A/N: Short Serah-centric one-shot. As always, any comments, critique, suggestions, etc., are greatly appreciated.
I also do not own Final Fantasy XIII.
Dawn
By: Saffire Persian
Serah was sure she was dreaming again.
This one was nothing like the nightmares that had dogged her sleep ever since she had come in contact with the fal'Cie in the Vestige. There was no destruction here, like in those dreams. No broken glass, no ravished homes, crooked and empty and silent as a grave. There weren't any corpses lining the streets, watching her with wide, unseeing eyes. The sea was as clear as it had always been, without even the faintest tint of red marring its glassy surface. Cocoon was still here. It hadn't crumbled to dust.
Serah's current dream was an empty one. She was on a beach—Bodhum's—that much she was sure of. In her eyes, the dream had replicated the town she loved perfectly, but that one simple truth was her one and only comfort. Everything else was gone, faded away into a sort of skeletal emptiness that could be felt as much as seen. The pathways crisscrossing the distant shoreline were vacant and devoid of life, while the keening gulls that should have been riding the crisp sea breeze had vanished as if they had never been. Even the burning light of the capital city of Eden had faded from the sky, dead.
All that surrounded Serah in her dreamscape was a faint, crystal breeze and the sound of the ocean lapping at the pristine shoreline near where she currently sat, hugging her knees and staring off into the distance.
Serah didn't know how long she had been here, here in this dreamworld that was everything just as much as it was nothing at all. Had it only been hours? Days? Years? It was hard to tell in a world that never seemed to change, in a place where no one else but her seemed to exist. The sky before her was fixed in a permanent pink-gold sunset fading into the sinking blue, and the rolling tide—the one and only thing that seemed to have any real source of life in it—changed little, seeming to follow the steady rhythm of her own heartbeat. It was like she was stuck, frozen in time.
Maybe this was the so-called gift of eternity Snow had tried to speak so optimistically of. A temporary eternity she would one day be released from.
Serah had wanted to believe him, have faith in his optimism that had had been such a gift to her in those last few days she had stored in her memory, but there were times when she couldn't help but give in to her fears, fears that not even Snow could allay completely. This was one those times. She hadn't wanted to become a monster, to become a Cie'th. She hadn't wanted to become a crystal either. Both options sounded too much like death, too much like being eternally alone.
Serah wished she were stronger than this, like Lightning. She should be thankful for the time she been able to experience. She should be thankful she had apparently done what she had needed to do, so now Lightning and Snow wouldn't have to risk themselves for her sake. But Serah couldn't help but miss everything that made up the world she treasured so much. Here, there were so many pieces of it missing.
After she had been branded by the Fal'cie, she had dreamed that she had destroyed Cocoon. Here, it felt like she had.
She missed the singing gulls, she missed the fireworks, she missed the people, all the friendships she had made throughout the years. Everyone had been so kind to her, and she hadn't yet been able to repay them properly. She missed the children that often played tag around the beach, sometimes flying kites or skipping about in the tide. She missed the bumbling antics of Team NORA, full of some of the nicest people she knew. At times like this, she also missed her parents—the father she could barely remember, and the mother who had never gotten the chance to watch her grow up. She missed Snow, too. She missed his smile and his immortal confidence. She wished he was here with her.
But most of all she missed Claire—she missed her sister, more than anyone else in the world. There was no expressing how thankful she was that she had been able to see Lightning (and Snow) one last time in the Vestige before everything had blazed white and faded into this.
She hoped, even through her heckling doubts, that she would be able to see her sister again. She had so much to tell her, and even more to apologize for. Serah wanted to tell Lightning everything. She wanted to tell her that she was sorry—sorry she had kept everything from her for so long. Sorry she couldn't have done something more. Sorry she had been so stupid. Sorry she had ruined her birthday.
But she couldn't.
She took a deep breath, trying to find some measure of peace, blinking away the tears that threatened to fall. She shook her head. She shouldn't be like this at all. She should at least try to believe in Lightning and Snow, just like she needed to believe that she would see them again. It had to be better than sitting here, acting as though they had died. Wherever they were, they were still alive. They were both too stubborn to die. Cocoon was still there, too. Had to be. That was what mattered. And believing that somehow, someway, things would turn out all right couldn't possibly hurt anyone. Not here.
She needed to be positive. No, she would be positive. Serah would see them again, no matter what.
All she had to do was stay and wait for the dawn.