Paradox Ending – The Light of Hope
Final Fantasy XIII-2 in its entirety © Square Enix
A/N: Greetings, Dear Readers! Thank you so much for taking a chance on this one-shot collection. I've never written a one-shot before; it was kind of daunting. It's also my first foray into FFXIII.
Summary: It is 10AF. Twenty-four-year-old Hope makes a choice that changes his future. He is trapped within a paradox ending for just one night, and in the morning, it's as if it never happened at all.
Now I present Paradox Ending - The Light of Hope.
Why did he feel like he had a live gun in his hand, his finger on the trigger?
Moreover, why couldn't he tell at whom was it pointed? Him, or Alyssa?
"Director?"
She was waiting for an answer. She beamed, her head cocked to the side, her eyes clear and expectant the way they always were. Dear god, what was he supposed to say? Thanks, but no thanks? That, as her boss, he didn't think that sort of behavior appropriate? That, for him, life was all about the research into the space-time anomalies rippling across Gran Pulse and an alternate power source so that mankind could finally, fully stand on its own, away from fal'Cie rule?
That, no matter how brilliant she was, how charming, how eager to help, or energetic, or adventurous, he would never feel that way for her. Could never. Because of Lightning Farron. A woman they all believed had turned to crystal inside the pillar with Vanille and Fang.
Hope covered her fingers with his, not quite managing a smile when hers brightened. "I don't think this," he said kindly, removing her hand from his sleeve, "is really what you want. Is it."
"Why, what do you mean?" she asked, her voice going high and thin, the smile disappearing like a solved paradox, her eyes darting from his face to their hands in growing alarm.
He took a step back. Let the cool night air flow between them. "I'm sorry if I gave you the wrong impression, but it's late, Alyssa. Go home and get some rest, all right? We have a meeting in the morning."
It hurt to watch the emotions run across her face like a recording on fast forward. Surprise, realization, rejection, disappointment, shame. Then she bowed her head, clasping her hands in front of her chest as if to hide an ugly hole put there by his dismissal. "I . . . I see. Will you tell just me one thing? Please?"
"Of course," he answered, subdued. He owed her that much.
"Is there someone else?"
Hope almost laughed. He could feel his face settling into its familiar, unhappy lines, but the laugh bubbled in his chest. There was absolutely no answer he could give her, not when the answer was contained in the grainy vision recorded in the recovered Oracle Drive. The one that he watched over and over when he was alone, just so he could see her again. Lightning, champion of the goddess Etro, trapped in Valhalla and forever beyond his reach. So far, only Noel had met her, and that was in Valhalla itself. Hope had thought the jealousy might tear him apart.
He didn't let it show. It was all moot, anyway. The vision showed Lightning losing her fight, not coming home.
Finally, he said, "No. There's no one."
"Then why," Alyssa whispered, speaking to her hands. "Why isn't it me?"
The heartbreak in her words was so genuine that he closed the distance between them without thinking, reaching out to touch her shoulder. He suspected that his assistant put on an act for everyone, maybe unconsciously. She always seemed to tell people exactly what they wanted to hear, which was why everyone idolized her. "Alyssa?"
"No, it's nothing," she said in a more normal voice, shaking her head so vigorously that her short blonde hair bounced. Bravely, she hitched her smile in place and danced backward, out of his reach. Bobbing in a well-rehearsed pseudo curtsey, she tilted her head to the side and gave him a cheerful wave. She was cute, there was no denying that. "Never mind, Director Hope. It's all right. Forget I said anything. Good night!"
Then she was gone, walking too quickly for a mind at ease but never fast enough to break into a run, leaving him alone.
So alone.
Ten years was a long time. Hope raised his face to the starry sky.
"It's not question of can or can't," he quoted, closing his eyes. "There are some things in life that you just do. Right, Light?"
No response. At the empty silence, he fought not to weep.
Snow. Sazh and Dajh. Serah and Noel. They were scattered. Either fighting against the destruction of the world, like Lightning, or simply vanished, like Sazh and his son. The future was a scary place, and they were barreling straight into it with no brakes.
He began the trek back to his quarters. His boots made the rusted metal platform ring, a steady, familiar tolling.
Then, when a breath of wind passed through the Paddra Ruins, he heard a soft chuckle.
"Still looking to me for answers, Hope?"
He whirled around.
"Light?" he breathed, hardly daring to believe his eyes. What with the Chaos bleeding into the world and causing paradoxes left and right, he'd seen stranger things, but nothing as impossibly beautiful as she was.
Because it was her. She was different, though. Lovelier, somehow, in an unearthly way. Now, Hope understood what Noel had meant when he'd tried to describe her; she had become a goddess, living apart from the ravages of time. A faint glow hugged her body, glinted in her rose-colored hair, on her pink lips, coruscating across her silver armor, blinding on the half skirt of white feathers that hugged her left leg. As if she was nothing more than a phantom, the glow did not touch the ground on which she stood.
She smiled secretively, a look he'd never seen on her face before. "Yes," she said.
He stumbled, only then realizing that he'd tried to move toward her, one hand outstretched. "Are you real?"
"Yes." Her eyes were steady. Confident. Amused.
"How – What are you doing here?"
No answer.
"Have you seen Serah?" he blurted, his mind catching up with him. "Light! There's so much to tell you. I –"
He hesitated, his face warming. So much, indeed. It had been ten years. Back then, she'd been like a surrogate mother to him. He'd been a hindrance to her. He knew that. But no one could go through what they had together without growing. Changing for the better. Because of her, he'd found the courage and strength to take his father's place in the Academy and become the leader that the world sorely needed.
He'd often wondered what she would think of him as a man, a scientist and a politician. If he could have met her like this instead of as an insecure, frightened boy of fourteen, would things have been different? The laugh bubbled up again, because right then, it occurred to him that he was actually older than she was, and the idea was so strange he had no clue how he was supposed to react to it.
As a man, he was respected and admired. His research was progressing in leaps and bounds. If all went well, he would create a new Cocoon, a haven for humankind, without flapping around on a fal'Cie's leash.
That was his dream. And he'd hoped so badly that she would approve. She was never far from his thoughts, for she had become his ideal, giving him a goal to work for. Now that she was here . . .
What would she think of him as a man in love with a memory?
Patiently waiting, Lightning did not move. She did not speak.
He let his hand drop. His feelings were his. He wouldn't force them on her. Not now. Probably not ever.
Suddenly, she drew the gunblade, extending her arm with the military ease that came from knowing exactly how strong and capable she was. A burst of white feathers patterned the night. The old gleam of anticipation entered her eye.
"Get ready," she said, smirking.
That was the Lightning he remembered. Hope grinned and flipped open his airwing before he turned to face their adversary. Months spent on site in Yaschas Massif had conditioned him to expect a wild animal attack at any moment. In fact, he landed the first blow. Activating the mechanism on the airwing that would freeze water particles in the humid air, he sent it spinning like a miniature snow blower. It clipped the nearest ugallu on its snout before driving into the flank of its neighbor. The pack howled, smelling blood, as it moved in for the kill.
He had modified the boomerang after he'd lost his l'Cie powers. Unlike Serah, he could no longer cast magic, but that was where science came in. While Hope caught the airwing and angled it for another throw, Lightning darted into the fray. The Overture seemed real enough, slicing through fur, muscle, and bone, spitting bullets in quick succession. She somersaulted through the night, the spikes at her elbows and knees serving her when a fang or claw got too close, and the airwing sprayed ice as it spun around her. Working together, it didn't take them long to thin the pack enough to send the survivors fleeing.
With a practiced flick, Hope folded the airwing and returned it to its pouch.
"Nice," Lightning said, her voice a purr of appreciation. She sheathed the gunblade at her hip.
Pleased, he laughed. "It's like a dream, Light. I feel like I'm dreaming."
He didn't say it, but he also felt fourteen years old, awkward and pathetic.
He sobered. Lightning was beyond his reach. She would never belong to anyone. Which was okay. He may have fallen in love with what he remembered of her, but he had never desired to possess her.
"It's not a dream," she said, and all at once he realized what was different about her. The anger that used to drive her was missing, although, now that he was really looking at her, the grief was still there. She was calm, but far from at peace.
Fate had dealt her a hard hand to play.
"I've been given a chance," she said, half to herself, half as if answering his unspoken thought. "Etro has given this chance to me."
He frowned. "What do you mean?"
She looked up at him, solemn. "It's a paradox, Hope."
"You mean something changed," he said flatly. "It altered the timeline. Something . . . that I did?"
"It was your choice," she said, and then approached him. She held out her gloved hand. "Yours, and mine."
Hope didn't stop to think. He saw her hand, the longing and loneliness in her eyes, and he took it.
Her small, strong fingers curled around his. The last time he'd grabbed her hand, thoughtlessly, like a child, it had been bigger. Then, she pulled, and the ground fell away. Swirling Chaos engulfed him; he could hear thousands of voices, uncomfortably sounding like only a few, including himself, talking endlessly; he could see nothing; smell nothing; feel nothing except the pressure of her fingers, and he held on for dear life.
"Valhalla," Lightning murmured an eon later. Without him quite knowing how it happened, they were standing on the balcony of a castle, or perhaps it was a temple, staring down at a beach littered with masonry, at a black ocean made up of blue light. A paradox in and of itself. "Time does not touch its shores."
It sounded dull and monotone, like something she'd said many times before.
"Does this mean that I've disappeared, too?" Hope immediately asked. He wasn't sure how he felt about that. There was still so much work to do. So many people were relying on him. Had laid all of their hopes for a future on him.
Lightning spread her hands on the rail, still watching the surging, yet stationary surf. "Yes. And no."
"Light," he said, speaking more sternly than he meant to. He wasn't a child anymore. "What does that mean?"
"It means that there is no time, and that we have no time." She turned to him, her face sad, her eyes impatient. "When you wake up tomorrow, you won't be here. And I won't be there. I want to make the most of this time."
She was so close, brushing aside his hair, her fingertips lingering on his cheek. "Please," she said. "No more questions."
He caught her wrist. Not forcefully – she could break his arm in a blink if she wanted. Some things wouldn't change. But her touch was electric, making breathing difficult, and he needed to think. "Why? Why me?"
"Hope," she said affectionately, and she smiled. A true smile that lit up her whole face. "Do you think I haven't been watching you all this time? You've been working so hard to change the past. For Serah. For all of us."
Then she frowned and shook her head. Muttered, "I've never been good at speeches. Look at it this way. You've got your eye on the future, and I've got your back. I will always be right here."
She put her arms around his neck and kissed him.
His entire body responded in an instant. Her mouth was warm, soft, and insistent, her armor, by contrast, hard and unyielding against his chest. He kissed her back, befuddled by the buffeting of the Chaos that surrounded them, all of his uncertainty and inexperience pushed to the side. He'd found his answer.
He did not wish to possess her, because he belonged to her, body and soul. If she abandoned him again, then so be it. If he was there because she needed companionship and a brief moment of feeling human, and it didn't matter with who, then . . . it didn't matter. He would deal with it. He always had.
Hope buried his fingers in her hair with a sort of desperate hunger, holding her to him. It felt so right, as if they'd done this many times before.
For a second or two, he had enough presence of mind to analyze the situation, concluding that they may well have, in this realm where time did not flow. But when Lightning whimpered a little and parted her lips, he soon forgot it.
The Chaos swelled, making him lightheaded. He was not on Gran Pulse, and Valhalla was letting him know it in the strangest ways. After what seemed like an eternity, his hands were touching more than cold, silver armor and supple leather – or, rather, less. It was Lightning herself, her skin and her curves, soft as only a woman could be, hard as the warrior she'd always been. Likewise, the balcony was gone, but where they were, he couldn't say. It was dark and light at the same time. It was kisses and embraces, warmth and closeness, taste and scent and pure touch. It was sweat and pounding hearts and gasping breath. It was pleasure. Instinct. Exertion. It was Lightning, opening up to him, accepting him, a perfect give and take as old as the world, belonging, for the moment, to them. It was his name on her lips, her body in his arms. It was a wave that crested and broke, carrying them along, a single entity.
It was love. His for her, and hers for him.
..::~*~::..
Morning light poked brittle fingers through the blinds across his window and stabbed at his eyelids.
Hope groaned and rolled over. Scrubbing the heel of his hand into his eye, he groped for his clock, wondering about the time. It felt like he hadn't slept at all.
He nearly dropped the clock. It was ten in the morning! He scrambled to get out of bed, entangling himself in his sheets in his haste. He'd missed the meeting, Alyssa must be frantic –
Alyssa.
At the thought of his assistant, an icy calm settled over him. He gazed blankly at his tie clip on the nightstand, the beams of sunlight hitting it, so hard-edged and real they had the power to make him bleed.
Because he couldn't remember where he'd been last night after he'd spoken with Alyssa. Was it a dream that he was trying to remember? All he could recall were bits and pieces: The fire of lips on his skin. A woman's voice, saying his name. A jumble of heat and passion, which had ultimately consumed him.
Through it all, a phantom with rose-colored hair haunted him. Took his hand and –
A message from Alyssa, probably not the first, sent urgent beeping through his quarters, derailing his rather embarrassing train of thought. Of course it was a dream! One best forgotten as soon as possible if he wanted to look anyone in the eye again. Snatching up a pair of pants, he hopped around with his hair in his eyes, yanking the trousers up to his hips while trying to type a coherent response one-handed.
When paradoxes were solved, time rewrote itself, and memories changed suit. It would be as if the paradox had never existed. He was relying on Serah and Noel to unwind the true past that Caius had twisted into countless knots, making falsehoods out of their own memories.
But he wouldn't let them fight alone. It was time to get out there and find a way to bring Lightning home. For all of them.
A/N2: In an interview, Motomu Toriyama said that Lightning would never belong to anyone. I agree with that. But I also don't, because there is more to love than possessive love. Of all the romance staples, I think possessive love is my least favorite. I wanted to explore the possibility of a different kind of love.
When XIII-2 first came out, I was thrilled. My little fangirl heart wanted to explode at the fact that Hope was a man. YAY. I fell in love with the Lightning/Hope dynamic during their original journey through the Gapra Whitewood, and could not help soaking up every hint of it thereafter. Too bad Hope's just a kid, I thought. I didn't want Light to have to wait for him. But, wait! He's an adult now! And I wished and hoped Lightning would get to see it, too. Sadly (for me), it didn't happen. (I seriously wanted to CRY when LR came out . . .)
I know that not everyone is a fan of this ship, and that's okay with me. I'm not trying to shove it down anyone's throat, promise. It's just something I love, and I wanted to explore that love. I sincerely hope you've enjoyed it!
By the way, I do not believe Alyssa was sincere in this fic. She is, after all, an excellent liar, and knowing that she is a paradox is all consuming for her. I tried to infuse her scene with that backbone.
I've said this before, and I'm feeling it now. Please, please, please review! I love reviews. Seriously. They're like candy. :3 Thank you for reading!
Yours,
Anne