Lightning's Thoughts

On Snow

"What I wouldn't give for a taste of Serah's cooking right now," Snow muttered, eyeing up the suspicious-looking cooked rabbit. "Don't you agree, Sis?"

Before Lightning could yell at him for calling her "sis," Fang glared at him. "Eat or die. We don't have the luxury of a home-cooked meal. Or do you have a problem with my cooking?"

"It's not that at all!" Snow backtracked, feeling the woman's hot gaze on him. "I mean, I don't know how you did it back in your time, but things have . . . Evolved from this." He held up his stick of skewered and blackened meat. "and Serah's cooking! I mean wow!" He turned to Lightning. "You agree, don't you, Sis?"

"I'm not your sister," Lightning growled. She was certain he just called her that because he knew it pissed her off.

"Aw, come on Lightning, I thought you said you were cool with the wedding and all." He seemed as if he were almost hurt. Sometimes, or more accurately most of the time, he made her sick.

"I told you to not let her down," Lightning snapped, "That doesn't mean I'm 'cool with it.'" This was why she didn't like to get close to people. Tell them one thing and they think everything has changed.

But then, that was Snow. Chummy with everyone, loud, big, and mostly obnoxious. Yet she saw why her sister had fallen for him, and that in itself pissed her off more.

Sazh laughed at the two, flopping onto his back. "That'll be one fun wedding!" While his sarcastic comment seemed to break the tension and return the group to a normal conversation, Lightning continued to eye Snow from across the campfire.

He threw around the word "hero," but that was her job. She was supposed to be Serah's hero, she always had been. And him? He was just going to waltz in and take her sister from her? To take up the role as her knight-in-shining-armor? Lightning bit into her skewered rabbit meat, tearing a chunk off all the while glaring at him. She failed to notice the frightened look on his face.

But no, he didn't see it that way. He saw it as if he were joining her family, not taking Serah away. He just didn't get it. Maybe if he was a hero like he said he was he would have been there during those years when the two sisters struggled to survive on their own. Lightning knew her resentment was stupid and childish, but she was the head of her family and had lofty right to scrutinize her sister's future husband.

"So you made all of your clothing?" She vaguely heard Hope asking Vanille.

"We made everything we had," Vanille answered, "back then we . . . Uh, is something wrong, Lightning?"

"Nothing," Lightning muttered.

"That's a relief!" Snow exclaimed, "you were giving me that look, it was starting to freak me out."

"Look?" She asked dully, only half-interested.

"You know, that "I hate everything" look," Snow started, "though I guess it's not that different from your usual look. You can be pretty scary at times, Sis." She could practically feel her temple throbbing with a mixture of anger and frustration. "Would it kill you to smile?"

"There's nothing to smile about."

"There will be when we see Serah and Dajh again and we save Cocoon, so you have to get some practice in soon."

Vanille's face lit up. "Yes! We should all practice a smile!"

Lightning huffed. She glanced at Snow from the corner of her eye before shooting him a sarcastic half-smile. "Happy?" Before anyone could respond, she stood up. "Come on, we've rested long enough, let's get moving."

Despite how much he annoyed her, Lightning knew how much Snow cared for Serah. It came as a shock at first, to see how he had become, and yet not much of a surprise. Serah would only choose to be with someone who really cared about her and she cared for as well. In all honesty, Lightning had already started to consider Snow a part of the family. She just wasn't ready to let him know that yet.

A/N: And so chapter 2. Thanks for reading and reviewing, you awesome people you.

In other news, I'm thinking of writing a more serious, continuing-story, multi-chapter fanfiction for XIII/XIII-2. By "thinking of" I mean that I have four chapters outlined as well as studied the butt out of these two games. I won't start writing it until I finish outlining or finish my current continuing story, whichever comes first. Anyway, just letting you know. I'll have more details about it the closer I get to writing it.