shrink your dress as oppose to stretch it?"

There was a silence that followed the previous inquisition.

"Shut up."

Zexion smirked outwardly at this one.

"Was that synonymous with, 'why yes, Zexion, you are correct, and I beseech thee?'"

"No. That was a shut up."

Zexion's smirk quickly faded into that of a line of confusion.

"Do you emanate this much bravado in front of all the other members, or just the ones with a penchant for letting you get away with things?"

Namine blinks a couple times in rapid succession. Too many words, too much make up. Try as she may, she was still the little snot ridden booger Zexion had left behind in his latest epic quest to over take nondescript world number one twenty seven in a myriad of cruel and unusual ways. She may be donning more rouge than clothing, but he still held the upper hand and this puts him at ease. Upper hands are all he has ever had, since turning around and throwing a punch has never gone well for him.

At this Namine gets up and attempts to...saunter...over to where Zexion is sitting.

"What are you doing?" he demands, almost as though he really does believe her to be a threat. And in some ways, she is. More so than the strapping Xaldin or the plotting Xemnas or the hot headed Axel. More so than the diabolical Marluxia or the sturdy Leaxeus or the knifing Xigbar. More destruction could be brought about by the pen of a lanky teenage girl, so white and so pale and so virtuous she almost hurts to look at, then any of the other twelve members that made up the Organization. "Why are you increasing your proximity? You can not sit on my lap unless you are in the process of crying."

"Who says—"

And with that Namine takes a nose dive and becomes personally acquainted with the white marble floors Xemnas had installed for her bedroom some six months ago.

"Shoes don't do you much good, Namine, if you can not walk in them."

"...but they made my legs look longer..." comes the muffled pleas of a dawning woman, just beginning to grasp the concept of balancing aesthetics with physics in one fell swoop. She is now sprawled out in an unbecoming position on the floor of her quarters,

a poster child for fashion gone bad.

"They make for absolutely preposterous fighting apparel," Zexion drones on, watching as Namine tries to scamper to her feet in a too tight, too short dress she can barely maneuver in. "Even Larxene ceases to wear stilettos on the battle field. And for someone like her to—" and then it dawns on Zexion. It dawns on him with such startling clarity that he can not believe he missed such an observation in the first place. "Namine," he asks, voice quieter than usual because his mind is busy processing things ten steps ahead of him. "Where did you acquire those pumps anyway?"

Namine tries to tossel her hair back with a nonchalance that can only be acquired through age, and she is not old enough to have obtained it yet.

"And the make up?" Zexion presses. "The rouge and the lipstick and the mascara...where did all this come from?"

Namine clamors back into her seat, her gait unsteady and wavering, almost as if she were a drunken sailor ready to go clubbing. Or, perhaps a drunken sailor who had already done some serious clubbing and was trying to make his way home.

Namine lets a few beats pass before responding, "Marluxia."

Words are not capable of describing the look of pure, undiluted horror that graces the milky sheen of Zexion's features at that precise moment.

"...I'm kidding," Namine adds precociously, reveling in the fact that she can still throw the schemer off guard occasionally.

Zexion swallows and attempts to respond, but it is in vain, for any well respecting man deserves a minute's worth of reprieve after nearly discovering one of his evil henchmen coworkers likes to dress in drag. Or, perhaps, is dressing in drag.

"Did Larxene say something to you?"

And at this Namine subconsciously snarls, not at the question itself, but at the fact that, even after a two week absence, Zexion still possessed the innate ability to read her so darn well, through make up and dresses and pumps and all, and there is nothing she can do to hide any part of her from him. Yet, at the same time, he had perfected avoiding questions and dodging conversations to the point where it almost became an art form, and an intriguing one at that. So why did she have to work so hard to crack open his emotions that were so protectively volted away while all he had to do is take one look at her face and he would be able to tell exactly what was floating around in her little hallow head?

It wasn't fair.

"What makes you think that?" Namine asks, in her own attempt to be cryptic. It fails, for Zexion can see right through it, even with his eyes closed, and he just sighs in agitation.

"I'm ordering you a new dress," he finishes, leaving no room for debate. It is not an option, it is a fact, and he will carry it out accordingly.

"What about fitting me for a new trench coat?" Namine teases, half serious half not. "That'll be cool."

Zexion's eye screws up something funny and Namine has to try and not giggle while looking at it.

"I was not serious about that."

"Yes you were."

"I was not."

"Yeah huh."

"Namine, we are not having this discussion."

A pause.

"Why?"

"Because—" and at this Zexion stops. Why does he have to explain himself to the prisoner? "Because I said so, that is why."

"You've been a flippin' scientist for twenty one years and you mean to tell me that's the best answer you can come up with?"

Zexion is not used to being challenged. And while he suspects such a feat should irritate him, it does not. In fact, he finds it refreshing. Refreshing in the fact someone is taking enough time to challenge him in the first place.

"What does having been a scientist have to do with the dress code?"

"...there's a code now?" Namine all but squeals. "You make it sound like an epidemic!"

Zexion gets that look on his face, that look that warns Namine that he is about to launch off into one of his scientific dissertations concerning the literal meaning of something she said that was meant to be taken figuratively, and she finds her suspicions are proven correct when he predictably begins, "Epidemics are caused by viruses, Namine, not shrunken polyester."

"Well why can't I have a trench coat? Why do I have to wear...have to wear white?"

"What is wrong with white?" Zexion ventures, somewhat anxious to see what the blonde will come up with for an answer. He can not recall the last time someone actually gave him a response he had not already predicted. It made for drab conversation.

"If it's such a great color why don't you wear it?"

"It does not compliment my skin tone."

Silence.

"Were you attempting a joke?" Namine questions, on the verge of a smile.

"...perhaps."

"Oh my gosh!" the girl squeals, the voluminous declaration piercing Zexion's very sensitive ear drums. "You tried to make a joke!"

"Don't I receive gratification of some sort? Aren't you supposed to...laugh?"

"Only if it's funny."

At this, Zexion hesitates. "Ah. I see."

"How could you have gone your entire life not knowing all this stuff?"

"Perhaps I simply choose to forget," he counters, averting eye contact, which is an anomaly all on its own, for his gaze is usually piercing and penetrating and reaming all at the same time, regardless of the fact he only utilizes one eye.

"That's stupid," Namine finishes up lamely, sensing the discomfort and not knowing what else to say.

"Ah, yes. And you are the paradigm of intelligence."

A crayon is chucked at the unsuspecting schemer's head.

"You missed," he derides.

"I've still got nineteen more," Namine informs him, glaring vehemently. Again, she almost looks like a force to be reckoned with. Almost.

"Where did you say you got the war paint again?"

"...war paint?"

"The stuff adorning your face."

"Makeup?" Namine suggests helpfully. "You dolt. It's called makeup."

"Axel refers to it as war paint."

"Oh please. Axel uses eye liner and we all know it."

Zexion refuses to be taken aback a second time.

"An answer, please."

"I told you, Marluxia."

"You also told me you were kidding."

Zexion does not wait long to begin interrogating. He already has an idea where this problem stemmed from and he is usually correct concerning these matters. Not to say teenage girls are of the norm for him, but when he develops a hunch he follows it, usually to affirming results.

"What did Larxene say to you? Did she give you all this...makeup?"

"...no."

"Do not lie to me Namine. It will not end well."

"She didn't give me the makeup!" Namine insists heatedly. "I stole it!"

At this, Zexion buffers. "You? You stole?"

"Um. Yeah."

"Namine, you can not steal."

"Why not? You all do."

Zexion has no ready remark for that last proposition, so he immediately tries to change the subject. "When were you left alone?"

"I'm not telling."

Zexion hangs his head in a slight form of defeat—the only he will ever show, but Namine is unaware of this—and inwardly heaves a mental sigh. "Of course not," he mutters.

"Besides, I think I look good."

Zexion, deeming words over rated, simply opts to stare dully at his prisoner.

"And is this your attempt at a joke?"

"I'm not trying to be funny!" she insists, charcoal rimmed eyes bulging respectively in their sockets. "I think I look good and I don't need your approval! So there!"

At this, she sticks her tongue out.

"Again with the tongue," Zexion mutters. "Always with the tongue."

He momentarily thinks about threatening to cut it off, but he doubts she would believe him. And besides, he has nothing to cut her tongue with.

Namine's brow furrows in a way that says she's done being the flaxen haired, corn fed good girl. Zexion senses there is some hidden agenda at play here, and he does not know why Namine will not come right out and say it.

"I wanna wear black," she declares.

"You're a prisoner, you have no wants."

Namine pauses, and then begins to smile coyly.

"I'll erase your memory."

Zexion finds himself startled, startled beyond any semblance of a response, perhaps for the first time in his afterlife, for Namine is not supposed to be aware of her powers. Not yet.

He feels the color from his already pasty complexion drain from his face and seep out through his toes. It is then he realizes that he is not simply dealing with an average teenager girl with rampaging hormones and a desperate desire to be seen as a woman, he's dealing with a emotionally starved ingénue beginning to step out of her realm of innocence and become aware that she is kept for a reason and is kept for a purpose and there are a whole plethora of powers at bay she has yet to take advantage of.

She's finally turning into the slumbering giant they've all been waiting for, there is finally a reason to keep an eye on her. She is now the force to be reckoned with, and while Zexion had always had an inkling of the notion reeling in the far recesses of his mind, only now has it been brought to his attention. And only now has he been forced to confront the matter head on.

"And when did you discover you were capable of...this?"

"Axel was making fun of me again," she tries to answer with an air of confidence, but there are insecurities forming behind her eyes and Zexion knows this. "I said something stupid, and he just kept laughing and laughing and laughing and he wouldn't stop. And so I drew a picture." She pauses. "And he finally stopped." She looks down at her sketchbook with new admiration. "You shouldn't make fun of me," she warns, locking eyes with Zexion, and if he weren't so practiced in the art of apathetic responses, he may have shivered.

"I don't," he replies.

Namine goes back to swinging her feet above the marble.

"Which is why I've left you alone," she chirps, back to lolly pops and dandelions and sunshine.

Zexion shifts uncomfortably in his chair.

"Yes Namine, but you need to leave everyone alone. Not just me."

"Why?"

Zexion readies himself to say, 'because I said so' but that answer no longer holds any weight.

"Because I asked you to."

And perhaps that answer does.

Namine picks up on a twinge of something she is unfamiliar with radiating from Zexion's words. She can't quite put her finger on it, but she knows better than to ignore it.

She locks eyes with him again, and Zexion can't recall when she's made this much eye contact in a day let alone an hour.

"...Get me a new trench coat," she surrenders. "Get me something that's not white and I'll think about it."

The schemer can not believe it's come back to this.

"Not this again, child," he moans, which is a first, because he rarely lets anything get on his nerves.

"What?" Namine asks. "I'm tired of white."

And how can she go from brain washing to wardrobe preferences all in a matter of seconds? Zexion determines then and there he will never fully understand the inner workings of the female mind. He also determines then and there that Namine does not fully understand what she is capable of. For if she did, outfits would be the last thing in her thoughts.

Though she does seem to understand the leverage she has now. This would be inconvenient to say the least.

"I don't want you to stop wearing white."

Namine's face scrunches up like a washboard.

"What? Why?"

"Because..." Zexion falters. Words, words. Where are the words? "Black is what we wear. And we're...we're the bad guys."

The girl is not convinced.

"Well maybe I want to be a bad guy, too."

And Zexion recognizes the danger in this. The danger of mutiny and the danger of sabotage. If Namine does not keep her conscious and her integrity then she will not keep her sketchbook free of the Organization. And now that she is aware of what she can do, there really is no stopping her from taking over their take over.

But also, Zexion does not want to lose the one bright spot he has left.

And he can not figure out which side would be best to run with. Or which side would be worse to admit to.

"You strive to be like Larxene, then?"

"What?" The eyes bulge again, and they go from being hockey pucks to marshmallows in a matter of seconds. "I don't want to be like Larxene!"

"Well you certainly seem to want to dress like her."

"But that doesn't mean I want to be her!"

"She is a bad guy, you are aware of this."

Namine pauses. She hates him for his logic and she hates him for his mind games and she hates him for always being right.

"You don't want to be a bad guy," he continues. "You just want to reap the social ramifications of the cosmetic attitude."

"...what?"

Again; too many words, too much makeup.

"You just want to grow up," he finally bursts forth with. And who can blame her? Normal girls get to swim in the ocean and dance on the sand and watch the sun sink into the waves and wish upon stars and daydream in palm trees. Namine gets to sit in a room with a sketchbook and an ever rotating cast of villainous miscreants. Of them the only female role model being that of Larxene. And where was she supposed to get her cues from?

Namine, at a loss of words, reverts to once again gracing him with her tongue.

Zexion's mind snaps and in an instant he is in front of the girl, quicker than lightening and quicker than sound, for he does undergo copious amounts of fighting when not assigned babysitting duty, and has her tongue lodged between his thumb and index.

"Not becoming," he says.

Namine is rendered incapable of speech given her current disposition.

"If you want to grow up, start by keeping your tongue in your mouth."

Unable to reply, the girl nods, dumbfounded.

Zexion is grabbing her tongue. Zexion is grabbing her tongue.

Overcome with the hilarity of the entire thing, she starts to giggle uncontrollably, causing Zexion to relinquish his grip instantaneously.

"You salivated on me," he all but pouts, and this makes Namine laugh all the harder, because when was the last time Zexion pouted over anything?

And she's on the floor now, convulsing in fits of hysteria as her face turns eight shades of crimson and she claws at her sides. Eventually she assumes the fetal position, and there are drops of saline making the suicidal plummet down her cheeks. Zexion has never bore witness to such a state of humor, to such a state of emotion, and it baffles him like nothing has ever quite baffled him before.

This is not the same girl who is capable of mind sweeping. It is not.

And yet it is. Somewhere beneath all that virtue and purity there lies someone capable of wrecking havoc like never before. And right now she is painted up like a porcelain doll wearing a dress three sizes to small and hyperventilating at his feet.

And he doesn't know what to do with her.

She's intriguing yet confusing all at the same time, and it's the first thing in years Zexion can't quite get his head around.

"Wipe off the makeup and I'll see what I can do."

Namine barely hears him over her string of unprecedented chortling, and logically speaking she probably shouldn't have, but teenagers seem to have a way with selective hearing. At least this one does.

"Re-really?" she coughs out, climbing back onto her chair and trying to gasp in enough oxygen to suffice for a small third world nation. "You mean, you'll get me a new outfit?"

Zexion already knows he won't but he nods his head anyway.

Lying is a requirement, not a choice.

And he doesn't feel bad about it. He can't feel bad about. He's incapable of feeling bad about it. Isn't he?

"Oh! Thank you Zexy!"

And now she's hugging him, and this is even more awkward than the laughter. But the most awkward thing of all is Zexion almost goes to hug her back.

He stops himself, of course. But still.

The instinct was there, and that counts for something, doesn't it?

"Release me," he mutters. Namine squeezes him harder. "I said let go, child." Harder. "Namine, I will whip you with your own entrails. Get off of me this instant."

Under threat of disembowelment, any girl is liable to listen. Namine is no exception.

The door clamors to life and Zexion finds himself thanking every deity he has ever heard of for allowing him the insight to detach himself from Namine. Because that's all the others need to see. Him. Hugging the captive.

"Bathroom," he says, and points in case the makeup has gone to her head and she has somehow magically forgotten where the sink was located. "Now."

Namine grumbles something about thinking she looks mature, but nonetheless listens under the promise of a new wardrobe.

It will never happen, but they do not call him the schemer for nothing.

Saix enters, flips his hair over his shoulder in passing, and diligently resumes Zexion's previous position in the middle of the room.

Perhaps the makeup came from him.

The man shoves the thought from his mind, for he would rather not think of where the war paint originated from, for there are simply too many options.

He doesn't bother with saying goodbye, for he feels the tradition unnecessary and cumbersome, and makes his way down the hall to Xemnas' quarters, which are characteristically shut off by two massive mahogany doors—there more for dramatic effect than privacy. No one approaches The Superior's presence unless they absolutely have to, and to lock them out is overkill when they would all most likely donate a kidney to avoid confrontation in the first place.

Zexion readies himself for a knock, but then stops.

He should inform Xemnas of Namine's newly recognized powers. He should. But he doesn't like to think of what it will entail. Would The Superior lock her up with himself? Would he assign Marluxia, that incessant flowerly prat that insists on calling her worthless, to permanent duty given his blatant favoritism? Would he no longer be able to see her?

And so he refrains.

Logically speaking, he shouldn't have, and perhaps this is the first time he has ever recognized the correct path and refrained from taking it.

He is trotting where he shouldn't and making decisions that do not fall under his reign of duty, but he decides that he simply does not care.

He doesn't knock and he doesn't tell and he doesn't think twice about it.

What Xemnas doesn't know won't hurt him.

o-o-o-o-o

Author's Note

This is me trying to weave in at least a small semblance of a plot.

Ha. We'll see how that goes. XP

You guys rock. Thanks for reading!