Chapter Two: Grief

"I always wanted to be the Guardian of the Seeress," Caius began. "So I had no difficulty finding the will to kill the person who had that task so that I could inherit it. I killed him and began to protect Yeul when she was only ten years old. The year was 600 AF. I was still so young. But no danger came close to hurting her. Not while I faithfully stood guard over her.

"Throughout the next five years, I saw her have several visions of the future. Each time she did, the time of recovery would take longer. I asked of her why she was plagued with this. It was then she explained: the visions would eventually kill her and another Seeress would rise to take her place. She was expendable. At the age of fifteen, my first Yeul passed. I was devastated. Another Yeul appeared soon enough. She was just an infant when I started guarding over her. She only lasted till she was twelve. The next Yeul lived until she was thirteen.

"Though I knew the fate of all Yeuls by then, my heart still longed to protect her. To put an end to her suffering somehow. The goddess Etro saw my heart's desire and granted it, in a twisted way. I was cursed with immortality and the power to travel across times. I became the Guardian of all Yeuls, not just the ones that lived in my natural lifetime. I was also grated the youthful body that I had when I started being a Guardian at the age of twenty-five."

Caius shifted his heavy gaze to the ground, the air of Academia silent around him and the whole group as he continued to speak with some sorrow and anger in his voice. "I travelled the timeline to be with different Yeuls, to try and find a way to save them. I became especially attached to the Yeul who lived at the end of days. By then I had my answer on how to save her: time needed to be destroyed. And, along with time, the heart of Etro needed to be released from my body. I found somebody who could do it."

"Me," Noel said in recognition.

Caius nodded faintly but continued onward. "Noel, the last one born, had the ability to save Yeul and do away with me. But he refused to. And so I left to go to Valhalla to get the task done myself. Whether I found the remaining force of the goddess and killed her or I was killed myself, Yeul would be free from her torment. But things did not go as planned in Valhalla. I returned to this realm and travelled with many Yeuls while attempting to destroy the future so that no visions could kill her. The opposition was too strong for me to reach that goal."

"You can't destroy time for the sake of one person, Caius," Snow inserted.

"She's not just one person," Caius said, irritated at Snow's lack of understanding. "Each Yeul was unique. Her own person."

"Still…None of the Yeuls wanted a world of destruction. You have to know that," Noel said more gently.

"Don't patronize me, Noel. I knew what Yeul wanted. What mattered more than anything else was her being alive."

"Not to her."

"No matter," he continued. "The opposition was too strong so I led Noel and Serah to Valhalla. If they stabbed the heart within me, it would free Etro's heart and help her regain her power. She's an evil goddess. She always has been."

"But she freed us from our crystal stasis," Hope said in confusion. "That was benevolent."

"Yes, and she also 'blessed' me with eternal life," Caius said sarcastically. "And she 'blessed' you with protecting a world that she planned on destroying. She has a cruel sense of humor, Etro."

"Caius is right."

Everyone looked over at the speaker in shock. "Lightning?"

"Etro 'blessed' Serah with her eyes," Lightning said bitterly without looking up from the ground. "She killed her…" Her eyes grew moist, though she didn't let her tears fall. She wouldn't with all these people around. The grieving process would wait until later, even if the people around her were in tune with her despair. Hope, who still was supporting her as she stood, held her a tad closer to his side as her arm was around his shoulders and his around her back.

"Light…"

"Let me guess, Caius," Lightning continued as she looked up to Caius. "You want revenge against Etro for Yeul's sake."

"Correct. Yeul was permanently taken out of the timeline when things were set 'right'. And like your Serah, there is no way to bring her back. Etro shall pay for taking away the one that I cared for."

"And you'll stop at nothing until you get to her."

"Correct again, Lightning."

Nobody said anything for a few moments after that. Clearly all of them were thinking. Caius was going to find his way to the evil goddess and kill her whether he had assistance or not. Or, whether they were all against him or not. They all knew that his dedication to Yeul was unwavering even in death. Nothing could get in his way or stop him from reaching his goal.

"…Light?" Hope asked. "What're you thinking?"

"For now, we have the same goal," she responded lowly as she kept her gaze on Caius. "I need an extra blade by my side, so it looks like we'll have to go together."

"Lightning, no!" Snow protested loudly. "Aren't you forgetting all that he's done?"

"How could I possibly forget!" Lightning practically shouted. Her temper took advantage of her for just a moment and terrified those around her. It terrified her as well, how strong her emotions were. But she couldn't back down now. She knew Caius tried to kill Serah in the past. She knew he tried to kill her and Noel as well. She just didn't care anymore. "This is the only way, Snow. The only way."

Everyone was wisely silent after that. Either they were too scared to cross Lightning or they recognized that she was about to leave on an extremely dangerous mission with the man who nearly killed her sister on multiple occasions. She was so angry about it herself, yet she had to push her anger aside. Killing Etro—getting revenge—would come first. Her emotions were too strong to face right now, so she'd put them on hold. It was running away, but she didn't care.

"…Stay here for a day or two to rest up first, okay, Light?" Hope requested. "You don't look good."

"Right," she agreed softly, looking down at the wound that Caius inflicted when they first arrived in this world. She'd grab a potion to heal that up and then rest, like Hope suggested. Time wasn't on their side but it didn't matter. Whether she would admit it or not, she needed a day or two with the family that she had left.

"Well alright then," Sazh said, motioning to Caius with his guns. "I trust that you'll play nice while you're here?"

"Yes."

That was all that needed to be said on the matter. Sazh put his guns back in their holsters and Snow took a few steps away. It was then that Caius had enough room to put his hefty sword onto his back again and regain all the composure that he lost from the sudden ambush of Lightning's friends. It wasn't like he lost his composure much anyway; he was as stoic as ever. On guard. It made sense, though; he turned the whole world against him since he tried to kill them all. Regardless, they all turned their backs to him and started towards the main building of Academia. If Caius said he would play nice, then he would. They believed that his goal was true even if he led them astray in the past. He didn't joke around when he came to Yeul.

No more words were spoken by any of them; there was nothing left to say. They were going to split paths again. A long time ago, Lightning learned on how to depend on these people before her. And now she was going on without them. It was back to independence again. No opening up, no friendship. She was going back to the hard soldier that she had been at the start of everything.

And it scared her how quickly she jumped back to that state.

They entered the building and took a door to the right, which led to a hall with multiple bedrooms, a kitchen, and bathrooms. Hope's suite, where he lived. And this was where everyone else now lived as well. "How long has it been since you returned?" Lightning eventually asked Noel as she entered one of the bedrooms and sat down on the bed. Hope slipped past Noel to go get a potion for her.

"Ten days," Noel declared with a nod. "It wasn't even ten minutes before…"

"Before the Chaos appeared," Lightning interrupted. She didn't want to hear what Noel had been about to say.

Thankfully, he caught onto that and nodded, though his expression was pained at the thought of Serah. "Yeah. Things have been in this state since then. Always dark outside, and Valhalla can be seen at a distance. Nobody's gone to check it out but Hope's studies show that Valhalla isn't actually in this realm yet. It's just a shadow of it."

"That's good," Lightning said. Hope reentered the room then and handed her a potion, which she drank without delay. Her nod to him should have been thanks enough. Hope knew how she was, after all. He knew that she wasn't the most talkative person in the world. Especially not now.

Silence fell over the room. The bedroom was a comfortable fit for three of them, so it was only them in the room. Snow, Sazh, and Dajh must have been in the kitchen making dinner. Or so she assumed. Was Snow eating these days? He looked smaller than he had before. He wasn't wearing his engagement necklace either. That was something that she would need to question him on later. He couldn't be out of love with Serah now that she was gone. She refused to believe that was even possible.

"Noel?" Hope said.

"Got it."

Though Lightning didn't understand that simple interaction, Noel and Hope had an understanding. Noel left the room to give Hope and Lightning the privacy that Hope had requested in that one word. He remained leaning against the wall in his Academy uniform, his soft eyes on the young woman who sat on the bed. "It's good to see that you made it out alive, Light," he said softly after a few moments.

"Yeah," she said quietly. That was the only response that she could come up with to that. But instead of leaving Hope hanging, she spoke of something else. "You've grown up well."

"Yeah, well," Hope started with a small smile, lifting a hand to his silver hair. "I met some people when I was fourteen who had a big influence on me. Someone tried showing me what path to take even when she wasn't sure what path was right. I'll never forget how she stayed by my side so I wasn't alone."

For the first time in a very long time, a faint smile tugged at Lightning's lips. "Well," she started softly. "You influenced me too. What you said made more sense than my own thoughts a lot of the time."

"Wish we could go on this journey together…There's a lot more to learn from each other," Hope commented as his smile turned sad.

Light's did the exact same as she nodded faintly. "Maybe when it's over, we can keep giving each other life-lessons," she said while being half-serious.

"One thing at a time, Light," Hope said. Those were nearly the same words that Lightning had said to Serah that last time that she saw her. If only I had given her a hug like I had wanted to. She lost the remainder of her family without even a proper farewell. It broke her heart to realize that Serah was truly gone, and she was at fault. But Etro was more at fault than she was. She'd pay that price.

As if sensing Lightning's thoughts, Hope spoke up again. "Would you like to see Serah?" he asked gently.

Though she wasn't sure what she would see, Lightning nodded faintly in silence. Hope pushed himself up off the wall and offered her a hand as he helped her to her feet. She was hardly an open book, but Hope was like her in a lot of ways. He was lost by grief in the past and she was lost by grief in the present. If there was anyone who understood how she felt, it was him.

Though they passed by the others on their way out, nobody followed them. Hope simply told them that they'd be back later. Most likely, they already knew where the two were setting off towards. They were the ones who truly knew Lightning and her love for her younger sister. They understood her need to grieve and gave her space…They were the best friends that she could have hoped for. They deserved life, not death. Joy, not sorrow. Yet sorrow was what they all faced now that Etro was trying to be the goddess of their realm.

There was a small garden that was hidden behind the large building. Hope even had to unlock the door with a special access code to be able to go out into that area. That showed even more that this was a sacred place that only a few could visit. It was a small area but had a few trees and flowers around to make it look lush. Under one of the trees, the ground wasn't grass; it was still dirt. It had been dug up and then covered again.

That was where Serah laid under a blanket of dirt.

The soldier walked forward a few steps, kneeling down by the end of the dirt. They must have given Serah a proper funeral, just the few of them that were around. Despite the chaos that the world was in, they took the time to give her this honor. "Thank you, Hope," Lightning said quietly as she gazed at the dirt in front of her. Thank you so much.

Hope hummed a simple response, standing at the other end of the area to give Lightning room. Though he wished he could leave her alone to grieve, he was afraid that if he took his eyes off her, she would disappear. He had to keep her safe while she was here. So he stood nearby as Lightning lowered her head and spoke her silent words of farewell to her sister.

I'm so sorry I brought you into this, Serah, she thought. This should have never been your burden to bear. After all that, you died seeing a horrible future…But all your work wasn't for nothing. I won't allow it to remain this way. I'll fight for all of our friends. I'll fight for Snow, and Noel, Hope, Sazh and Dajh. Somehow I'll set this right.

Her mind started to stray. What if forgiveness wasn't an option now? What if she didn't deserve forgiveness for what she did? Knowing Serah, she'd forgive her anyway. Serah was too kindhearted for her own good. She was the best person that Lightning knew. The world was certainly a worse place now that she was gone from it.

When Lightning no longer felt like sitting in front of Serah's grave, she rose to her feet. It wasn't a surprise to her that Hope was leaning against the building like he had been since they arrived. He hadn't left her alone for even a second. Just his silent presence was hugely comforting to Lightning. She nodded faintly and started walking towards him, showing that she was done grieving for now and she was ready to return to the suite.

Hope cut her off at the door. He stepped right in front of it and opened his arms. Before she could stop herself, she walked right into his embrace. Though her arms didn't wrap around him right away, that didn't stop him from holding onto her. This was like a time when he was fourteen; she had been so worried over him that she suddenly hugged him and he was too shocked to return it. "I know you're not really one for hugs," Hope finally said softly. "But this is one that needed to occur."

"For more reasons than one, right?" Lightning asked quietly as she caught onto his drift.

"I needed to know that you're really here with us," he responded in the same tone. "That we didn't lose the both of you…I've lost too many people, Light. I don't need you being added to the list."

"I can't guarantee what the outcome of all this will be, Hope…"

"I know. And I know that you don't necessarily want to live right now. When all you see is despair, it's easy to lose the will to live…"

You got that right, Light thought silently.

After a few moments, Hope picked up his former train of thought. "…I know right now hate and revenge will drive you. But remember to come back to us once that path doesn't work out anymore, alright?"

"Alright," she agreed quietly. She'd try her hardest, for Hope's sake. At that moment, she wrapped her arms around the young man that she thought of as a brother and allowed him to take care of her for a brief time.

They didn't linger outside too much longer. There was no need to. And besides, it was time for them to return to the others. In times like these, it wasn't good to be apart from the people that you loved. You never knew when they were going to be taken away from you. Although in her case, they all knew that she was going to leave them soon to go on her mission. Whether she came back to them alive, dead, or not at all was debatable. As Hope said, Lightning wasn't sure which she wanted.

The two of them reentered the suite and were not surprised when the others were still there. In the kitchen, everyone was already seated around the dinner with food before them. "Eat up, Light," Snow said, motioning to one of the plates. She grunted her response and sat down, though she didn't immediately begin eating. Instead, she played with her food. Everyone else pretended not to notice and ate their own food.

"So, what's the plan?" Sazh asked partway through the meal.

"You mean to fight Etro in this realm?" Hope inquired in return. "I don't know. We need to prevent her from killing a mass load of people. The most vulnerable point is the new Cocoon."

"So maybe we should evacuate," Snow suggested. "Spread people out all over Gran Pulse so that the goddess doesn't have one place where she can strike."

"That opens up the possibility for natural disasters and animal attacks though," Hope said as he shook his head. "We don't have the military to protect all the people, even now."

"It seems wiser to just hold down the fort in Bhunivelze," Noel input. "That way, our forces are strongest and Etro will have to work harder to bring us down. Who knows, maybe she'd need to come to this realm herself and make herself vulnerable."

"That's possible," Snow agreed. "Caius, what do you think?"

Everyone seemed shocked that Snow would even regard the person sitting at the far end of the rectangular table. "You truly want my input?" he asked after a moment. When Snow nodded, he spoke again. "The goddess will try to find a way to achieve her plans no matter what you prepare for. So you should choose setups where you are flexible to change if you must."

"Light? What do you think?" Sazh asked the former soldier.

"Sounds like the best course of action to me," she agreed after a moment. And it was. She was in the army before and a good strategist, so she knew a bad plan when she heard it. This wasn't bad. Etro wasn't an enemy that they could predict well. She most certainly had the upper hand in this war. Until they had a sure-fire way to defeat her, taking Caius's course of action was best.

"Alright," Hope said. "We should keep everyone in Bhunivelze, then. Having everyone spread out will make it harder to change our actions if we need to."

A murmur of agreement came from everyone at the table. They all continued with their meal, whether it was picking at their food or actually eating it. By this point, Lightning actually did begin eating even if she had no appetite. If she was leaving within the next day, she needed to be in good physical shape.

"We'll talk more about our plans tomorrow," Hope declared after a few minutes. "It's been an exhausting day for everyone." Nobody elaborated on that and Lightning didn't bother asking. She assumed that all the days were exhausting.

"Right you are," Sazh agreed as he stood up from his seat. "I gotta get the kid to bed. Goodnight kids." Dajh, who had been eating his meal quietly beside his father, got up and left the room along with him. It wasn't natural for Dajh to be so quiet. Sazh had told them all what a talkative, sweet boy he was in the past. But things were too serious for that and even that child realized it. What a sad reality this was.

"I'm off too," Snow said. He rose to his feet and gave Lightning a look. "Don't go running off in the middle of the night, hear me? You need rest."

"I hear you," Lightning mumbled.

Snow left the room and Hope followed his lead. Only Lightning, Noel, and Caius remained. This must have been weird for Caius, being with people who he challenged in the past and eating their food. At least he had Noel, if that was any consolation. He betrayed Noel as well; that couldn't be forgotten very easily.

"Lightning," Caius said after a few minutes of silence. "When will we depart?"

"We'll worry about that tomorrow," she declared. She was too exhausted to think about it. Caius didn't bother protesting. That, or he didn't have the chance to protest.

Lightning rose out of her seat and walked down the hall to the bedroom that Hope had directed her towards earlier, seeing that she had it to herself. That was both good and bad. Good because it meant she could let her guard down for a moment. Bad for the same reason. If she took off the mask now, she wasn't sure that she could wear it the same way again. She couldn't unleash her grief and then bottle it up again. Instead, she'd keep it contained. That way it was always under her control.

After about an hour of tossing and turning on the bed, she finally fell into a fitful slumber.

*…*…*…*…*…*…*

Well hello there readers! I was seriously shocked with how many reviews and subscriptions I got in the past week to this story. I was only expecting half the response I got! So, thank you guys for making me feel special. Just some quick notes for all of you then I'll get into the personal stuff.

I promise to continue the story. ;) I won't leave you guys hanging and I won't stop till it's done. I plan to update every week or two depending on how fast I can write the chapters. At this rate, it'll be about a week between chapters.

Reviews mean a lot to me, so PLEASE review. As I often say on my other stories, I give you guys chapters that are thousands of words long; the least you can do is give me a review. ):

If you like my writing style, check out my other stuff! I've written stuff about Final Fantasies, Kingdom Hearts, Chuck, etc.

Okay, onto the personal stuff.

Bluefairy10- Thanks! Be sure to tell your sister thanks from me; it's always nice to hear people are excited enough about my stories to recruit fans!

Oh…I thought I had more personal stuff that I needed to respond to. Ah well. (: If you're still reading this, you must be bored.

Peanut, signing out.