Hey everybody! 2013 is just around the corner for me! :D Wherever you are have an awesome New Year!

0erbayunFang and Moons-Chan - Thanks for the reviews! And yeah... It's true, nothing is going quite right. Mwahaha... Just kidding. Sort of.

The next chapter is called Promised Eternity, because, well, it's about Caius and Light. And because that's the song I discovered while I was writing this. Not a bad choice of background music for reading it either... :3

I realized I used the same lyrics as last week, so I had to change them... I know I'm so absent-minded... But just go with it. Arigato!

Chapter Thirteen: Promised Eternity

Dropping your bombs now

On all we've built

How does it feel now to watch it burn, burn, burn?

Raise your weapons, raise your weapons and it's over

~Raise Your Weapon, Deadmau5

Lightning was perched on top of a structure in Valhalla, looking over the lifeless realm before her. She thought of Caius yet again and ended up biting her lip to try to forget the feeling of his mouth against hers. Things made more sense now, but in a way, that only further confused her.

The reasons he must have had for bringing her to Oerba, for pushing her away from the distortion.

Caius clearly had feelings for her. But how was that possible? They were destined to fight forever in Valhalla, and yet here she was sitting alone with her gunblade lying across her lap. Sitting alone with only memories of him in Oerba, with her emotions conflicting rather than their two blades.

She tilted her head back to look at the sky and her thoughts circled back to the Oerba incident. She couldn't allow herself to want this so much. If she was supposed to hate him with every cell in her body, then why couldn't she stop thinking about him? And if she reciprocated his feelings, then why did she still hold her grudge?

Lightning shook her head to clear it. She leaped down off her perch and began to wander along the shores of Valhalla. There was something that had very obviously changed since she had last been here – the number of temporal rifts had increased exponentially, springing up from the sands nearly everywhere she could look. Shaking her head, she realized that the only thing she could do was go through each one and fix it.

Was this a result of their expedition in Oerba, she wondered, or something completely different?

She decided that if it was directly related to the temporal rifts in Oerba, she would rather have Oerba erased than have the timeless Valhalla, the timeline's current anchor, erased. And with that thought, Lightning walked straight-on into the first distortion.

She reappeared mere seconds later. This rift had been caught early on, and hadn't done much damage, nor did it need much work to be repaired. Thinking that this must have been the case for the other rifts she faced, the warrior moved forward a few paces into the sea of rifts.

But of course, things were never that simple.

Right before her, another huge distortion exploded, throwing her backward. She hit the ground hard, the air knocked out of her lungs for a second, but pulled herself onto her feet quickly, trying to stay alert. Then the distortion changed direction like a wave. It began to draw everything toward it instead of pushing it back. Lightning drew her sword and planted it in the ground in an attempt not to be sucked into the black hole.

Her efforts, though, were in vain. The dark distortion stopped its pull on gravity for a few seconds, and then it blew everything to pieces.

But all Lightning witnessed was an ear-shattering blast and a complete flash of white.

Caius staggered mid-step for the thousandth time. He was praying that there really was no one around.

The truth was, he was in trouble, and even he had to realize that.

He'd successfully taken Lightning's sister Serah out of the picture with no issues, but after that was when the problems had begun. Caius had been on his way back to the gate when he'd felt a strange sensation, like his heart fluttering. A sign of weakness, of failure. He had stumbled then too, but refused to admit that anything was wrong.

The Heart of Chaos does not weaken.

Still, trying to leave Oerba was starting to seem nearly impossible. He could barely take ten steps without that feeling returning to him again. Darkness had crept around the edges of his vision multiple times, and he had fought it every one of those times, not allowing himself to give in.

Finally, the gate was in sight. Disregarding the strange sensation he had, Caius broke into a run. He was suddenly determined to make it out with no more incidents.

But just inches before the gate, the lightheadedness came back to him again, and he was forced to stop, sinking to his knees just in front of it. He took a deep breath to steady himself. Slightly annoyed, he reached out to enable himself to enter the flow of time and return to Valhalla.

Caius wondered what could be causing the sensation he felt.

Should this heart stop beating, the goddess will die once again.

He came to an unwanted realization: if Etro died, he would die. If he died, Etro would die. And he was supposed to be the cause of Etro's death, not vice versa.

But before he could finish that thought, he entered Valhalla and his mind went blank. Shattered stone and glass lay everywhere, surrounding him at every step. But that wasn't what surprised him. The thing that caught him off guard was the fact that Lightning was lying listlessly on the shore, in the middle of all of this. Her blade had slipped from her hand, and her eyes were closed as though she was merely asleep.

Caius went to her and knelt beside her, watching, wondering if she'd open her eyes and threaten to kill him. But she did nothing of the sort.

His hand seemed to move of its own accord, brushing her face. He found his fingers touching her lips lightly, pushing loose strands of hair away from her forehead. Then, quickly, he drew back. He knew he would be going too far if he thought he could change things between them. It was one thing to acknowledge feelings; it was another to act on them. He knew the right thing to do would be to kill her now.

But he had no will to even reach for his blade.

Caius stood, turning from her, and sighed. He wanted to walk away right then, to pretend nothing had ever happened, but something kept him from doing so. He wanted to know what exactly had gone on here.

And so he sat and stretched out his legs next to Lightning's unmoving form, vowing to keep watch until he knew for sure it was over.

When Caius opened his eyes, he realized he'd fallen asleep, sitting up no less. Relief flooded him as he realized no one was there. Lightning, meanwhile, still lay unconscious a few feet away. He couldn't fight the urge to reach over and put his hand over hers.

He was dragged back into reality with a jolt when she opened her eyes and glared tiredly up at him.

"What are you…? What are you doing here?" Lightning's voice was weak, like she could barely say the words, didn't have the energy to rekindle her grudge against him. But when she saw his hand resting on top of her own, she jerked back.

"You caused that distortion, didn't you? So you could take advantage of me?" Just like that her eyes were aflame with hatred. "What's your problem? Why can't you just—" She broke off, shaking her head.

"Distortion?" he questioned. "What do you mean?"

She flung a hand out into the air. "There was a distortion that tore up half the shore here. Don't act like you don't know."

"I did not cause the distortion. I was keeping watch until you came to." Caius watched her as he explained, though her eyes never met his.

Lightning's gaze snapped to him suddenly, suspicion and anger mixed with something else showing in her eyes. Then she looked away with a sigh.

"Th…Thank you," she said simply.

She stood up and walked a few paces away, facing the fractured and stony structures that lined the shore. After a minute, she spoke quietly. "I'll spend the rest of my time here, won't I," she ventured. "Fixing the timeline."

"Yes." Caius's answer was only half aware, not really looking any more into it than he had to. He watched her for a moment, but when he saw her back was still turned, he turned and walked across the sands, in the direction of another gate.

Lightning found herself short of breath at the thought of staying alone in Valhalla without him, a thought she knew shouldn't have ever crossed her mind. "Wait," she called.

He looked back, his expression devoid of emotion as usual. But she kept on. "Caius," she whispered. "Please. Stay here."

There was a second of agonizing silence.

Finally he nodded. He was looking into her eyes, and she into his. The frozen seconds in between were full of unnecessary thoughts that were quickly chased away.

Caius took a step forward, and when he leaned down to her their lips met again. This time neither of them pulled away for a long time.

When they finally drew back from each other, Lightning's thoughts came back to her. She realized that what she'd been avoiding all this time had finally happened, but now she hardly had any reason to avoid it. Whatever events had kept them from doing this had been erased from the timeline.

"Caius," Lightning said after a lengthy silence, "thank you."

"What?" he asked.

But she was already on her way to the next group of rifts, whatever they might be. Caius hurried after her, contemplating her words.