Blighted Storm - Chapter 1: Arrival
Dragon Age/Final Fantasy XIII
Lightning

Disclaimer: I own nothing. Dragon Age belongs to Bioware and Final Fantasy is the property of Square-Enix...I'm just playing with their charaters for a little bit.

-0o0-

The world seemed to be a haze of shimmering lights and shifting colors as the woman slowly started to wake up. The relatively simple concepts of up, down, left and right had absolutely no meaning to her as she struggled to pull herself off of the surprisingly soft and pliable ground she found herself upon. A small, calloused and yet distinctly feminine hand tentatively rose from the woman's side and placed itself in a steadying position against her throbbing and slightly wobbling head. Awareness was slow to return to the woman as she carefully sat herself up and tried to begin the process of taking in her surroundings through still somewhat hazy vision.

Upon first glance it was fairly obvious that the woman was in a forest or marsh of some kind with an abundance of thick knarled trees clumped close together that extended high into the heavens above. Littering the area along with the trees were large crisscrossing vines and hanging ferns that lazily strung their way from tree to tree. Plant life was everywhere, blooming with intensity and a variety that almost matched the woman's only other experience with nature...but still fell short by quite a large margin from that absolutely grand landscape.

The ground that the woman was still sitting on was soft, slightly damp and was covered with generous amounts of mud, moss, loose bits of grass as well as various other pieces of woodland detritus typically expected of such an area. The leaden air around the woman was thick and heavy with moisture but a pleasantly gentle breeze running through the area kept the humidity from becoming overbearing in the mild heat of the marsh.

As her senses cleared a bit more, the incessant sounds of life and nature began to assault the woman's ears and seemed to be coming from everywhere all at once. Insects, birds, and plants swaying noisily in the breeze along with a wide assortment of braying, barking and snarling animals all seemed to be trying to serenade her at the same time to the backdrop of running water somewhere further in the distance.

Needless to say, these aggressive sounds painted a rather contrasting picture to that of the stereotypically picturesque wilderness.

Once her head and vision had cleared completely, the woman briskly rose to her feet and took a closer and more analytical look at her surroundings. Bright and narrowed blue-green eyes frigidly swept across the landscape inherently suspicious of what she might find there. Her previous experiences with nature and its inhabitants had not exactly been what one could call pleasant and the woman had just cause to be suspicious and on her guard.

The last time the woman was forced to trek through a wild area bereft of modern civilization, absolutely everything she came across had tried to kill her in one gruesome fashion or another. From the largest behemoth to even a few of the less than friendly plants, something about the woman must've seemed absolutely appetizing as they all had tried to turn her into a lovely mid-afternoon snack.

Unfortunately for those creatures, the woman had thought that the end of her blade was a far better meal for them to snack on than she was.

But hey, at least the view was absolutely amazing!

Remembering her training as a member of her hometown's military defense unit, as well as her past experiences with nature, the woman began a quick diagnostic on her current physical condition. It was basic procedure in the Guardian Corps training regimen for a stranded soldier to ensure they were in well enough condition to defend themselves if - no make that when knowing her luck - the need arose en route to the nearest area where aid can be called upon. The procedure was ingrained into the woman's skull from countless drills and the almost automatic action came with nary a thought.

'No visible injuries or discomfort...odd considering how I woke up,' thought the woman scanning her toned and athletic body with no visible defects aside from a few minor mud stains on her uniform.

The normally white and tan vest was still belted securely across her waist over a sleeveless brown turtle-neck sweater, though it now had a few dark brown splotches from mud and who knows what else. Her dark red leather miniskirt had ridden up her hips to show off more of her black athletic shorts than she would've liked, but otherwise she was fine with no cuts or even any bruises. Satisfied with her physical condition, the woman proceeded to the next item on her diagnostic.

'Checking Primary Weapon...' The drilled words resounding through the woman's brain in the exact same robotic tone with which they were taught as the woman deftly reached a fingerless gloved hand behind her back.

A quick tug later and a gleaming silver and red object was revealed from the confines of inconspicuous brown leather harness resting against the backs of the woman's legs. Another deft flick of her wrist and the object rapidly unfurled with an odd mechanical screech and a whirring of almost otherworldly gears.

Of all of the noises ever emitted in these wilds, this was the one that seemed the most alien to the surrounding marsh...Which is actually saying something seeing as though everything from High Dragons to the blood magic of Tevinter Magisters to the more recent depravities brought by the rapidly growing Darkspawn horde has graced this stretch of wild land at one point or another over the ages.

However the woman was completely unaware of these facts as she continued her assessment of her condition.

The alien whirring lasted for a scant few seconds before revealing a shining sliver sword with red accents tracing odd markings across its length and several still moving parts standing proudly in the woman's hand.

With absolutely no hesitation, the woman turned on her heel and slashed her weapon with blinding speed at the nearest misshapen tree. A single mighty sweep of her arm was all that the woman needed for her blade to slice cleanly through the thick wooden trunk of the tree.

For a moment the entire marsh became silent and still as the tree remained motionless despite clearly having been cut in two by the woman's gleaming blade. Said woman gave naught but a small smirk before stepping back and retracting her weapon into its smaller form with another flick of her wrist. Pointing the retracted weapon at the same tree she just attacked, the woman gave slight twitch of her index finger on a curved trigger on what was once part of the sword's pommel. Almost immediately, the far end of the weapon let off a blast and a noise like a thunderclap as a small projectile came hurtling out of the woman's weapon at speeds never before seen in these wilds. In less than a second, the projectile had buried itself more than six inches into the thick wood of the tree - and caused it to slide backwards and shear itself neatly in half from the same spot as the woman's earlier sword strike.

'Gunblade model 01672, Blazefire Saber...fully operational and combat ready'

A satisfied look came across the woman's face as she converted her gunblade into its apparent storage mode and placed it back into its sheath with an elegant and well-practiced flourish. Her smile slowly started to fade as she began to think about the next item on her self diagnostic.

'C'mon soldier, you can do this,' thought the woman as the demeanor of calm efficiency falling into her training brought her briefly faded and left a small but intense feeling of fear and anger in its place. A scowl settled upon the woman's beautiful face as she blew an errant strand of pale blonde hair away from said face. The woman's hair was always said to be a bit of an oddity as in certain lights it looked almost a light shade of pink.

'It's a part of you now and you have to check all of your capabilities before you can go further.' Thought the woman as she resigned herself to using her least favorite ability. She rarely used it due to the circumstances surrounding how she received it and the abnormal nature of the power. But, for the purposes of checking herself, the woman felt compelled to test her power to its fullest capabilities to avoid any nasty surprises later when it might be a matter of life and death and she has to rely on her most deadly ace in the hole.

"Dammit..." spoke the woman out loud this time as she mentally reached inside herself for the power she unwillingly received trying to rescue her sister from a terrible fate. She felt the power build and gather upon the odd mark of crisscrossing lines and arrows branded to the flesh in the dead center of her chest. The woman hated the mild enjoyment she felt at the rush of power that radiated throughout her entire body as the mark began to glow an otherworldly magical blue.

She let the power build and rise until it was practically begging her for release from the minute confines of her human body. The woman turned with her light strawberry blonde hair and crimson cape attached to the bronze pauldron on her right shoulder swaying fiercely in an unnatural gale created by her magic. She lifted a hand out in front of her and clenched her teeth together as her body trembled and strained with the effort of keeping such massive amounts of inhuman power under control.

Electricity crackled on her skin and in the air around her as the woman focused the wave of power from it's origin in her chest and down through her arm to gather at her fingertips. With the power reaching critical mass, the woman prepared to release the most powerful version she knew of her favorite spell, and coincidentally, her simultaneous namesake at a nearby tree.

The woman took a deep breath and shouted her name out to the heavens:

"Lightnin-GAUGHHH!"

Pain suddenly lanced through the woman interrupting her call with an agonized scream. The woman now known as Lightning continued her pained screech as a massive blast went off from her rebounded spell that encased her in a massive sphere of rushing magical energy.

Something had gone terribly wrong with her spell. Instead of all of the power releasing outwards towards her target in a rush of hissing and crackling electricity, the unstable magical energy rushed /inward/ and centered itself into the mark on her chest. Lightning could feel the intense heat of her mark burning and twisting upon her flesh as if it were being branded upon her skin anew.

'This is it, isn't it...my time is finally up...I'm actually turning into a Cie'th!' Lightning felt nothing but despair as her entire life flashed before her eyes, reminding her of every mistake and regret she never had the opportunity to correct during her relatively short life.

Distancing herself from her little sister, Serah, when their parents died…Becoming a Pulse L'Cie…Not being able to save her friends, Fang and Vanille from sacrificing themselves to save the people of her floating home of Cocoon…Letting Serah drift away into the arms of that lumbering oaf, Snow. Lightning eventually gave the couple her blessing to make Serah happy, but that didn't mean she had to like the buffoon.

Probably the biggest regret out of them all would be not taking better care of herself. Sure, Lightning was a soldier and kept herself in prime physical condition, and just the idea of Lightning looking unkempt is simply absurd, but Lightning never took the time for herself to actually be happy. Ever since her parents died, Claire Farron had to take up the self-made persona of Lightning in order to protect herself and her sister against the harsh realities of the world.

Lightning had lived a strict and regimented life of duty and order that had absolutely no room for any emotions or happiness outside of those belonging to or revolving around her younger sister, Serah. Even with her sister being the prime focus of her life, Lightning still managed to screw that relationship up with her detached persona acting as an insurmountable wall between her and her sister.

Being a soldier was all Lightning ever had to her life and she had given that up to try and save her sister from the Pulse Fal'Cie, Anima, during the Purge.

The Purge.

That's where it all started for her. And where all else ended.

But that's a story for another time.

For now though, Lightning had more important things to worry about...like whether or not she's going to turn into a mindless monster to wander the world with naught but her regrets for all eternity.

During her entire life-flashing experience, the magical sphere and the searing pain of her L'Cie mark had not abated a single iota. Lightning couldn't feel any grotesque changes happening to her body that would indicate a transformation into a Cie'th, but she did feel an odd growing warmth spreading from her mark to the rest of her body. The feeling was much like that of her magic when she called upon it. Lightning could barely spare a thought to how odd the sensation was in these circumstances through the torrents of pain assaulting her body before becoming acutely aware of her feet leaving the ground as the sphere surrounding her rose off the ground and took her with it.

The excruciating pain and unstable powers built and grew in intensity in and around Lightning's body until it felt as if it would explode from her every orifice...and then with another anguished scream that tore its way violently from Lightning's throat, it did.

A massively violent explosion erupted from the sphere of magical power surrounding Lightning with a resounding BOOM. It wiped out everything within a 50 meter radius of her location with Lightning's body acting as the blast's epicenter. Trees, vines, plants, animals...absolutely everything within that circle of land was wiped out in a single massive explosion of pure, unadulterated magical power. There was no gore from mutilated animals, plant debris from the area's destroyed fauna, or remains of any kind from that section of the wilds left after the blast. It was just a giant crater full of nothing...except for Lightning.

To be more precise, a floating, unconscious, battered and bruised Lightning suspended spread eagled in the air over the explosion's center. There was a shiny, pearlescent glyph resembling her L'Cie brand on the ground beneath her as she floated. The glyph was gigantic and covered the entire blast zone with its majestic glow. It pulsed several times with a few remnants of magical power before fading away to leave scorched brown earth behind it. With the glyph gone, Lightning quickly began her descent to the ground like a marionette with her strings cut. She landed with a heavy thud and a nasty crack that echoed all throughout the empty blast zone and she did not move.

Lightning was a mangled mess upon the decimated earth. There were bruises seemingly everywhere on her body and she was bleeding steadily in several places. Her left arm and right leg were bent at sickeningly unnatural angles and were most likely broken from the fall to the ground. Her clothes were destroyed beyond all hope of repair and left her relatively exposed to the free elements of the partially destroyed marsh.

The tight belt around her waist held enough of her vest and sweater together to cover the majority her tattered brassiere that stubbornly guarded the soldier's modesty despite the fact that the center of her shirt was blown wide open from the power escaping from her brand. Luckily for her, the majority of the blast escaped from her brand leaving most of her lower body and her gunblade in its sheath against her legs safe, if not a little scorched.

In her current state of undress, it was plain to see that Lightning was not transformed into a mutilated form of herself, meaning that she was not a Cie'th. However her exposed chest did reveal something interesting and completely unexpected. Lightning's L'Cie brand that had previously been black, rough and full of twisting arrows with a partially closed eye that almost seemed alive lying in its center had changed. Now the brand was burned smoothly across her skin and glowed a faint blue as if it were magically frozen in place. The eerie eyeball that sat in the brand's center was gone and the twisting arrows had retracted into a simple geometric pattern not seen since the brand was first bestowed upon Lightning.

Possibly a final reward for outstanding service from the Fal'Cie or a result of her appearance in...wherever she was, but whatever the reasons behind it, the results of whatever process Lightning was put through was clear. Lightning had been freed from the curse of the L'Cie and allowed to live her life as she saw fit. The true gift of this was that by allowing her to keep her brand and freezing it in the same manner as her friend Fang's brand, the Fal'Cie had granted Lightning the ability to keep her magic without the threat of turning Cie'th if her Focus wasn't completed.

There is absolutely no greater gift for a L'Cie to receive than the one Lightning was just given. But there were a number of questions that needed answering...

Where exactly is she?

How did she get there?

Is she supposed to do something here?

Can she get home? How?

Lightning's future was unknown and very uncertain, but she would have to deal with that when she woke up...if she woke up. For now, she needed to get some much needed rest as errant magic began to leak from her brand, healing Lightning's cuts, bruises and broken bones in a soft wash of green light that carried through the trees and silhouetted against a dragon gracefully flying in the distance.

-OoO-

The High Dragon flew confidently from the top of the Tower of Ishal in Ostagar back to her little hut in the Korcari Wilds with her prizes held securely in her massive talons. The last two Fereldan Grey Wardens left alive were held quite literally in the palms of her hands...or more appropriately, claws. The Dragon allowed a small chuckle to come over her as the intricate pieces of her plan slowly began to piece themselves together with her acquisition of the Wardens.

Her daughter should be pleased. The two men were actually rather attractive and should make her task easier regardless of the one she chose.

The Dragon was still congratulating herself on her cleverness when a massive explosion followed by a blindingly bright flash of light erupted in the deep blackness of the night. The taste of unknown and foreign magic was heavy and heady on the wind as the Dragon's head perked up and she changed her direction to go investigate. She knew that the Wardens were in bad shape having been thrown about by a particularly large ogre before being riddled with the darkspawn's tainted arrows, but this was a truly intriguing occurrence. It had been many decades since the Dragon had felt magic she was unfamiliar with and her never ending thirst for new knowledge drove her towards the blast zone of the explosion.

Upon her arrival, the Dragon inwardly quirked an amused eyebrow as she surveyed the devastation centered around a single prone figure bathed in a soft green light. The figure was that of a young woman with light blonde hair that seemed to glow pink in the magical glow around her. Her clothes were in tatters and she was in very rough physical condition. If not for the obviously healing magic at work on her, the Dragon would have surely mistaken her for a corpse; which would've been a pity. But what really caught the Dragon's attention despite the Wardens clutched in her grasp was the complete absence of Fade energies in the woman's magic.

As far as the Dragon knew, which was rather considerable considering her age, the root of all magic existed in the Fade and had to be called from that plane of existence to be used in the mortal realm. What this woman was doing in her unconscious state was clearly magical in nature.

It felt like magic.

It tasted like magic.

But it didn't feel like the Fade.

The Dragon was more than a little curious and wanted to know how this was possible. It went against everything anyone knew about the properties of magic and could be a rather useful trick to learn. To call upon magic without rousing the demons and spirits that lurked in the Fade waiting for their opportunity to catch a mage in a moment of weakness would be an incredible step in the changing of the perception of mages in Thedas. Not that the Dragon cared about the other mages, but having a complete night of sleep uninterrupted by annoying pride demons too bold for their own good was greatly appealing to the dragon.

Swooping down into the clearing of nothingness, the Dragon reached her long, scaly neck towards the glowing woman in its center. Without losing any of her momentum, the Dragon swept the woman onto her back with a single powerful movement of her neck and banked off to return on her way.

Things were about to become very interesting for the Dragon when all three of her charges woke up.

-OoO-

Alistair was the first to awaken several days later in a nondescript shack in the middle of the Wilds. Above him was a vaguely familiar female figure gazing upon him with an almost clinical look on her admittedly gorgeous face. Dirty blonde hair and brown eyes met midnight colored locks and gold eyes for a brief second before Alistair immediately flushed a deep shade of crimson while the woman gave him a triumphantly knowing smirk. Out of pure virginal instinct, Alistair tried to get up and run as far away from the scary sexy lady in front of him as he possibly could. Alistair's Chantry upbringing was screaming in his head that the woman was far too close and he should get away as quickly as possible before any...improper shenanigans could occur.

Unfortunately, that voice wasn't too clear about how graceful he should be in doing this...and was shouting some distracting nonsense about being hungry and sore on top of being disoriented and confused from his abrupt awakening, but those were far less important matters than Alistair's escape.

Alistair hadn't even made it to one foot before he got tangled in the bedroll he was lying upon and tumbled back to the ground with a resounding crash. The resulting impact caused his body erupt into a symphony of pain from recently healed wounds aggravated by the sudden exertion.

The woman above him gave a low chuckle at Alistair's misfortune before addressing him, "Well that was entertaining...My name is Morrigan, Warden, lest you have forgotten."

Alistair instantly tensed up and cleared his mind of all confusion immediately at Morrigan's words. Oh, he remembered her all right. She was that creepy witch-thief that accosted his party at the old Grey Warden tower in the Wilds. Something about her had seemed...off to him despite her obvious beauty, and had set Alistair on edge within seconds of meeting her. He had hoped to never the strange apostate again after he successfully retrieved the Grey Warden treaties held by the witch's equally creepy apostate mother. But life is never that kind...especially not to him.

"And you are currently within my mother's hut in the Korcari Wilds," Morrigan continued on without acknowledging Alistair's change in demeanor. "She rescued you and your two companions from the top of the tower of Ishal when the darkspawn overran your position. The man who was to respond to your signal quit the field and the darkspawn won your battle. Your king and the Grey Wardens fighting in the battle alongside him all perished during the onslaught."

Alistair's eyes widened in shock as he struggled to take the news in. Duncan...Cailan...his brother Wardens...all dead?

"We have spent the last several days tending to your rather extensive wounds here in the Wilds. Your friends are still unconscious but the majority of your injuries have been taken care of. If you have a moment, my mother would like to speak to you outside." A cruel smirk appeared on Morrigan's face as she quickly added, "Hopefully you still possess enough coordination to find the door, hmm?"

Either oblivious to Alistair's distress, or simply not caring, Morrigan had continued to speak as if the deaths of hundreds, maybe thousands, of loyal Fereldan soldiers as well as the closest thing Alistair ever had to a family had no effect on her. She didn't know any of them, so her lack of grief was understandable, but the effect of her words and demeanor sent a disturbing chill down Alistair's spine at her callousness. He was starting to find her remarkably less attractive the more she spoke in that detached and disinterested tone of hers regarding the complete and utter destruction of what had once been the entirety of his life.

Alistair was so consumed in his grief and sorrow that he almost missed Morrigan's next comment, "If you have need of anything, I shall be here to assist. Mother is waiting for you outside."

Having said what she needed to say to her guest, Morrigan turned on her heel and left the hut's single room with a rather interesting sway to her hips...not that Alistair noticed in his grief-stricken state. Even if he had noticed, Alistair wouldn't have been too inclined to do anything about it, anyway. Chantry sensibilities notwithstanding, the apostate gave Alistair the creeps and he couldn't get out of there fast enough.

Peeling himself off of his bedroll with a bit more care this time, Alistair gave a startled yelp when he noticed that he was in naught but his smallclothes! Blushing furiously, Alistair busied himself with putting his tarnished splintmail armor sitting rather helpfully near his bedroll back on, all the while grumbling about perverted apostates and traitorous heroes.

Alistair was just finishing buckling the last few straps of his armor when something that the witch said finally sunk in. Morrigan had said that he was saved along with /two/ companions.

One look at the floor revealed Duncan's newest Grey Warden recruit motionless on the floor in a bedroll similar to his own. If it wasn't for the steady rise and fall of the new Junior Warden's chest, Alistair would've thought for sure that he was looking at a corpse...the thought of being the last Grey Warden in all of Fereldan was definitely not appealing and brought a pang of sadness to his chest as memories of brothers lost came unbidden to Alistair's mind. He couldn't help but hope that his new comrade would wake soon...if they woke at all.

But as relieved as Alistair was, he couldn't fathom who their supposed third companion was. By the time he and the recruit made it to the ogre guarding the top of the tower, both the circle mage and the soldier who accompanied them to that point had perished at the hands of the darkspawn. The two Wardens were the only ones who engaged the ogre, with the new Warden impressively striking the final blow to fell the beast. As soon as the signal fire was lit, they were besieged by a sudden outpouring of darkspawn that caught the two off-guard. Outnumbered and surrounded, the two powerful but inexperienced Wardens were overpowered by the darkspawn and were taken down by well placed arrows that slid effortlessly through narrow gaps in their armor.

The next thing Alistair knew, he was waking up to the creepy apostate in this hut.

But that doesn't explain where the third companion comment came from. As exciting as his recent adventures were, Alistair distinctly recalls only one other person with him and they were still unconscious on the floor. Maybe the older creepy witch would have some answers for Alistair and hopefully he could get them without getting put in a pot or turned into a toad...green is so not his color.

Consumed in suspicious thoughts of apostates and turbulent emotions centered around the deaths of his mentor and brothers in arms, Alistair strode right out of the hut determined to get those answers.

In his haste to leave the hut, Alistair failed to notice the unconscious female figure on the small bed behind him as well as the stirring form of his fellow Warden on the floor.

-OoO-

A/N: Yeah...um...my first (uploaded) story in over a year and I'm not too sure how it turned out. I've been sitting on this chapter for a few weeks now in an effort to make it longer, but I think this part stands alone well and it's been burning a hole in my hardrive so I decided to just put it out there and see what kinds of responses I'll get. I think in the past year my witing style has improved and I'm eager to hear people's reactions on this. I think I'm going to try something new where I'll actually take suggestions on where the story should go from here as I have vague ideas on where to go but nothing solid...like as of right now, there are no pairings planned but who knows what might develop as I continue this fic. I also have several others that I'm working on (including a continuation on one of my previously abandoned fics from last year) so I can't promise anything in the way of updating, but I promise a minimum of 4,000 words for each chapter. That's gotta make up for something right? So...thanks for reading and be sure to review! I like those...

Side note: I do know that the actual spell in FFXIII (and every other square-enix game I have ever played) is Thunder and not Lightning, but I wanted Light to say her name so she did...I'm very much a geek for sticking to canon but I decided to cheat for once. Sue me.