Title: Roleplayer/Paradigm Heart
Series: Final Fantasy XIII
Rating: K+
By: Ssomsie
Summary: A analysis fic describing the change in Lightning's character from when she becomes a l'Cie to the final battle through the use of her three central paradigm roles. Lightning centric/spoilers
Pairings: Platonic Hope/Lightning, implied Serah/Snow and Fang/Vanille
A/N: At end this time. :)
.Medic.
She would never have though, even given a thousand years, that she, of all people, would be the "mother" of the group.
All Lightning has left is hope- she certainly no longer has time, after all. Her brand is progressing; the weeks, possibly days, maybe even hours or minutes, left before she becomes a Cie'th is upon her.
Although she never directly comforts Sazh or Vanille (As Vanille comforts Sazh, and Fang stays by Vanille's side and knows the girl far better than Lightning could ever pretend to.), the group's morale is dependant on Lightning- for although she does not comfort Sazh or Vanille, Snow, Hope, and Fang all depend on Lightning in some way or another.
When Snow looses himself occasionally, Lightning reminds him that they will see Serah again… after all, it is his optimism (that infuriated her at one time) that has shown her that not every ending has to be sad.
Hope is only fourteen years old. Even if he has grown up and "toughened up", he still needs a mother. They are l'Cie doomed to destroy the world and be enslaved to fal'Cie whims for eternity, or, worse yet, become Cie'th, a fate far worse than death. There is no way that anyone- Lightning included- could handle that by themselves. But, Hope is still so young that he has to have someone to look up towards.
Then there is Fang. Because they are so similar, there are times where- without saying words- they encourage each other. Because to their own respective groups, they are the "rocks". For the two older females, there is no choice but to be strong- the other four depend on them.
That is why when Orphan tortures Fang, Lightning refuses to say a word to Fang as she hands Fang her lance- a look is all that is needed; words are useless. Both women know the words that are being said; verbally saying it is unneeded overkill.
Once the final fight with Orphan begins, Fang charges towards Orphan; it is not hard to believe that she is the feared "Ragnarok" that almost destroyed Cocoon over five-hundred years ago, judging by the way that attacks. Viciously and rapidly her lance swings into Orphan. The cowardly-demonic fal'Cie laughs… it is, to be blunt, creepy; the laugh is just short of something that you would expect to hear from a possessed-baby- not a fal'Cie that controls the entire world of Cocoon.
Snow focuses on taking damage for everyone- he is, after all, not the strongest attacker anymore. Sazh works on pushing Orphan to its break-state and exploiting any weaknesses that he sees. Hope's role is to cast beneficial spell on the group of l'Cies; all six members are moving at rapid speeds thanks to his Haste spell, and he is working on applying every buffing spell that he knows- after all, there are fewer fights more important than this one; Vanille's job is the opposite of Hope's- she is using every spell she knows to disable Orphan in any way possible.
That leaves one person and one role- Lightning and healer.
Once upon a time, Lightning would have scoffed at being the team healer- even now, she is definitely not the most efficient at the role.
In the past, before she became a l'Cie (and even a little while after she was a l'Cie), she had to be the main melee fighter- up front and center. Now, however, Lightning has submitted to the fact that she is not the best at that role anymore- Fang surpasses her easily.
Next came the period of time that Lightning was the backup fighter- she specialized in finding the enemies' weaknesses and trying to push the enemies to their break state; that way, the main melee fighter (Usually Fang, as Lightning's ego prevents her from allowing just anyone to push her to secondary melee- they need to be better than Lightning if they wish to take primary melee from the strawberry-blonde. And there are very few better than Lightning.) could defeat the enemies easier.
Finally, Lightning decided to pick up the curative arts in order to help Hope's self-confidence and morale (in this time where morale was so hard to keep) by allowing him to teach her something. By no means is she anywhere near an expert, but, surprisingly, she is better than she would have ever thought.
(The memory of Hope teaching her Cure is something that neither party will ever forget- "No, Light! That'll cause someone to set themselves on fire!" or "Look, maybe I just can't do it… It sounded good, but, well… Hope, I can't do everything." "Light! You're not even trying!"
It had been a long process to learn that first Cure spell. The next spell, Esuna, was a little easier. Still felt like pulling teeth, but it was not quite as bad, at least. It has been an uphill battle from there, but, like when Lightning became the head of household once her parents died, or when she first enrolled in the Guardian Corps and was frequently mocked for both her age and gender, Lightning is nothing if not stubborn and resilient when she puts her mind to a task.)
Orphan is close to defeat- the world almost has its freedom.
However, they are becoming tired- this is the third consecutive fight. There has been no "breather". Orphan must sense that they are growing fatigued- it shoots some type of beam at Vanille, who screams in deafening pain.
"Vanille!" Fang yells; her attention is immediately drawn away from the fal'Cie and onto the younger girl.
"Fang- focus!" Lightning immediately begins casting repetitive Cure spells on the injured member of the team.
Once Fang turns her attention back to Orphan, Lightning feels a form of sympathy for the fal'Cie- even though she does not believe that the fal'Cie deserves her sympathy in the least. There is only one true "automatic berserk button" for Fang; it involves hurting Vanille in any possible way.
The final hit is thrown and- against any possible scenario that Lightning would have thought of in the beginning of her l'Cie journey- she is not the one to throw it. She is not even near the melee (respectively, anyways). No.
She is the healer the one who saves, not destroys.
A/N: It was so~o hard to not use the words "Ravager" or "Commando" during this entire thing ("Medic" was a little easier, and it works as long as we pretend that "Healer" isn't the Japanese version of "Medic" for the Paradigm system. XP), but I felt that I would lose something if I did use them, so I refrained. Also, yes, I whole-heartily acknowledge that in a fight (especially the final one against Orphan), you do not use Lightning as the only (or main) Medic; she just can't handle it. But, you can't have all six of them in the fight at once either, yet logically, it wouldn't make sense to have three stand off to the side. Therefore… Sh~hh. It'll be our little violating-gameplay-systematics secrets, m'kay? ;)
Also, the final sentence is also supposed parallel and contradict Lightning's statement to Hope about why she chose the name "Lightning" to replace "Claire". ^^ (Uh... probably should'a left that open, but well... he... XP)
I hope that everyone enjoyed reading! Thank you so much for your support and reviews!
~Ssomsie