Disclaimer: I only own the plunny/inspiration.
Entrance
Chapter 1: New Heart
Remember, we all stumble, every one of us. That's why it's a comfort to go hand in hand.
- Emily Kimbrough
"Sora!" Cid shouted from his corner of Merlin's house, startling the keyblade wielder. "Get your ass over here!"
"What's going on?" Leon asked as he prowled over to the mechanic's side, staring at the blond's computer. "Did someone arrive?"
"Damn right," Cid growled, his brow furrowed. "Brought a whole mess of Heartless with 'em too."
Leon sighed and pinched the bridge of his nose, trying to stave off his nearly omnipresent headache. Just four months ago, Radiant Garden had almost been restored to its former state and Heartless sightings had been almost nonexistent. Things were peaceful and flourishing until Harry had arrived, literally from nowhere.
Not that Leon minded. The green-eyed wizard had been an essential part of the Radiant Garden Restoration Committee, well, after he had gotten over his near-worshiping of Merlin that is. The two incredibly talented wizards had managed to cut the time it would take to repair the Garden in half, something Leon was grateful for. Harry had also found a niche in the group with his friendly demeanor, though he usually hung out with Cloud and Aerith, much to Leon's bemusement.
It could not be denied though that Harry's arrival had brought back the Heartless attacks; they had first found him tearing his way through a pack of Destroyers after all. Leon had made it very clear to everyone that Harry was not to know of the resurgence of Heartless at all costs, because behind the smiles and bright eyes, Leon could see something familiar; the tiredness of a soldier who had both won and lost everything, that same kind of weariness that he knew hung around him, Cloud, and even Aerith on her more somber days.
The last thing Harry needed was to fight anymore, but he had been insistent on defending his new home, so the least Leon could do was make sure he didn't know the reason behind why the Garden needed defending in the first place.
Harry hadn't been the only arrival though - it was an inside joke nowadays that the Garden had continued on Traverse Town's habit of adopting strays - but he had been one of the few who had stuck around. There had been that odd man who kept calling himself a leading man with his companion, who Leon could safely say was one of the most unique beings he had ever seen. Zack as well had been a surprise, an amazing stroke of fortune that had left Aerith and, much to the entire Garden's shock, Cloud smiling brightly for days at the return of their lover.
Leon stifled a chuckle as he remembered the angsty blond and the quiet flower girl flinging themselves on Zack, bellowing his name for the entire world to hear. Though Leon would never say it aloud, he had been happy for the two; the unconcealed joy in all three of their eyes was more than enough to warm even the most cynical of hearts.
Not to mention with Zack's arrival, he could finally stop worrying about what exactly Harry and Cloud were doing when they were all alone for hours at a time...
"That's down by the old castle, right?" Sora asked from beside Leon, and the older man shook his thoughts away. "Do you want me to do some recon?"
Cid grunted affirmatively. "The defense specters are reporting not only a huge amount of Heartless, but an equally high rate of Heartless destruction. Whoever's appeared is making short work of whatever they brought with 'em."
Leon's frown deepened in thought. "I'm going to go with you."
Sora blinked, cocking his head to the side. "Aren't you busy? I can take care of myself, you know; you don't have to go out of your way to help me."
"Everyone needs backup," Leon said simply. "Even you, Sora."
Sora laughed, rubbing the back of his head. "Yeah, I don't remember how many times Donald and Goofy saved me." The young keyblade wielder's face fell for a moment before he smiled widely once more. "I can't wait until they visit again. King Mickey has been them ragged according to their letters."
"They'll be here in two weeks, Sora," a new voice, inflected with a heavy British accent said. "The time will fly by."
"Harry!" Sora cried happily, jogging over to the tired wizard. Leon followed at a more sedate pace, an almost invisible smile on his face. "When did you get back? We thought you wouldn't be home for a few more days."
"Merlin sent me home a little early." Harry laughed sheepishly, looking off the side. "I think he's a little upset with me, actually."
"What did you do?" Leon asked, almost afraid to know the answer.
"Um, I, kinda maybe, lured a bunch of Heartless together and, ah, ambushed them all." Harry smiled winningly.
"Who was with you?" Leon asked, reigning in his temper and worry. Harry didn't say anything. "No one?" Leon asked, his voice practically a whisper.
Sora quickly jogged backwards to hide behind Cid, who was watching the duo apprehensively. Leon didn't get mad often, but when he did, you were fucked.
"Are you an idiot?" Leon hissed. "You could have been killed or worse!"
"I can take care of myself!" Harry exclaimed, glaring at the older man. "I took care of all of them and I'm fine! Not a scratch on me!"
"That's not the point," Leon said explosively. "What happens when you don't make it out unharmed? When you get in over your head? What am I supposed to do then?"
"You don't need to do anything," Harry said lowly. "I'm fine; I can take care of myself. In case you've forgotten, Squall, I'm a healer, which means I need to be strong enough to take care of both myself and my patients." Harry sighed gustily, rubbing his temple.
"Are you two done with your lover's spat yet?" Cid asked crankily. The two brunets stared at him dispassionately, though there was a bit of pink on both their cheeks. "Did you forget about our visitor who, you know, is being attacked?"
"What?" Harry asked in confusion. "What's this about an attack?"
"Nothing," Leon said quickly. "We will talk about this later. Sora, come on."
"Wait a second, where are you going?" Harry asked, following the two warriors as they left Merlin's house.
"Nowhere you are," Leon grumbled.
Harry glared at him. "If there's been an attack, then a healer needs to be at the scene to heal any wounded."
"Sora knows Curaga," Leon countered.
"Sora knows how to throw white magic at someone until they have no choice but to heal, while I can actually treat people in a way that doesn't mean continually flinging around magic carelessly." Harry paused before blushing hotly. "Sorry, Sora."
"No problem. I do waste a lot of magic when I try to heal something," Sora admitted. "Anyway, someone arrived a little while ago and brought a bunch of Heartless with them, so we're going to go save them!" Sora exclaimed as he leapt onto nearby house's roof and from there onto the Bailey, the other two letting him take point.
Harry smiled in amusement. "Playing the hero, huh?"
"Someone has to!" Sora replied as he summoned Oathkeeper and casually destroyed a small contingent of Soldiers. Harry watched as he chatted on aimlessly, picking off the Heartless that slipped past his defenses with a few well placed spells, still slightly in awe of the power Sora could harness so casually. Sure, Harry was nothing to laugh at, especially now that he had begun mastering the third tier spells and improving them as he went along, but Sora was in a class all to himself.
The trio made short work of any Heartless they met on their way, arriving at the Dark Depths in record time.
"So, where is he?" Sora asked, peering around.
"Maybe in one of the ravines?" Harry offered. "Sora could glide over and do some recon."
"No need," Leon said shortly, pointing a little bit away. "There are gunshots coming from that direction."
"…Nice hearing," Harry said after a moment of silence, nodding his head in concentration.
"Gunshots?" Sora asked in confusion.
"You mean you've never been to a world with guns?" Sora shook his head vigorously. "Huh. Well, I'll tell you all about them later. For now though, we should get going before he decides to leave without u-SQUALL!"
"It's Leon!" Leon called back from quite a distance away.
"And I'm Cinderella," Harry muttered.
Sora cupped his chin, looking contemplative as they sprinted after Leon. "I think I know Cinderella..."
"Interesting, but not now!" Harry gathered white magic, casting Raise on the woman who had just been struck through the chest with a lance made of shadows. She looked around quickly, her strawberry blonde hair flying around her face, before bright eyes locked with his.
"Harry, you're with me," Leon ordered, sliding to a stop at the woman's side and drawing his gunblade.
"What an old model," she muttered, and Harry looked at her curiously.
Leon continued, ignoring the slight against his trustworthy blade for the time being. "Sora, will you be alright with guarding our backs?"
"Don't worry about it," Sora said cockily, switching out Oathkeeper for Ultima Weapon. "I won't even break a sweat."
The woman glanced at the two brunets out of the corner of her eye. "These things are tough. Are you really going rely on one kid to take all them out?" she asked between pants, gesturing behind her at the hundreds of Heartless Sora was dashing towards.
"He'll be fine," Leon said firmly, no doubt in his voice.
"Only a couple hundred Heartless? Sora'll be fine." Harry grinned, pooling his magic together and shaping a Holy spell. "Besides, we have other things to worry about."
The woman stared at the frothing mass of darkness before them, ominously glowing yellow eyes peeking out of the mess and jeering mouths slobbering everywhere. "Worry? I took out a group twice this size before you arrived."
"Well then, just leave this to us," Harry said, stepping forward and releasing the built-up magic into the air. The cloudy sky brightened and bleached before rays of light struck down at the Heartless from on high. The remaining Heartless howled ferally and rushed forward.
"And miss this fight? I don't think so," she said lowly.
"I think we've got another stray," Harry laughed. Leon grunted in amusement, launching a quick succession of Firagas into the advancing wall of darkness. "Can we keep her?"
"Can't stay too long," she said after a long moment of staring at them cast magic, one hand clenched in front of her chest. "I have someone I need to save."
"We'll help you," Harry said simply. She looked at him oddly. "Whoever you need to save; I'm sure we can get a team together to help you, if you need the assistance or simply want it. Just say the word."
The woman huffed, her lips curling in a semblance of a smile. "Is this really the place to be talking?" she asked, destroying a group of wyverns with a powerful couple of Thundaras.
"No," Leon said shortly.
"Yes!" Harry smiled, laughing at Leon's annoyed look. "Sourpuss over there is Squall, but everyone calls him Leon. I'm Harry. What's your name?"
"It's Lightning," she said. She drew a sleek gunblade from its sheath, pointing at the Heartless about to crash into them. "No more talking. Let's go!"
I LOVE FFXIII.
Now that that is out of the way, expect a few FFXIII/HP oneshots out in the next couple of weeks. I'm still trying to churn out as many chapters for the Fantastic Four before I begin posting them, so for anyone still waiting for an update on them, I'm planning on doing another mass update on my birthday (April 17th) this time. Four updates and an oneshot for you guys and a ton of birthday reviews for me, right?
...I just realized this will be the third birthday I've celebrated on this site. Ah, how the time flies! My writing, I hope, has improved quite a lot since my first few days. I tried to clean up one of my older stories, but I gave up in disgust, it was so bad. /Shudders/
Anyway, I hope you all enjoyed and weren't too weirded out with the random characters. I was stuck between Balthier and Fran or Firion, but I just finished rereading Shivani's Balthier/Harry story, so my poor new iTouch game had to take the backseat for this oneshot. Never fear though, I have a Firion/Harry oneshot in the works (or maybe you should be afraid).
As for Zack, Zack/Cloud/Aerith is love and I was upset I wasn't able to have as much (read: any) of it as I wanted in Benevolence, so I decided to put a cameo for it here. Ignore the fact that it is completely implausible and Zack has already canonically appeared in the Coliseum; focus on the OT3!
That's it; I'm done with this oneshot. I don't think I'll do anything with this universe but, as with some of the others, I can give you a run down of some of the things that I might have done (here be spoilers):
Sora would return with Lightning to Gran Pulse, where she would have been confused, only realizing where she was when she noticed Cocoon in the sky. They would then return to Radiant Garden when they discovered the Gummi Ship would not be able to land in Cocoon.
Merlin and Harry would create a portal right into Cocoon, and Leon, Lightning, Harry, and Sora would land there. I wouldn't make any of the three crossover characters for l'Cie (that could be subject to change - making someone a Sanctum l'Cie would make for good drama, a la Sazh and Dajh), but they would basically fit into the following Paradigm sets (in terms of combat – the three non-XIII characters would not be able to use the Crystarium after all):
Lightning: Commando/Ravager/Medic
Leon: Sentinel/Commando/Ravager (hi Snow clone!)
Harry: Medic/Ravager/Synergist (hi Hope clone!)
Sora: Ravager/Saboteur/Commando
Timeline would be a little iffy, but it would definitely take place before Palompolum. Hope makes it hard to form a set timeline unless I send him off with Sazh and Vanille, but that would destroy all the character development, both good and bad, he had with Lightning (not to mention that he would never even arrive at Palompolum that way).
See why I'm not continuing this? I have ideas, but I'd have to twist canon so much that it wouldn't even be realistic. Now, I'm all for trying new things, but... I just don't see anything but plotholes coming from this direction.
So just enjoy the oneshot as it is (and I hope you did), and don't forget to leave a review! Also, don't forget to look for more FFXIII/HP crossovers in the future!
Ariaeris~