Authors Note: Hey there! I've wanted to write a Final Fantasy XIII story ever since I began playing the game, especially one revolving around Hope and Vanille, and I finally got an idea for one. Hooray! I hope you enjoy and please read and review. :)

Disclaimer: I don't own anything Final Fantasy related.

Prologue

The ground trembled as an enormous creature made it's way over a large plain, littered here and there with bushes or rocks ranging in size from large to small. The creature greatly resembled a large reptile from prehistoric times, with thick gray skin covering it's entire body and large teeth poking out of its mouth.

A scream split the air as a young girl with bright red pigtails ducked and ran to the side, dodging the creature as it tried to crush her under it's large feet. The girl thinking fast; tossed a ball of fire back over her shoulder as she ran. It threw the creature off long enough for her to get a few paces ahead of it. When she was far enough away from it to feel somewhat safe she slowed her pace and glanced around anxiously, her green eyes lit up upon seeing someone leap into the air and land on the creatures back, driving a sort of spear into it.

The creature let out a long moan and fell, lifeless, to the ground.

The redheaded girl jumped up and down and clapped her hands together happily. "Yay! We did it!"

The other person was a young woman with dark brown hair and green eyes somewhat similar to the redheaded girl. She jumped down off the creatures back and slowly made her way towards the other girl. As she drew nearer to her she twirled her weapon in her hand and smiled.

"Of course we did," she said smiling fondly at the redhead. "Now lets get out of here before we end up as Adamantoise stew. Because for some reason I don't think that's our focus."

The redheaded girl nodded. "Right!" she said as she got down from where she stood on a rock and followed her companion through the plains filled with monsters of every size and shape.

The two of them walked in somewhat peace for the next twenty minutes coming across several small monsters but nothing that was too hard for them to handle.

After pleasantly making their way through the plains for a while another creature, even larger then the one they had fought earlier, began making its way towards them.

The redheaded girl gasped, bringing her hands towards her mouth. "Fang! What do we do?" she asked her companion anxiously; as she pulled out a weapon titled 'Blinding Rod' and prepared to fight.

The young women called 'Fang' frowned, her eyebrows furrowing together. "Retreat!"

Fang turned to run and the red head followed, matching her fast pace. As they headed for the cover of a forest, it became apparent that they couldn't outrun the large creature.

With a heavy sigh Fang turned and faced the creature, twirling her weapon in her hand.

"Come here beasty," she taunted, moving her hands back and forth over her head to get its attention.

The redheaded girl came to halt, turning back to look at her friend. "Fang! What are you doing? You can't fight it!"

"Don't worry, I'm just going to slow it down," Fang assured the girl. "Just head into those trees over there and I'll catch up to you."

The girl looked down sadly before nodding and giving her companion a wide smile. "Be careful!"

With that the redhead ran into the forest as fast as she could, worry clouding her thoughts. She forced herself to push away all thoughts of anything bad happening to her friend as she continued through the trees now at a much slower pace.

Finally she came to a halt, gazing at the ground sadly, reflecting on all of the things that 'could' happen even though she tried hard to push them all away.

She hadn't been standing there for very long however, when a creature nearly barreled into her. She gasped and pulled out her weapon once more, ready to fight it, but then frowned as it continued past her as though she didn't exist. The girl tilted her to the side and followed the creature deeper into the forest, curious as to why it hadn't attacked her.

Finally the creature came to a halt in a clearing and began circling a human lying on the ground. The human was a young man whom was most likely between the ages nineteen and twenty-three; he had silver hair, pale skin and wore clothes unlike any the girl had ever seen before.

After pacing back and forth around the boy for some time the creature snarled and sprang at him. The redheaded girl shot a large fireball at the creature just before it reached the boy and it fell on top of him, lifeless.

She quickly ran over to the boy and pushed the monster off of him. She then knelt down beside him and felt his pulse and after seeing that it was steady, she gingerly lifted his head into her lap.

"I wonder what he's doing here?" She wondered to herself, watching the boy curiously. He looked unlike any person around there that she'd ever seen, with his pale skin and odd clothes.

Finally the boy began to open his eyes, they widened upon seeing the girl looking down at him and he gasped.

"Don't worry, you're safe now," the girl told him, thinking that his shocked expression was one of fearfulness. She stood up and held out a hand to him, which he accepted still staring at her. The girl smiled at him. "My name's Oerba Dia Vanille. What's yours?"

The boy continued to stare at her, surprise and delight lighting up his eyes. "Vanille? It's me Hope... Hope Estheim."