Edited in August 2017.
I don't own Final Fantasy XIII or its sequels.

fandom: final fantasy xiii and its sequels
characters/pairings: platonic hoperai
summary: he's changed, but so has she.
a/n: four of the seven chapters take place in lr!verse but I chose ffxiii fandom simply because the first prompt I wrote was set during the first game

Ichiban taisetsu na koto wa keshite iwanakute ii
Kono sora ya yureru haoto ya sekai ga zenbu shitteru

(It's definitely alright not to say the things which are most important
The sky, the sound of the rustling leaves, the world knows it all)

Maaya Sakamoto, More than Words.

space (day two)

Lightning has always been alert with her surroundings.

Trained as a soldier, she notices every little detail of her surroundings such as the number of people in the district she used to monitor, their gender and their clothes. She'd keep an eye at that black-haired teenager who owns a small knife hidden in his pocket or plot the quickest route to track down that suspicious man who keeps looking behind his back. She'd also remember the license plate numbers of all the cars parked in the district.

To begin with, she was already a clever and perceptive girl—if she hadn't had to look after Serah and work to support the both of them, she'd have ended up at Eden University with good grades. She didn't regret joining the Guardian Corps though, as it provided them a nice income. Plus, it actually seemed pretty logic to her to join the GC after collecting odd jobs throughout high school. A stable job was a necessity for both Serah and she and since public services paid its workers rather well, to become a soldier was pretty much the best solution for Lightning.

Throughout her training, she'd learned many things but mostly how to fight, learning hand-in-hand combat and armed combat. She was naturally gifted with gunblades and thus, when she completed her training months after and was put into Lt. Amodar's squad of Bodhum Security Regiment, the man gave her a customized gunblade as a welcome gift.

"Remember, Farron," he once told her, "The length of your blade represents your area, your space. Let an enemy in and you're good as dead."

If she has ever learned something useful aside from her combat skills, it'd certainly be this.

She loves her space, it gives her a sense of control and security. No one goes there if she doesn't let them in. She protects it with all her might, destroying any monster that dares to ever step a foot in and glares at whoever tries to come near her bubble against her will—glaring mostly at that stupid Snow though she's been somewhat tolerating him ever since the Purge incident.

In fact, there's only one person she has let enter her space save for Serah, finding herself gazing upon his sleeping form at the thought of him.

Hope.

He's sleeping a few feet away from her, sitting against a big stone with his head bent just a little backwards, lips slightly open and arms flat against his sides with one knee folded and the other leg straight on the grassy ground—she would've smiled at the cute sight of him had she not seen his furrowed eyebrows and the lines of his face sharpen.

From the way his lips are twitching, Lightning supposes he must be muttering something but Snow's loud and annoying snores render his barely audible murmurs completely mute. Sighing in annoyance, she gets up from the spot she was sitting on, gripping her gunblade tightly in case of surprise attacks and makes her way over to the sleeping boy in light steps, attempting to approach him without waking her comrades up.

"Mom…" Lightning hears him when she's standing before him. It's a weak, sorrowful voice.

Her eyes soften and the corner of her mouth slightly turns upwards, a pained smile on the lips. It isn't the first time he calls out his mother, she recalls. He said it the first time when they were resting at the Vile Peaks and at that time, she'd thought he mistook her for his mother in his sleep but maybe she was the one in the wrong. Maybe he'd been dreaming of his mother all along.

"Mom…" he mutters once again in the same tone, moving slightly from his initial position.

He somehow reminds her of Serah when their mother died, six years earlier. Her death made her start to sneak up on her bed again, something she hadn't done for several years. Lightning remembers waking up to muffled cries, cracking an eye open only to see her little sister grieving for their mother so Lightning would stroke her head the same way their mother did when they were younger. It'd somehow appease Serah, her muffled cries stopping as she finally slept in exhaustion. She would keep caressing her head till sleep welcomed her as well.

At that time, Serah was twelve—just two years younger than Hope.

A kid, that is.

Lightning draws a soft breath between her lips as she settles by his side, still holding her gunblade tightly in her grip as she sets it next to her thigh. Hope, at the new presence beside him unwittingly turns his body towards her, first resting his head on her shoulder before slipping down her chest and then to her lap, adopting a fetal position.

She doesn't look down because she knows he probably doesn't want anyone to see him so… vulnerable so Lightning simply lets her long fingers run through his hair, caressing his locks, smoothing him in the same way she used to comfort her sister.

"Mom…" she hears him whisper again and this time, Hope sounds serene.

Lightning looks up to the scenery above her, wishing upon the few stars that glow in the dark to keep him—all of them—safe.

Unbeknownst to her, her space gives more comfort to the people she cares she'll probably ever know.