Lightning was once again summoned to Etro's empty throne. Even though she knew she wasn't really in the Void Beyond, that this was just another vision created by Etro, she felt uneasy. The dream was much more intense than the last time. The scenery was more detailed, the air was colder, and the echoes of her steps were louder. Everything was frighteningly real. She kneeled in front of the throne, her Valkyrie armor clinking softly against the cold marble floor.
"Claire Farron, leader of the six, warrior of Valhalla, champion of mine," a thousand voices chanted. Lightning immediately recognized the polyphonic cacophony as the voice of a fal'Cie.
"Etro…?" she whispered, still kneeling in front of the goddess' throne.
"Many names I've borne; though Etro is the name time has not yet washed away."
"You can speak?" Lightning asked, perplexed and a little ticked off. Having an actual audible conversation was a lot less painful than Etro's old image bombing method.
"From the mind of yours I've learned the tongue of mankind," the thousand voices of Etro exclaimed proudly.
"But how? I don't talk like that."
"The art of speaking you possess. The art of exerting it you neglect."
"And the art of grammar seems completely lost on you," Lightning snapped. She couldn't shake the feeling that something was terribly wrong. "What do you want? Why am I here?"
"I want you to slay Caius Ballad, wielder of chaos, former guardian of mine…"
"I know that already," Lightning interrupted. "I remember your commands. I remember the course of actions." But I'm forgetting something else. Something important. "I'm working on it, okay?" How did I even get here? Am I unconscious?
"Earnestly tried, you did. Failed me you did withal. In an unfair game he bested you, wielding chaos to ensure his victory."
Oh, crap. Lightning's memories came back all at once. Her hand automatically went up to her temples, touching the place where Caius' sword had hit her. In this dream world, her head was still intact. But it the real world…
"Am I dead?"
"Almost."
"Crap. Crap crap crap." Lightning stood up and started pacing in front of the throne. "I have to wake up. I have to… Hope. Oh no, Hope." Lightning swore, uttering a word she hadn't used since she became Serah's legal guardian. The one that begins with an 'f', ends with an 'uck' and isn't 'firetruck'. "Etro, you have to let me wake up. Right now."
"In time, I will. First, a gift I have for you."
A low-pitched humming echoed through the room. As the sound increased in strength, a red hot pain pierced Lightning's chest. She recognized the pain all too well. The goddess was branding her skin with the mark that would once again make her a fal'Cie slave, a l'Cie.
"No!" Lightning yelled as the burning pain intensified. The humming sound was reaching deafening magnitudes, and the whole room was vibrating. "I don't want this, not again, please don't do this to me…"
The goddess didn't listen. Lightning fell to her knees as an explosion of power detonated in her chest. Etro's gift rushed through her veins, filling her body with strength and magic, making her more powerful than any human was ever supposed to be. The pain was excruciating.
"Good luck I wish to you, Claire Farron, leader of the six, warrior of Valhalla, champion of mine… Savior of souls."
My resume is getting ridiculous, Lightning thought as she slowly faded away from Etro's dream world and slipped back into reality.

"Fix her!" Hope roared at the worn-out nurse. "You have to fix her!" Lightning's body was rapidly growing colder in his arms, her lips turning blue. Hope had never been so afraid in his whole life.
"Of course, of course, a crash-cart and a stretcher will be here in a second. Calm down, okay?" The nurse was nervously fidgeting with her long blonde hair.
"Calm down?!" Hope bellowed. The nurse indiscreetly took a step back. "Have you seen her? Huh? Have you seen her head? Do you really think this is a situation where I could just calm down?"
Suddenly, Lightning's body started glowing, as if an inner light was erupting through her skin. Hope and the nurse looked at each other in complete awe.
"Does that usually happen? I mean, does she do that a lot?" the poor nurse asked nervously. Hope just glared at her, and then shifted his focus back to Lightning.
"Light? What's happening? Light!"
Lightning's body started levitating. Hope tried to hold her back, unsuccessfully. The glow increased as her body floated upwards towards the ceiling.
"She… she doesn't usually do that either, I presume?" The nurse looked like she was about to pass out. Hope couldn't blame her. He could see Lightning's wounds healing, the dried blood vaporizing from her skin. Her hair was dancing around her face as if touched by an invisible wind. Color returned to her skin, giving her cheeks a faint blush, and her lips regained their usual rosy shade.
A crowd consisting of various doctors and nurses had joined them, and was now staring in wonder at the sight before them. She looks like an angel, Hope thought, stunned by the mind-numbingly beautiful vision. No, not an angel. A goddess.
Lightning opened her eyes, a loud gasp escaping from her lips. Her eyes widened at the sight of the crowd below her.
"Hope?" she said with a trembling voice, sounding like a lost child.
"It's okay, Light, I'm here."
Lightning's eyes followed the sound of his voice, and he could see her body relax in the air when she caught sight of him.
"Hope," she said again, considerably calmer. "Hope." It was like the mere sound of his name was calming her down.
"I'm here." His fear was finally dying down, and the relief was overwhelming. She called my name. As long as she was alive, everything was going to be alright. I was her first waking thought. Lightning gave him a small smile, a smile which he immediately returned. She called my name.
The power causing Lightning's levitation suddenly disappeared, dropping her unceremoniously through the air. When Hope caught her in his arms again, her skin had almost stopped glowing. She wrapped her arms around his neck and took a deep breath through her nose, inhaling his scent. Hope carefully lowered her feet to the ground, but kept an arm around her waist.
"I thought I'd lost you," he whispered as he brushed a few stray strands of hair from her forehead, tucking them in behind her ear. "What on Pulse just happened?"
Lightning took a step back, forcing Hope to reluctantly release her from his embrace. Slightly blushing, she pulled down the zipper of her brown turtleneck.
"I'm not… I'm not human anymore. Etro made me l'Cie again," Lightning said quietly, showing him the mark on her chest. Etro's mark was different from the mark the Pulse fal'Cie had branded her with, looking a bit like two lightning bolts winded around each other in a vaguely triangular shape. Had it not been a symbol of slavery it would have been quite beautiful, the black tattoo contrasting attractively against Lightning's pale chest. Lightning's chest…
"What do you think?" Lightning's words brought him back to reality. She was looking at him expectantly.
That your breasts are magnificent, Hope thought. "About what?" he said instead.
"About the l'Cie thing?"
That Etro's a bitch, he almost said, but then remembered Lightning's aversion to swearing. "I think Etro's getting desperate," he said instead. "I don't think she'd ever let you turn into a cie'th, though. We already know she has the ability to make l'Cie human again. I think you'll be fine."
"You do?" Lightning looked at him, her beautiful blue eyes filled with complete trust. Hope was once again struck by how young she looked with her soldier façade turned off.
"I really do," he said, and pulled her in for a kiss.
The kiss was just as magical as the last one, and this time Lightning answered it immediately. Hope wrapped his arms around her again. Something inside him felt permanently wrong when she wasn't in his arms. It was like the world wasn't complete unless he had her body pressed against his.
They were interrupted by someone clapping his or her hands. Hope looked up, slightly annoyed. Another pair of hands joined in, and soon the clapping had evolved into a full round of applauds.
"I have no idea what's happening, but it's beautiful," a tearful doctor said.
"Yeah, did you see him catch her? So romantic!" another doctor chimed in.
"Yes, but isn't she a little young for him?" said a third doctor.
"Why is no one freaking out about the girl healing a major head trauma in less than a minute while hovering like some sort of fluorescent helicopter?" muttered the poor, poor nurse under her breath.
Lightning let out a snorting laughter and gave their audience a little wave. She then sighed, resting her head against Hope's chest. "We have to fight Caius again."
"Soon." He wasn't ready to let her go yet. He suspected he'd never be ready to let her go. "Did you hear that, by the way? Apparently, you're a little young for me."
"The fact that you're physically older than me is still weird," Lightning admitted. She glanced up at him, looking a little embarrassed. "Puberty really did a great job on you, though."
"Oh, really?" Hope said with a teasing grin. "Does Lightning Farron perhaps think I'm handsome?"
Lightning's cheeks took on a light shade of pink. Her cuteness made him grin even wider. How can a thousand-year-old be so damn adorable?
"Maybe. Stop looking so smug." She reached up and kissed him, as if to erase his smugness with her lips. She succeeded.
Then, they were once again interrupted, but this time not by an innocent round of applauds. This time, they were interrupted by an enormous explosion.

When Lightning's eyes finally decided to work again, the room was no longer a room. The walls had collapsed and the roof had fallen in, so the room was more like a big heap of wood, plastic and metal than an actual building. On top of her was Hope, who'd pushed her down on the ground and protected her from flying debris with his body.
"Light? Are you okay?" Hope asked.
"I'm fine, thanks to you… Hope, you're bleeding." New stains of blood covered his no longer white shirt, and those stains were rapidly growing bigger. Not until then did she see the big chunk of wood, most likely a segment of the broken ceiling, resting on his back. It had to weigh at least a ton, and Hope was holding up all of it.
"When I said I could bench press a car, I might have exaggerated a little," he said with a strained voice. "I did it once. And it was just a micro car. One of those silly ones without a back seat."
"Crap… It's okay, Hope, I've got this. Don't move, okay?" Lightning turned her focus inwards, searching for her magic. She could feel it pulsating from her brand, more powerful than it had ever been before. She was more powerful than she'd ever been before.
"Ruinga!" she yelled, aiming her power at the wood, turning it to dust. Hope took a deep breath of relief and rolled over on his side. Lightning could now see where all the blood came from; a large shard of glass was stuck between his shoulder blades. The chunk of wood had pushed it deep into his body, creating a really nasty looking wound. Lightning once again said the word that rhymes with firetruck.
"I'm going to have to pull the shard out before I can start the healing, okay?" Lightning tried to sound calm, which would have been easier if she weren't moments away from a panic attack. She mustered her strength, mentally and physically, and pulled out the shard. Blood immediately started gushing from the gaping wound, but Lightning was already gathering her magic, getting ready for healing. She put her hands on the wound, and tried to ignore Hope's muffled groan of pain.
"Cure," she said, putting as much force behind the words as she possibly could, "cure, cure, cure." She waited a few moments, letting the magic reload, and then continued. Over and over she repeated the words, letting her magic heal all of Hope's wounds.
"Light? You have to stop, now. There's nothing left to heal." Hope sat up and grabbed her hands, removing them from his back. "There are others here. Civilians. They need you."
The word 'civilians' made Lightning think rationally again. She changed her mantra from cure to curasa, a spell that would heal everyone in close proximity. It was a way more draining spell, especially when used on so many people at once, but it was also a way more efficient spell than cure. Hope, powered up with Lightning's magic, was carefully searching the ruins for survivors. Some people he could save just by moving the debris trapping them. Others were already long gone.
Lightning could see a hand sticking out from under a pile of bricks a few meters away from her. She took a short break from the healing, and slowly limped towards it. The curasa spell was wearing her out.
She kneeled next to the pile of bricks and grabbed the hand, trying to find a pulse. The hand was cold and lifeless. Lightning knew she shouldn't waste power on the dead, but she just couldn't leave a person beneath a pile of bricks. She just couldn't.
After two rounds of ruinga, the bricks were finally gone, revealing the body that had been buried beneath them. Lightning vaguely recognized the young blonde girl as one of the nurses, the one who looked like she never had time to eat or sleep. She carefully closed the girl's unseeing eyes. At least you get to rest now, Lightning thought, heart aching.
"Why?" she asked herself out loud, a tear escaping from her eyes. "Why would anyone do this?"
"Because you wouldn't come out yourself," a familiar baritone uttered. A purple-haired figure landed next to her. Purple?
The man next to her no longer looked like Noel, but he didn't exactly look like Caius either. His hair and eyes were violet, and he was almost back at his original height, but he still had Noel's more slender facial structure and fine-boned body. The mixture was grotesque.
"No more games, my dear. Do not drag others onto the path of your own unavoidable fate." He grabbed a handful of Lightning's hair, forcefully dragging her up to a standing position.
"I have finally gathered enough chaos from the artefacts of this world to open a gate to the Void. Can you hear me, Etro? Do you know your end is near?" He pulled her up even higher, forcing her to stand on her tip-toes. Lightning tried to find the power she'd used before, the power to turn l'Cie into crystal, but she was all dried up. Now, when she was finally close enough to him to carry out Etro's plan, she didn't have a single drop of magic left. Oh, the irony.
"Perhaps I really should kill you first, warrior goddess. You have been quite a nuisance." Caius paused for a moment, lost in his own thoughts. Then, he chuckled, shaking his head. "But what would be the fun in that? Come on, kitten, let us leave. This is not the proper place for a portal." He released his grip on her hair and aimed for her waist instead, planning to throw her over his shoulder, but Lightning was faster. She was always faster.
She hurried backwards, until her back hit one of the building's few remaining walls. Caius smirked, walking slowly through the debris towards her.
"You have already lost, yet still you play games. You truly are an endless resource of amusement."
"You know what else is amusing?" Lightning said as Caius reached out to grab her again, believing he had her cornered.
"I'm a l'Cie now, too." Lightning gave Caius a sweet little smile, and then smashed his face into the wall.

Hello, dear readers! Your friendly neighborhood writer Cia speaking. Damn, what a hiatus. I'm terribly sorry, dear readers. It makes me really happy that you care so much about this story, though. I never saw that coming.
So, this chapter got way fluffier than I originally intended it to be. This is becoming a serious problem (no it's not, I love fluff).
I really hope I haven't contradicted myself with the swearing thing, by the way. It's been a head canon for me for quite some time that Lightning doesn't swear, but since I on the other hand swear like an angry sailor I might have messed up somewhere. If that's the case, dear readers, I sincerely apologize. Feel free to point it out to me.
Reviews make me happy. And you all want a happy neighborhood writer, right?
Love,
Cia