SEPARATE WAYS ~
Luxerion was a beautiful place during the day. Sunlight beat down on the gothic-looking streets and shops and children played games throughout.
Hope Estheim, clad in a prayer robe, was standing at the northern monorail station, waiting for the train that would take him to the floating island of Valhalla. He couldn't explain why he wanted to go; he just felt drawn there.
The train arrived and Hope stepped aboard. It jetted off a few moments later and Hope sat down in a clean-looking seat against the back wall of his car.
Lumina had warned him not to go. She'd said that the world would forever change if he reached the throne room, which had only served to pique the preacher's curiosity more. The weird thing was that she'd made it sound like there was something wrong with Nova Chrysalia.
Hope dozed, but when the train stopped at his destination, he moved with vigor.
Valhalla was an austere temple, the architecture of which didn't match anything else that anyone had seen anywhere. Hope wasn't sure what it was, himself. Some said it had to do with the demon, Etro, but still others insisted it was proof that the fal'Cie existed. But that was absurd; fal'Cie were stories used to scare children into listening to their parents.
Green rings of light hovered over the building, giving off a sense of power and glory that had faded into nothing.
Hope started up the steps that led from the enormous foyer into the temple proper. All around him, he could see scars from battles. Burns and rubble from blasts of magic, cuts and scars from slashes of swords, and truly peculiar slashes from what looked like gigantic claws.
Still, Hope was undaunted.
He made it into the throne room and stopped. A staircase led up to a tall crystal throne, upon which sat the crystalline statue of a woman with a sword across her lap. Kneeling in front of her was another statue; this one of a younger man, his sword planted in the floating platform on which he was placed.
Why would anyone leave such exquisite works of art in an abandoned temple in the middle of nowhere?
Hope anscended the steps and took a closer look. There was something eerily familiar about the woman's face...
"No..." he muttered, his eyes widening.
Recognition struck him hard. How the hell could he have ever forgotten Lightning Farron?
Tears burst from his eyes and he looked down at the second statue, almost afraid to see the face of the World Destroyer, as he'd been known in the early days.
The crystallized face of Noel Kreiss was what met his gaze.
Hope collapsed to his knees and screamed.
"Why, Noel?" he whispered, "Why come here?"
But Hope Estheim, Director of the Academy and former l'Cie, knew the answer. Noel had come to die and had gotten something else entirely.
His memories of Cocoon and Gran Pulse rushed back. As did the realization that he could never return to Luxerion if he wanted to live.
He tore off his robe and threw it high into the air. At a thought, a bolt of the magic he'd forgotten he had for nearly three hundred years lanced from his hand and incinerated the disgusting garment.
He would never forget again.